Walked into the office this morning and there's this wild flutter and flurry of motion. Bird. Sparrow. Maybe trying to break into the dog biscuits. It's flapping and battering against the only window which isn't open. I set my computer backpack down and when I turn around to help it the bird is gone. Well, there was a window behind me, not open very far but more than enough for a panicked bird. I check the other offices just to be sure. No bird.

Go through the morning routine: brew up an espresso, eat a muffin, check email. It's when I head down the hall to the bathroom that I discover the bird hadn't left after all. Flutter, flutter, boink...up into the flourescent hall light fixture. You and I both know that there's no reasoning with a bird, even a calm one, but I insist on talking to this Sparrow to explain the various options for leaving the building.

"You could follow me back to my office, all of the windows are open now."

"Hey, there's the stairway, just head down that and I'll open the door."

"Stupid bird...get...out...of...the...light."

"Good, that's it, go away from the light and...SHOOO...yeah, into the stairwell."

"Wait, not UP the stairwell, down..."

Yes, for all our wonderful advances we sure haven't done much in figuring out how to talk to the other 95% of the earth's occupants. I mean, I would love to think that Zeke and I have rich verbal interactions, but the truth is closer to a parlor trick than anything else. Like the time I taught Zeke to count.

The sparrow flapped up to the third floor of the stairwell while I closed the exit doors. There's a window on the third floor, but it is unreachable without a ladder (or wings) and, get this, it is locked. I have a long pole and was hoping to bump the window open a bit, but no joy. Once bumped open I'm not sure how I would close it again so maybe that is why it is locked? The windows on all of the other floors are wide open but the bird isn't going for it. It flies from a door jam, slams into the closed window, flaps for a bit, back to the door jam, and so on.

I have the pole and am trying to use it to guide the bird downstairs to no avail. I'm starting to think that maybe I should just bonk it on the head. Transport the stunned body to a nice, grassy knoll where the bird will wake up thinking it was all some kind of screwy nightmare. Did that dog really have a racoon in its mouth? Why was the sun locked in boxes? Est-ce que les chiens peuvent sourire?

Finally it gets scared by the pole hovering above it and flies downstairs. That or we developed a temporary psychic link and it picked up on the head bonking thought. A little more clumsy bird herding on my part and it flies to freedom out a second floor window.

All of which reminds me of the birds you see flying around the rafters in warehouse stores like Home Depot. Do you think new employee's are told during initiation not to try to "save" the birds? And wear a hat, definitely wear a hat. I like hearing the chirps of birds while shopping. Real birds, not the ambient new age living audio tape birds that some stores play. In the warehouse you hear the birds chirp and the flutter of wings as they travel from handtool to plumbing department. Where are the wings in nature recordings? Nature tape birds sound like birds duct taped together in front of a studio mic.

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