Bird In The House

Only day three of the school holidays and already I'm not sure I can take it. Despite several trips to the barn to do chores and feed lambs, an expensive  trip to the book store, another to McDonald's and the ice cream store, I am still battling a chorus of the "I'm boreds".  I can't even take off and leave the little bastards stranded, because Lindsay has my van.

This morning was a little livelier, when I hear a crash in the chimney and a starling flies out into the family room, where I am working. I start screeching a warning "Bird in the house, BIRD IN THE HOUSE" , but no one comes running. Meanwhile the poor bird is hitting windows left, right and centre, while I rush around opening doors and yelling for the kids.  I found out afterwards, they are all ignoring me because they think they are in trouble.  How "Bird in the house" translates to "You're in trouble" is beyond me. Not to mention, if they are in trouble, ignoring me is guaranteed not to improve their situation.

Finally Grady ventures downstairs only to have the bird dive bomb his head as it flies upstairs.  He screams "Holy Crap!" and hits the deck, while I'm yelling at him to open the back door.  By the time I make it upstairs the girls have joined the fray and Sid, as useful as ever is calling out directions, but the bird can fly faster than she can speak, so by the time we get to the last known position, the bird has already moved on. I finally corner it in the window in the sun-room and with ninja like stealth I balance unsteadily between the settee and DVD stand and pounce.  Grady is in the background, yelling "Don't hurt the bird, don't hurt the bird". Sidney is screaming and the bog is barking. Lindsay has only just got up, so she isn't doing much of anything.  The only difference between me and the trapped bird is that he will soon be free! 

The last time this happened, I made the mistake of hesitating while the kids took a closer look at the bird and it took that opportunity to escape. I am wiser this time, and despite entreaties to the contrary, as soon as I got that bird in my hand, I headed straight for the back door and let it go.  All this on only one cup of coffee !