Quote:
Originally Posted by nomesque
*snort* Been to Australia lately? Spiders bigger than dinner plates, cockroaches slightly smaller, and cute furry critters which happily rip you apart despite being vegetarian.  |
Six
Noisy Miners and a
Butcherbird chased a
Leatherhead into an upstairs window yesterday. I had to go out onto the roof and retrieve him from the storm-gutter, where he was being inspected by the Miners and especially, repeatedly, by the Butcher. I remember as I was walking towards the mob, I felt like a teacher come around a corner behind the lunch sheds to see a group of kids watching a bully beat the crap out of the gawky kid. The Miners scattered from their egging-on of the Butcher, while the Butcher stood her
(*) ground, trying to bluff me, at least until I got close enough to call her bluff. It was actually only when I looked into the gutter I saw the Leatherhead. He
(*) wasn't well...but if he stayed there the mob would be back. I lifted him out onto my finger, let him settle a bit (he decided he wouldn't get off when I tried to put him down), and then moved him gently up and down through the air a bit until he got his wind back. Then he flew off over next door okay. Not your prettiest of birds, by popular standards, but he was an interesting looking thing (bald, black head, bump on top of beak, long, slender needle-like tongue darting out occasionally...lovely brown eyes).
Encounters with wildlife...always give a delectable frisson of reality to this stageplay.
Cheers,
Marc
(* The genders selected are arbitrary. I haven't checked the books for differences)