trouble in paradise 2

 That didn't sound so bad at first, house sparrow has a kind of biblical ring, God noting the fall of the sparrow.  See I was thinking that was biblical, but a google tells me it comes from Shakespeare, still, small and drab and meek and mild, it sounds like the kind of bird that would warm His heart.

Not so much, small and drab, but meek and mild, hardly.  When I went to the google I learned that it is an evil bird hated by many, one of the first pages that showed up wanted to know if it was okay to kill sparrows, and the answer seemed to be, doesn't do any good, they just keep coming back.  Here in the states it is an invasive bird.  And it kills other birds.  Invades their nests, pecks their eggs and takes it over.

Maybe because bluebirds have a big lobby, it seems like they specifically kill bluebirds.  I asked directly if it killed finches and didn't get a direct answer.  

And besides all that I am not to crazy about the way they have taken over my balcony party, seemingly partying, hardy, all daylight long,  When I step out onto my balcony the finches were all like "Oh my goodness," and flying off, and these guys are more like what do you want fatso, and standing their ground until I walk right at them, and looking over my shoulder as they fly to the next balcony in a light Bavarian accent, I'll be back.

I could just stop putting food out, but I wonder what good that would do.  If they left that wouldn't mean the finches would necessarily return, and even if they did and I put out food again, wouldn't the sparrows come right back?

Maybe I could get used to them, if a bit too raucous for my delicate finch-honed fancy, they do seem merry enough.  And they are birds, and any birds are better than no birds.  And if they are invasive, well so are my beloved morning glories.  And it isn't like this is some pristine prairie, it's downtown Chicago for Chrissake. And if their ways seem brutal that is just the path mother nature made for them.  I guess I shall have to learn to live with them.

I'm glad that Old Dog's memories mesh so closely with mine.  I had thought that the guys somehow shoveled it out of the truck, but that laying it down at the curb makes more sense, but I don't remember coal dust on the curb, the kind of thing that interests a young lad.  And I remember the steam engines from my youth pushing around freight cars in the Grand Trunk yards by 55th and St Louis.  And those huge engines are something else, and now about those streamlined versions of the art deco era?

More beautiful engines were never made.