Bird eat bird

Today is Haloscan's big deadline. Either start paying for their service or get dumped. Screw them. I have been wanting to switch back to the Blogger commenting system for years but, oh no, Haloscan didn't offer that option. Undoubtedly, part of plumping up the user base in hopes of getting acquired and/or eventually discontinuing the free service. Yes, I could have reverted to Blogger's default widget template at any time thereby (probably) deleting them in the process but didn't want to make work for myself so good. Delete me. Adiós assholes.

And while I am on the subject of good sites gone bad, WTF Technorati? Seems Corporate also decided to castrate this once saavy interconnected site and turn it into a top-down-one-way-maze leading to the inevitable craphole advertisement. Fuck you too, Technorati.

Okay then.

And while I am on the subject of predator and prey, a small hawk recently claimed the Bird Park as his personal hunting ground. He is eating the little birds and leaving disturbing feather piles in and under bushes and trailing across the yard in tell tale testimony to successful captures. Just yesterday he swooped by my window after some poor fellow who probably did not get away. The Bird Park is on the brink of becoming yet another Nevada ghost town. The magpies still come about 7 am but they just grab their peanuts and go and though, at the moment, the little birds are braving death for a quick breakfast, they don't stay long. I really miss watching them throughout the day. Now, more often than not, I just look out at the fence and ugly roof line of the neighbor's horrible house. No movement, no life just another dead suburban moonscape. While I really resent corporations who suck the life out of things, I don't blame the hawk. He is not obsessed by profit and control but, between him and the fat neighborhood cats who saunter by after breakfast to play lion, there is not much joy in the Park. It's sad. I'm wondering if the magpies might chase the hawk away or at least challenge his hold on the place. They'd hang around if I feed them more. They scream at the cats. Of course, they also eat finches. It is a bird eat bird world.

The pigeons don't bother anybody but the neighbor on the other side of the fence but he died last month so that's something anyway. His widow doesn't give a crap about the outdoors. And the quail keep to themselves and are very fun to watch. They too are plagued by hunters, mostly the babies, but that's in the spring. Talk about sad. I get instantly attached to the tiny fluff ball babies following their parents around like a little train winding around curves after the engine. Last year the hunters gobbled them up like popcorn. What are ya gonna do? We are all food for somebody no matter how I wish it were NIMBY.