Skunked By Grouse: Motorcycle Trip: Part 7: Microbird And Explosionbird

That night, after listening to the most beautiful music on earth, I slept like the dead. Such a relief! I needed it. So do you. None of us are living calm measured lives. It’s a goal I once pursued. I’ve done ok in that pursuit. But lately it’s nigh on unattainable. Sanity is hard during a time of universal madness.

I needed sleep because the 20th month of 2020 is on the edge. More edge than I’ve ever seen in my life. I’ve seen edge, I grew up in the cold war fer crissakes. I was told the Russkies could drop the bomb any minute and they certainly would. This would unleash global thermonuclear war; I believed it. Total obliteration from the sky; no place to run, nowhere to hide. Destruction so vast that no man would emerge unscathed and perhaps humanity itself would perish.

That was placed on my shoulders when I was still pedaling a Huffy! Such things should never be done to kids! Yet it happens. Adults force their insanity on the innocent. Children today wear masks to school… if there is school at all… lest they die of statistically unlikely yet socially overwrought pestilence. Poor bastards.

I remember the tension of my youth. Would I ever get to own a car. Would I die in a radioactive crater before I was old enough to get a license? Would Carter simply outlaw cars? (I am ever so grateful I’ve owned vehicles!)

Even so, that time of weirdness wasn’t us doing it to us. When our house was cold from expensive oil and there was a ribbon on a tree in my yard that was inexplicably for the benefit of hostages in Iran and I might get fried by what became the plot of a Terminator movie… it was still NOTHING compared to now. Mutually Assured Destruction was inflicted by far off geopolitical forces and complicated physics. Some boring dude on our black and white TV might blather on about terrible things during the 1970’s but it was distant. Our current collective social suicide is happening right in our own towns and lives. The next step in the cascading shitshow will unfold and I’m going to have to experience it personally. I will be forced to watch society stick it’s dick in yet another light socket. I’ll experience the predictable effects. As always, I will be told it’s either my fault or for my own good. We’ve spent years sitting in the dentist’s lobby, listening to the drill.

This is the first time in my life things have been this unfettered. The local HOA might Karen up with the harpies in the HR department, join forces with the Coke marketing department, and fuck my life for shits and giggles. For them it’s an amusing hobby; a side gig. My fate is affected by something that’s vaguely the same (to them) as their vegan diet.

Unfettered is the right descriptor. There’s no end game. When they run out of the unvaccinated they will not be happy. If, sooner or later, we’ve gone full Australia then what? Suppose the cops are running around with dart guns and a leer… administering medicine and bashing heads filled with improper political opinions… then what? When every unvaccinated bastard is put on a cattle car and that horrific evil action still doesn’t fill the hole in their soul… then what?

Who will be the next target? Humor? Fun? Knowledge? Males? Blue collar workers? The unwoke? The rich? Those who have knowledge that’s non-political?

Zimbabwe fucked with farmers until there was no food. Then they nuked their economy until I bought a 100 Trillion Dollar note as a novelty. We walk the same path. Our stores are already sparse compared to 2019. Introspection and caution aren’t slowing anyone down.

I wish I could ask of every politician in creation that simple question; “And then what?”

But this night… I got a break. I’d had a grand day of adventures. Sure, I’d failed to land a grouse but that’s ok. I’d been out with nature in God… and then had gorgeous music by a little fire. A pinprick of light in a dark empty universe. Everyone needs a good day sometimes.

The fire died down and I clambered into my beloved tent with its oversized cot. I practically collapsed into the soft sleeping bag.

Ah sleep; perchance to dream.

Not this time bubba! I was out like a light, slept like I’d been hit with an elephant tranquillizer, and woke wondering what planet I was on. No dreams that night.

Perfect!

The day dawned cold. I spent the morning crouched with a fire on one side of me and a Mr. Heater on the other. Took a bit to get the blood pumping.

I started thinking of a hot tent. I used to camp in the snow when I was young and stupid. Now I’m old and stupid. The romance of a woodstove in a tent appeals to me. Winter is coming. Is it time for a new form of adventure?

By the second cup of coffee I was fully warmed up and daydreaming about ice fishing. Optimism, submerged by events, was resurfacing. That’s why I went grouse hunting in the first place.

I rolled out on Honey Badger earlier than usual. Why not? I was more rested than usual.

I parked at a likely spot and started hiking. I spent most of the first part shedding warm gear. Dawn had been cold but the sun is mighty and soon it was hot out. I forgot all about ice shacks as the hunt progressed.

I’m not much of a bird hunter. I’ll admit that right up front. I spooked a few that thundered off long before I was in range. I had no opportunities even close to taking a shot.

I slowed to a crawl. If sauntering wasn’t going to do it, I would go full predator.

I inched down a trail like it was laden with landmines and rabid tigers. I watched every leaf, twig, and branch for long minutes before moving.

If you’ve ever done it you know it’s harder than it looks. It’s also exhausting!

It was also totally ineffective.

After a long time of this brutally difficult approach, I heard the tiniest hint of the possibility of a noise. I froze until it repeated.

I departed the trail at 90 degrees; inching into brush that would piss off a rabbit. I had no idea if it was a legit grouse or just a damn mouse. But I was trying hard to get the drop on it.

Whatever I was pursuing moved in front of me. Eventually, ten yards out, tangled in brush that would have deterred anyone sane… I saw it!

A bright little bird. Barely bigger than a humming bird. Just a few feet away. When perched, it looked like a hummingbird but when flying it didn’t have the special “humming bird” flight pattern.

Gosh it was cute!

Near silent and small as a wisp, it was flitting around checking twigs for food. It looked happy. I smiled broadly. I’d gone after this little nugget like he was a tiger. I’d well and truly snuck up on him. Not that he cared. My shotgun was hemmed in on both sides by brush, the barrel was inches from him. He could just about have fit down the barrel. The way he was dutifully exploring every twig I half expected him to try.

There was a time when I was a mediocre bird watcher, that time is gone. I’ve forgotten it all. I have no idea what species I was looking at; but I didn’t care. “Cute little happy bird” is just as accurate a description.

I dug out my camera and waited while the thing booted up. The bird, in no particular hurry, flitted away. All I got was a photo of some blurry twigs; and a happy memory. I stuffed the camera back in my pocket. I don’t need a photo to know what I saw.

Satisfied, I thrashed through the brush back to the trail. I emerged covered in scratches, leaves in my hair, twigs stuck to my jacket, and thoroughly baked from the sun. I was about to reach for my water bottle when my camera made some sore of electronic beep.

“That’s weird.” I thought. I reached for the camera and…

BOOM!

A grouse exploded from the brush. It had been practically at my feet! It gained altitude like a cruise missile, zipped behind a pine, and then blasted, head high, through the forest like a lightning strike. I had one hand in my pocket and absolutely no chance of even hoping to take a shot. I was caught totally unawares! The damn thing about gave me a heart attack!

In a flash, it was over. Birds infinity, Curmudgeon zero.

I know when I’m beat. I sat down on the trail right were I was. I sipped water and gave my heart a chance to come back from DEFCON 4.

I like to think the little microbird and the grouse were in cahoots. But I know it’s not true. The little simply lives in a dimension where I’m irrelevant and the gamebird simply outplayed me.

Damn birds.