I shit you not.

I like to start my day out with a cigarette. When I get to work I get the immediate issues out of the way and then I typically go out on the back porch and have a cigarette to unwind a bit. The road beside where I work is a 55 mph state highway so we'll sometimes find odd things that blew off the back of trucks or whatever. A couple weeks ago I found an empty bag that once contiained Purina Horse Chow. I shit you not. I wasn't even aware there was such a thing. But there was and on my morning constitutional I put the bag in our trash can no big deal.

Today was no exception to my desire to get out of doors and I ended up on the back porch about 8:30 this morning. In the yard I noticed something black that, through the fog, appeared to be some sort of lava rock or maybe black garbage bags. Having nothing better to do I cautiously approached to investigate. I'm a curious boy. Lo and behold it was a big bird. I'm not very good with bird taxonomy so I walked back to the office and recruited a few coworkers to help me identify the nature of the beast. They all agreed it was a buzzard and it was likely hit on the road while eating a rabbit. I didn't realize there was a rabbit on the road but hey, who am I to question.

I asked what we should do with it and among the things I heard was:
You can't take it to the landfill.
You'll get arrested if you are caught killing one.
Throw it over the bank.
Whether or not the 1st two were true, the 3rd one was a workable plan.

As it turns out it was an American Black Vulture and I find that they are covered under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. I didn't realize we were sitting down with birds and drawing up treaties in 1918. Wasn't that the year we all got the flu and died? And they recently linked that flu to the bird flu? I'm starting to get a bad feeling about these birds and all they entail. I shit you not.