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Under the Viaduct
To a man, ornithologists are tall, slender, and bearded so that they can stand motionless for hours, imitating kindly trees, as they watch for birds.
-- Gore Vidal
Friday, December 5, 1997
At three o'clock this afternoon, my manager poked his head throught the red velvet curtains (sounds like Victorian porn!) and asked me if I'd be able to get some specs (documents where product features are planned and specified) on the team website. Normally it wouldn't be a problem to stay late, but I'd already committed to a family thing. I felt bad, since I'd been wanting to get these on the site right away, but this one evening it just wasn't possible.
I went to my sister's house to take my nephew and his friend to The Paper Cat, a rubber stamp store in the Pioneer Square district of Seattle. The easiest place to park was under the viaduct (an elevated highway), which I didn't think anything of at that time. I parked there all the time during the Clarion West readings during the summer.
J---, his friend, and I walked the few blocks to the rubber stamp store, and picked out some good christmas rubber stamps. We also selected some child-safe stamp pads.
When we walked back to the car, I found that it was covered with bird droppings! The viaduct is a nightly roost for some migratory birds, far beyond the normal pigeons or grackles. This hadn't occurred during the summer because the days are longer then, and the birds stay awake later. The extra bad part was the lack of windshield wiper fluid, darn it!
The boys are really excited about the kids carnival project tomorrow.
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