Books, Birds and Knights

(This picture is from here. It looks cute, doesn't it. Yeah, everything's cute until...)

Ramona, being the kind, good-hearted soul she is, offered to accompany me to the University to get my school textbooks for the summer semester.

Sister drives the two of us to my Grandparents house for breakfast. Everyone enjoys some sausages, eggs, toast and cantaloupe. Even the dogs. (Well, to be perfectly honest, I don’t enjoy the eggs because I don’t like eggs unless they’re scrambled.)

In a rare moment of generosity, I pay a dollar for Grandpa to park for half an hour, so he can spend two hundred dollars on textbooks. He didn’t even ask me too. It would have been one of those nice, selfless acts, but he was only there for me. So, it wasn’t. But I can pretend, right?

Anyways, as we walk to the University Bookstore, I see a crow. The crow lands on the edge of the building beside us. I react like I always do when a bird lands in my vicinity.

“Puhlease don’t poop on me!” I do a little duck and dance, putting Ramona and Grandpa (and an extra two feet) between me and the edge of the building, where the crow sits, being all birdlike.

Grandpa looks at me, lips turned downward in admonishment. He thinks I’m being my melodramatic, paranoid self. He thinks birds are nice. “What are you doing? Birds-“

And then I scream.

It’s the best, and only, warning I offer Ramona. A white missile of stench and nasty plummets towards her. Ramona’s head twists around.

If crows had brains bigger than peanuts, the crow would be snickering.

The poop splatters the side of Ramona’s hair, coating several strands. The missile’s momentum mixed with Ramona’s movement causes the poop to spread, peppering her black pea coat with white.

Ramona looks up (not the most intelligent move, just saying). “Ewww!”

Both she and Grandpa are shocked. No one moves for a second.

Grandpa, a knight in a weathered cowboy hat, comes to Ramona’s rescue, trying to wipe as much poop as he can off of her. It’s everywhere.

I stumble, tripping over my feet and then, I die. I die laughing; it’d be a good way to go, if I wasn’t apologizing too. For a fleeting moment, I feel guilty for laughing but it’s so funny the guilt evaporates faster than it came.

My Grandpa’s being very knightly: consoling Ramona and doing his best to clean her up. After a bit he says, “you should go to the bathroom.”

“Yeah, all I can smell is bird poo.”

I can’t catch my breath. Every breath is fleeting. My stomach hurts. I’m still apologizing.

Ramona leaves to clean herself up.

Grandpa looks at me, a small smile twisting his lips. “I’ve never seen a bird poop on someone before.”

Later, after I find my books, Ramona returns and Grandpa leaves us at the school, I say, “If I was you, I’d be mad at me for laughing so hard. It was just so funny because I told it not to poop on me and then it pooped on you.”

Ramona laughs a little (She put a lot of soap on her jacket so she’d smell that instead), “If I was you I’d be laughing at me too.”

“Except I’d probably be mad at you for laughing.”

That conversation highlights the differences between us nicely. She’s the good, light one. I’m the bad, dark one. (Actually I’m probably more [chaotic] neutral, but whatever.)

On our way home, sitting on a bus, both listening to our I-pods, I start laughing again.  The scene keeps replaying in my mind like a movie. I can’t stop it. Eventually she gets annoyed and kicks me.

I guess I deserve it.

I’m happy though; neither Grandpa nor Ramona can mock me for being paranoid anymore.

Paranoia saved my hair and clothes.

This morning also proves that the wicked really do prevail. At least for a while. (Ramona promised that one day a bird (or something worse) will get me).

Word Of The Day: Firmament - The heavens or the sky, regarded as a tangible thing.