>Subject: Are you a Birder?
>
>
>Answering "yes" to any of the following questions qualifies you as a
> true birder.
>
>>> >1. Someone yells DUCK! and you look up and shout "Where"?
>
>>> >2. You criticize television programs and commercials that depict a
>>> bald eagle but play a red-tailed hawk call.
>
>>> >3. One of your kids is named, Kestrel, Merlin, Peregrine or Phoebe.
>
>>> >4. Your spouse says, "It's either me or the birds," and you have to
>>> think about it.
>
>>> >5. You pay a neighbour's kid $20 to play dead in a field while you
>>> search the sky for vultures.
>
>>> >6. You try to talk your kid into going to college in Belize so that
>>> you have an excuse to go and bird there.
>
> >> >7. A machine at work is making a squeaking noise and you describe it
>>> to maintenance as sounding like a black-and-white warbler.
>
>>> >8. The first time you meet your future in-laws, you demonstrate the
>>> >courtship dance of the woodcock, complete with sound effects.
>
>>> >9. You spend only 15 minutes preparing dinner for your family but 30
>>> >minutes mixing and placing seed for you birds.
>
> >> >10. You wake your spouse at 5:30 a.m. and exclaim, "Say, is
>that a nuthatch
> >> >I'm hearing outside the window?"
>
>>> >11. You identify calls of birds in the soundtracks of television
>>shows and movies.
>
>>> >12. You lose friends and perhaps even your spouse, from fighting
>>over the pronunciation of the word "pileated".
>
>>> >13. You know what birds USED to be called before the English name
>>was changed, so you use them all in, "Look, there's a common egret,
>>> American egret, great egret, or whatever they're calling it these days."
>
>>> >14. You spend most of the day on Saturday, after getting up at 4
> >a.m., making a five-hour drive in near zero degree weather in snow and
> >sleet with wet feet and inadequate clothing while looking for an
>unusual bird,
> >and then exclaim "YES!" with a big grin on Monday morning when someone
>at work asks you if you had a good weekend.
>
> >> >15. You are the only one in the room who doesn't think "prairie
> >> chicken" and "yellow-bellied sapsucker" are funny.
>
> >> >16. The nastiest works in your vocabulary come out exclusively while
> >> birding.
>
> >> >17. In your worst nightmare, "Private - Not Trespassing" signs
> >circle around your head.
>
> >> >18. When it come to chasing after birds, you sometimes, in
>fact regularly,
> >> >walk the very thin line between courage and plain ol'stupidity.
>
> >> >19. You enjoy living, love your family and friends, have life
> >> insurance and worry about your health - but routinely attempt
>suicide every
> >time you get behind the wheel of a car because you're always
>looking for birds
>and never at the road.
>
> >> >20. You fail to convince the retarded judge that "Because that
> >> (&*^%&^% scared away my possible ivory-billed woodpecker!!!" is an
>acceptable excuse for manslaughter.
>
> >> >21. There are more miles on your factory-new, one week old car than
> >> >feathers on a flock of whistling swans.
>
> >> >22. No, you don't think all those little brown birds in the field
> >> guide look the same.
>
> >> >23. Every last gift or card you receive has a bird somewhere on it.
>
> >> >24. Getting out of bed fully energized at 4 a.m. is perfectly fine
> >for birding but for any other reason, its pure # at (&$.
>
> >> >25. You know more about optics than a lenscrafter, more about
> >driving than a trucker and more Latin than the Pope.

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