Car Stories

A Bird of a Different Feather

City girl saves bird

Cale Yarborough Special

Katrina and I both love cars; all kinks of cars; four wheels and a motor and we love it. We both also love animals but  Katrina REALLY loves animals. I don’t care what it is she loves it. Sometimes I think when I return from an out of town trip I may find a donkey in my bed and some straw in the barn for me. Just kidding, Katrina would never let a donkey into her bed, they won’t lie still!

Just to show you how much she does love little critters let me tell you a story. You can go to our other Web Site Legendary Farms at http://www.legendaryfarms.com to read and see more about that part of our lives. We live on a farm with a bunch of animals and a couple of buildings for cars and a big barn for the horses and miniature donkeys. If you are wanting to read about cars hang on, I will get to the part about the GoodGuys car show but you have to put up with some animal stories first.

Anyway, Katrina was in the dog yard and found a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest and was about to be consumed by a snake that was slithering up to it. She scoped it up and brought it into the house and then began figuring out how to keep it alive. She decided to put it into a small cage, get some appropriate food and water and nurse it along until it got the rest of its feathers and could fly away.

Now, back to the cars; it was the 4th of July weekend and there was a GoodGuys car show in Nashville that we were registered for and did not want to miss. I had just gotten our Cale Yarborough Cyclone Spoiler out of the restoration shop and was anxious to show it off. It was the first big show it was going to attend. It still wasn’t 100% but I didn’t care, it was GoodGuys!

The decision was made that we would take the bird with us so Katrina could keep it nourished. Needless to say everyone who came by the car was curious about the little cage and what was inside so Katrina went through the story with each person about how she saved it from the snake. I never did get to talk cars with anyone very much. They all wanted to see the bird. I wanted to talk Mercury Spoillers and they wanted to talk birds. Let this be a lesson to all you gear heads, it is good to take the wife to a car show but its bad to take a cute little animal if you want to talk cars.

Have you ever tried to go to a car show with a car you want to sparkle? Have you ever had to carry a bird and cage in your car? It is a challenge; birds are messy.

The heat got hotter and hotter and we decided it would be best if we left and kept the baby bird cool; again the animal wins. So we left early, the car overheated and we had to get a tow home. The day was not the best.

The little bird seemed to enjoy the outing. It was doing much better and seemed to be bonding with its new adoptive mother. When we returned home it was decided that the best thing for the bird would be to put it in a bigger regular sized bird cage for the night. You should understand we have all different sizes of bird cages because Katrina has a flock of white and gray doves on the screened in porch! Sometimes they need to be separated and placed with different birds. We are always prepared for little scuffles between the love birds!

With the little bird securely at rest in his new home we went off to bed. The next morning Katrina was up early to make sure it got its breakfast. Within seconds I heard a scream that sent chills down my back and made me jump from bed and wish I kept a gun under my pillow. I was sure there was a one armed stranger at the door.

I was wrong. She rushed back into the bedroom and was sobbing. I asked if the bird was ok and she started cursing like I had never heard before. She said it was awful; it was terrible.

What?

The night before she had not hung the bird cage up, just left it sitting on the screened in porch floor; the snake returned! It had heard the baby bird chirping, slithered UNDER the porch door, between the bars in the cage and ate the baby. However, it now had a BIG bulge in its stomach and could not get back out between the bars. It was captured by its own hunger. It looked like a rope with a huge not tied in the middle of it.

Katrina fumed, steamed and screamed some more about the terrible snake and the pool little baby bird. She felt so bad for it. She felt like a mother who just left her child unattended in the front yard and just heard the screech of brakes.

After a reasonable time to morn she went out on the porch and picked up the cage and took it outside. I did not follow because I was sure there would be splatter involved!

When she returned I asked her what she did. She said “I thought about killing it, but it was just doing what Mother Nature intended for it to do. I was just trying to survive. So I let it go!”

Do you believe that? This slimy sneaky snake just ate her little baby bird for breakfast and she lets it go free. That is one of the reasons I love her so much!

She loves animals; she has compassion and she understands the circle of life; she doesn’t always appreciate it but she understands it. She also understands that mechanical things break, cars need need new chrome and bigger carburetors! how cool is that? I love her!

To see and read more about the other animals on our farm go to our other site Legendary Farms, click here.

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Richard

I grew up and lived in Iowa for a good portion of my life before moving to Southern California. After 20+ years we now live outside Nashville Tennessee. I have been into cars since I was old enough to remember. I don't have a brand loyalty although I do prefer American Muscle especially the 1969/1970 NASCAR Aero Cars. (Check out our other web site at www.TalladegaSpoilerRegistry.com site) As long as it has four wheels and an engine I get excited. Few men are lucky enough to be able to share their passion for cars with the woman they love. Fortunately, my wife, Katriana, is also a gear head and many of our activities revolve around the cars. We have a small collection that includes at least one car from each of the Big Three. It includes a Best of Show winner, a survivor, a driver with lots of patina and several others. Katrina prefers all original cars while I like to modify them so we have a few of each. When we aren't playing with cars we are out working with or showing our miniature donkeys. You can see more about that part of our lives at http://www.LegendaryFarms.com.

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