One of the oddest things about humans is our morbid fascination with the manner in which our fellow species mates meet their respective ends.
Google "dumb death stories" and you'll be treated to tales of the man who was run over by his own pickup when he got a friend to drive it while he hung on underneath, trying to locate a strange noise he'd been hearing, or the guy who fell off a hotel balcony while trying to get a better Wi-Fi connection.
Perhaps it's, literally, gallows humor. Perhaps in our subconscious we're trying to explain away the departure of those who leave us too soon in an effort to inoculate ourselves against our own eventual demise. I mean, only an idiot would stand a fireworks mortar on his head and light it, and since I won't do that, well, I could, realistically, live forever.
But every now and then we find ourselves in a situation that rivals the rolling mechanic or pyro technician. And it's at that point we realize we are all just a poorly timed skateboard jump away from joining our "more bars" seeking friend.
I almost got killed by a birdhouse.
OK, qualification. A birdhouse didn't follow me down a dark alley or try to toss me a plugged-in radio while I was in the shower. It didn't have to work that hard. As you can imagine, there's a story here. And it all starts with the Lovely Mrs. Smith.
Seems my beloved has always wanted a birdhouse in the backyard. And not one of those Cub Scout project, Popsicle stick models, either. No, she wanted the kind of structure birds would move into and then invite the entire family over for a barbecue, just to make them all jealous.
And, so, after 30-plus years of marriage and almost constant mention of her desire for a Taj MaBird, I decided before Mother's Day that, hmm, I wonder if she'd like a birdhouse? A little slow on the uptake, but I got there eventually.
I searched online until I discovered a majestic, multi-storied model complete with individual stands for all the flock of Purple Martins that were sure to descend upon its Trump-Tower-like magnificence. When it arrived I was somewhat underwhelmed by the size of the box, but put that aside as I contemplated the joy the Lovely Mrs. Smith would derive from the fact that, after all these years, I finally quit buying her kitchen appliances and got something she actually wanted.
When the holiday came, she opened it with something akin to glee. At that point, I discovered why the box seemed smaller than I anticipated. And then I read the three most frightening words in the English language: "some assembly required."
According to the instructions, assembly of the house should take an hour. Which meant that, a solid weekend later, I had it done. Which is about par for the course for me.
Of course, that was merely half the battle. Because we had to mount this thing on a 12-foot pole in our backyard. Which means we had to sink the pole in the ground. Now, typically, I'd just start digging and hope for the best, but the Lovely Mrs. Smith sort of wondered out loud if we might want to consider, oh, locating a utility line or two. A phone call to whomever handles that later, and our backyard was covered with strange day-glow lines indicating where all manner of important stuff was buried. Or that space aliens had decided to vandalize our property. Hard to say.
What is easy to say is that if we hadn't had that done, I'd have started digging right in the middle of those lines. Which means I missed the chance to potentially electrocute myself and/or cut off all sorts of important services to my neighbors. Oh, well, better luck next time.
So, with the house built and ready to be mounted, I discovered the best plan was to fully extend the pole with the house on top of it, then raise the entire thing and sink it into its holder. A best plan, but not an easy plan. In fact, the entire process had me wobbling around the yard holding onto the pole like the world's worst caber tosser. About this time, the little levers that locked the sections of the pole into place would come loose, allowing the magnificent multi-storied bird house to hurtle down onto my head.
To recap, in the course of one weekend-ish, I almost suffered death by a thousand sheet metal cuts, almost electrocuted myself and then dropped a heavy thing on my head several times. I call this a project. Some people would call it assault and battery. At various points I would not disagree.
The birdhouse is in place, but since it's so late in the season, it closely resembles one of those cities in China that was painstakingly built but is completely deserted. Oh, well, timing.
As for me, the scars have virtually healed, the knots on my head subsided, my vision is somewhat normal and I'm not hearing strange noises anymore.
But my risk of offing myself in some spectacularly goofy way is still out there. Seems I'm supposed to lower the pole sections slowly every year, clean out the house and then raise it again.
My chance to make the list lives! In a matter of speaking ...
One of the oddest things about humans is our morbid fascination with the manner in which our fellow species mates meet their respective ends.
Google "dumb death stories" and you'll be treated to tales of the man who was run over by his own pickup when he got a friend to drive it while he hung on underneath, trying to locate a strange noise he'd been hearing, or the guy who fell off a hotel balcony while trying to get a better Wi-Fi connection.
Perhaps it's, literally, gallows humor. Perhaps in our subconscious we're trying to explain away the departure of those who leave us too soon in an effort to inoculate ourselves against our own eventual demise. I mean, only an idiot would stand a fireworks mortar on his head and light it, and since I won't do that, well, I could, realistically, live forever.
But every now and then we find ourselves in a situation that rivals the rolling mechanic or pyro technician. And it's at that point we realize we are all just a poorly timed skateboard jump away from joining our "more bars" seeking friend.
I almost got killed by a birdhouse.
OK, qualification. A birdhouse didn't follow me down a dark alley or try to toss me a plugged-in radio while I was in the shower. It didn't have to work that hard. As you can imagine, there's a story here. And it all starts with the Lovely Mrs. Smith.
Seems my beloved has always wanted a birdhouse in the backyard. And not one of those Cub Scout project, Popsicle stick models, either. No, she wanted the kind of structure birds would move into and then invite the entire family over for a barbecue, just to make them all jealous.
And, so, after 30-plus years of marriage and almost constant mention of her desire for a Taj MaBird, I decided before Mother's Day that, hmm, I wonder if she'd like a birdhouse? A little slow on the uptake, but I got there eventually.
I searched online until I discovered a majestic, multi-storied model complete with individual stands for all the flock of Purple Martins that were sure to descend upon its Trump-Tower-like magnificence. When it arrived I was somewhat underwhelmed by the size of the box, but put that aside as I contemplated the joy the Lovely Mrs. Smith would derive from the fact that, after all these years, I finally quit buying her kitchen appliances and got something she actually wanted.
When the holiday came, she opened it with something akin to glee. At that point, I discovered why the box seemed smaller than I anticipated. And then I read the three most frightening words in the English language: "some assembly required."
According to the instructions, assembly of the house should take an hour. Which meant that, a solid weekend later, I had it done. Which is about par for the course for me.
Of course, that was merely half the battle. Because we had to mount this thing on a 12-foot pole in our backyard. Which means we had to sink the pole in the ground. Now, typically, I'd just start digging and hope for the best, but the Lovely Mrs. Smith sort of wondered out loud if we might want to consider, oh, locating a utility line or two. A phone call to whomever handles that later, and our backyard was covered with strange day-glow lines indicating where all manner of important stuff was buried. Or that space aliens had decided to vandalize our property. Hard to say.
What is easy to say is that if we hadn't had that done, I've have started digging right in the middle of those lines. Which means I missed the chance to potentially electrocute myself and/or cut off all sorts of important services to my neighbors. Oh, well, better luck next time.
So, with the house built and ready to be mounted, I discovered the best plan was to fully extend the pole with the house on top of it, then raise the entire thing and sink it into its holder. A best plan, but not an easy plan. In fact, the entire process had me wobbling around the yard holding onto the pole like the world's worst caber tosser. About this time, the little levers that locked the sections of the pole into place would come loose, allowing the magnificent multi-storied bird house to hurtle down onto my head.
To recap, in the course of one weekend-ish, I almost suffered death by a thousand sheet metal cuts, almost electrocuted myself and then dropped a heavy thing on my head several times. I call this a project. Some people would call it assault and battery. At various points I would not disagree.
The birdhouse is in place, but since it's so late in the season, it closely resembles one of those cities in China that was painstakingly built but is completely deserted. Oh, well, timing.
As for me, the scars have virtually healed, the knots on my head subsided, my vision is somewhat normal and I'm not hearing strange noises anymore.
But my risk of offing myself in some spectacularly goofy way is still out there. Seems I'm supposed to lower the pole sections slowly every year, clean out the house and then raise it again.
My chance to make the list lives! In a matter of speaking ...
Commentary on 08/12/2016