Well, in truth, not even close. But, this time when the bell rang, there was a lovely small package in hand. That is, the Lakeside Livery guy had a small box in his hand, his other elbow resting nonchalantly on a box that was just the right height for the debonair stance, and behind him, a carton with feathers flying out of it.
There was lots of squawking.
There was a delivery ticket to sign. Then, with help from Lakeside Livery, the boxes were wrestled into my living room and opened. All in all, itt was an expected haul of gifts, all from the essentially nameless, TrueLove. All. One. Word.
Not True Love. Not "Your True Love." Nope. Just "TrueLove."
And so, I had some investigating. I had to get this bird brain to stop. Here I was, cheek by jowl, up to my eyeballs in birds.
Make that BIRDS!!!
I had yet another pear tree, with partridge. Another TWO turtledoves. Another THREE Bleeding Froggy Hens. ANOTHER FOUR, PUT A SOCK IN IT, CALLING BIRDS. Calling. Every 2.5 seconds. CALLING!!!!
My eardrums were at bursting point.
In a hugely belated attempt to assuage my ill humor, I did get five, count them FIVE. Gold. Rings.
With the price of gold, and with MF Global out of business, gold was nothing to sneeze at these days, I now owned FIVE, count em, FIVE. Gold. Rings.
I tried bribing the Lakeside Livery delivery guy to get him to part with the real name and address of the elusive TrueLove.
Nothing going there.
And so, I needed to get going early Friday morning, and do the legwork that had made Sherlock Holmes successful. Unfortunately for me, eveyrthing was closed up tight for New Year's Eve holiday, minus one.
They had to get a holiday for the workers, and had chosen Friday to shut everything down. Most places I went also had signs up that they'd also be closed Monday. To allow the hangovers to subside, I guessed.
Well, that left me with only one alternative.
I went to the only outfit in town that sold grain and hay. If I was going to be housing the Chicago version of Old McDonald's chicken coop, ala Franglish, I would need food for the hens, food for the partridges, and food for the soon to have their vocal cords removed without benefit of anesthesia, Calling Birds.
So, having spent the day looking for a way to find and shut down TrueLove, if only to get the feather count below 2000/cubic meter of air in my flat, I accepted defeat gracefully. I took the El back north to my residence, which was noticeable from about a half mile away due to the sound of a veritable chorus of operatic wannabes disguised in feathers, letting everyone know they wanted to be fed.
When I got to my floor, I could see boxes, five large, one very small, right in front of my door. There was a note from my helpful neighbor. "I signed for the delivery, hope you don't mind. Could you please get the noise under control? It's beginning to worry Bitsy, my cockapoo. Happy New Year! Sandy."
Right, I thought to myself. How do I silence the hellsa-raisin' chorus of birds? Sunup is just not a concept they believe should be observed as the earliest they should, umm, vocalize. Sundown doesn't shut them up one bit either.
My hands were shaking like quaking aspen leaves in a gale force wind as I dug the keys from my pocket. When I opened the door, there emerged from a carton behind me a sound that can only be hinted at, not fully described. It was somwehere between a jet engine and a train whistle in volume and eardrum fracturing horror.
I opened that carton first. Out waddled six, count them SIX geese. Complete with goose eggs left inside the carton.
Whoever TrueLove was, he was going to answer for a right increase in my cholesterol if I were to eat even half the eggs that were arriving in each shipment, or that arrived every day under the various foul fowl.
The small container that had been left atop the goose box, contained another (and this was the only smile I managed all day), FIVE. GOLD. RINGS.
That would be ten, yes TEN. GOLD. RINGS. The one part of this hellish Christmas prank that was worth anything.
I hustled the rest of the cartons inside, putting the obligatory FOUR. CALLING BIRDS, completely without cell phones, so they relied on volume to send messages that could reach Mars from right where I was standing. They, along with another Three French hens, with eggs, Two Turtle Doves, and a very irritated partridge, with pear tree, were all put into the spare bedroom/office. From the looks of it, if it wasn't condemned by the health department, would never again be the same.
That left the geese. Laying. Six of the sodding birds.
Geese don't get along with other birds very well. I needed to find a place for them. So, without a further thought, I cleaned out the large walk in closet, and shoved them in there. I'd use the weekend to sort out the contents of the closet, in addition ot a very thorough computer search for the elusive, and clearly demented, TrueLove.
But, it was late. I lived in fear of the next delivery. I also lived in fear of impending eviction or deafness, choose one. I was living in the nightmare of McDonald's Farm, the Hitchcock Birds Edition. I made myself some tea and consoled myself that tomorrow was another day, and it couldn't be worse than today.
Little did I know.
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