I’m so sick of this bird, this piddling gabshite crow. Every twenty minutes, it lights on the wire beneath my window; every twenty minutes, it waits while I grab my camera. If I don’t, it rattles at me, that throat-clicking thing crows do when they want to be fed. It eggs me on, practically promising a shot. It sits and it poses; it fluffs itself up. It fans out its tail. And the instant I capitulate, the very moment it’s in my crosshairs, it turns to the lens and it brawks in my face, and it’s gone.

Rotten hogpillock airhorn of a bird. Stupid, dirty packbawky.

Y’know, that reminds me…all right, picture this. It’s twenty years ago. I’m in bed with some guy. We’re watching Babylon 5. An extra comes on, and this guy nudges me in the ribs, all “look! A Mustafa!” I ignore him—whatever the reference, I don’t get it. I figure if I hold my tongue, maybe he won’t bother explaining. This guy, see, he’s annoying as hell, but he has three horrible habits, three habits that make me want to throttle him, and they are as follows:

3. He smacks his food. My God, with the smacking—those dreadful, wet plahs—who could eat, next to that?

2. Say something droll, say something clever, and he’ll fix you with this dull, cowish gaze, and go “What’s that from?”—as though all wit must come from Hollywood.

1. The nerd jokes. Holy fuck. He’ll make some obscure reference, some Magic: the Gathering pun—and then, he’ll explain it to you. And that’ll remind him of ten more things you should know about M:tG, and that one time he was playing, and he had this card instead of that card, and it was so funny, and you had to be there…ugh. Sod off, already.

Anyway. Where was I? Babylon 5; some extra; “Mustafa”—and I’m ignoring that. Five minutes later, he tries the same joke, and this time, I cave. “Fine. What’s a Mustafa?”

“Well, he’s black.”

And I’m not sure I heard that right. “So…you’re racist?”

“No! It’s like you, at work, with those Indian guys…?”

—and I’m thinking, what?—

“Y’know…when they’re on their way out, and you’re like, ugh; what an aardbong….”

And I stare at him, and he stares at me, and I think he realises that’s not what aardbong means, but I tell him anyway: “no. Aardbongs are ringworms in human suits—in this case, annoying clients. They get under your skin and itch the bejesus out of you. You think you’ve got rid of them, and they just come right back. Aardbongs.”

So, I stopped using aardbong, after that. The whole Mustafa thing tainted it, rather. Not only did this twit hear a racist joke, but he thought he’d get in on it, double down on the action—which is precisely what made him an aardbong, that ingratiating, spineless lack of character—which is why I told the whole story instead of defining the word, which describes the crow from the beginning of this entry. Hah. Phew. Well. That was a mouthful.

Fucking aardbong crow.

(Nope. Still doesn’t feel right.)

On another note, clocked this today, parked outside the Dollarama. The flags read “OBEY THE HOLY SPIRIT,” “ONLY JESUS SAVES,” “JESUS IS LORD,” CHRIST ❤ YOU,” and “JESUS IS KING,” from left to right. The wee box reads “DONATIONS” along the long side, and “GOD IS REAL” across the back. The number plate says “JESUS IS LORD.”

And He shall reign forever and ever!