As soon as I opened the blinds, there they were, Mr. and Mrs. Trouble, sitting cheerfully on the railing of my third-floor balcony. The same grinning, goofy-looking, gray mourning doves I had battled with the two other times they had invaded my balcony. I took a deep breath, and decided to keep my cool. I would handle it this time in a humane, civilized manner. Though the smile was not genuine, I managed to politely say, "Sorry folks, not this time. Please try someplace else."
As usual, the wily female did most of the talking, "We can't help it Mr. M, we're programmed, we've been here twice, it's now in our genes, we've got to do it here." Obviously, being nice was not going to work. Forget humane, time to let them have both barrels. "You are,” I shouted at the top of my voice, "the worse nest-builders in the entire avian world! Did you see the mess you made the last two times you were here? You guys are too dumb to be parents. I won't go through it again!"
They both flapped their wings furiously trying to interrupt, but nothing could stop my righteous rage. "I Googled you guys! I Googled the 10 worst nest builders in the world. Know where you stood? Top of the list, number 1! It said blind mice could build better nests."
They were now not only flapping their wings, but also hopping up and down on the railing, but I was not finished. "The college is right here! Take a course in structural engineering! Practice in your off-season! Learn to be neat!" I was right in their faces, waving my arms faster than they could flap their wings, shouting
as loud as I could. "Scoot," I yelled, "you're trespassing!"
Fluttering down to the railing, and ruffling her feathers to regain her composure, the crafty female immediately launched a perfidious counter offensive, "We want to see the missus." Before I could pull the sliding glass door shut, there she was, rushing to their rescue, their savior - Florence Nightingale, Mother Theresa, and lifetime subscriber to the Audubon Society. With a sickening happy smile she gushed, "I'm so happy to see you both! Daddy cleaned up the tree, and I've got lots of plastic to spread around. It will be so exciting to watch the marvels of nature unfolding again, right here on our balcony." I stared at her. My hands twitched. My mind reeled. Did she say, "the marvels of nature"? That abominable nest! That pile of litter under the tree - twigs, sticks, toothpicks, cigarette butts, and worse of all, the poop and biting mites everywhere. "Not again," I muttered between clenched teeth, but what could I do?
"Honey,” I sweetly said, "don't you remember what happened the last time?" Those poor babies, how often did they fall from that miserable nest? How often did I rescue them from the edge of the balcony as they were about to plunge to their deaths? Those two should not be allowed to breed until they complete an engineering course!"
With the missus at their side, both emboldened birds now piped up, "Engineering course? We both flunked algebra in high school. How do you expect us to pass an engineering course? We've got instincts, that's all we need." Then that cunning female played the Ace she had hidden up her sleeve all this time. "Come on Mr. M, we saw you standing on that chair taking pictures of those babies as they hatched; and were those tears running down your cheek as you watched them fly off?"
We measured, and the missus and I went shopping for netting. The safety net I constructed under the tree looks dumb, but it should work. The netting around the railing looks dumb. The plastic sheets on the floor look dumb. The can of mite spray on the table looks dumb. But the dumbest looking thing of all is the nest these two idiots are now trying to construct.