If I Didn’t Have A Blog, I’d Start One

I never realized that totally random things happened to me until I started a blog and opened my eyes. Now I notice weird and hilarious things all the time. Usually there are one or two odd things that happen per week, but Saturday… wow. It was the mother of all random days.

My family went to Dickens on the Strand. It’s a festival in Galveston where people dress up as characters from Dickens’ books. There are singers, jugglers, parades, etc. I was pretty excited about it– mostly because I got to spend the day with my family, but also because carnival food speaks to me on a different level. We got there a bit after noon and did some hardcore people watching. I wish I could show you a picture of this woman who had the most giant cha-chas I have ever seen but it was really hard to get a good photo without being obvious. Although I don’t know why I should care… if you put your jugs on display, you can’t be shocked when people look. Just imagine a “hefty” woman with giant jello molds spilling out of her dress.

I really don’t know why I’m telling you this.

Anyways, we were standing in the middle of the road eating our respective fried foods and drinking our respective high calorie beverages when all of a sudden a man starts singing. He was about 4 feet away and it scared the poo out of me. The man was dressed up and had a great voice. But since 1) many people were dressed up and 2) we were in the middle of the road, I had no reason to believe that this was anything but a random man singing.

Some family friends joined us for the day and a few lines into the song, our friend started singing along. Little did we know, he was joining in a flash mob. The second verse started and another person joined in. A few lines later, more joined. And on and on. Until about 12 people were singing and we were smack dab in the middle of it.

It was seriously one of the strangest things I have ever been part of. I just kept looking around and thinking, “Did that really just happen?”

It did. It really did. Then it got weirder.

I’m really not a fan of birds. Something about them really freaks me out so I really try to stay away from all things bird related. However, there was this bird show that Stephen wanted to see so I went with him. It was in the street, right in the middle of all the activity. They showed us several birds, and I can’t remember much about them because I don’t really care all that much. I do remember that the owls were really pretty and were completely silent when they flew.

They also brought out a vulture and it was disgusting and it walked right next to me.

Then out came the falcon. It was the closing act. It was big and beautiful and it didn’t really scare me. They made him fly from one perch to another to show us how pretty he was. Then they were going to show us this trick where they swing a leather bird around on a long string and the bird wiould be flying high in the air and would dive bomb the bird. So picture this: The bird is flying in the air (as opposed to the water?) and he lands on the shops. Then he soars a bit more and lands on another building. He flys around going high and low, coming close and going far. He doesn’t seem to be interested in the leather bird.

I had a bit of anxiety because this bird was literally on its own. There was no reason he couldn’t just fly away, never to be seen again. He kept going further and further. He’d come back a bit, then go even further. It was like one step forward and two steps back, only he was using wings and his two steps were more like 17. This bird went far.

But we’d survived three other birds so I tried to relax. Surely he was going to come back. (Don’t call me Shirley.)

HE DIDN’T, Y’ALL! He left. He flew away. The bird flew away. The trainers did a really good job at not freaking out but you could tell they were uneasy. One trainer took off. The other one remained calm and closed the show. “Well, I’m going to go try to find my bird…” We were shocked. SHOCKED! I couldn’t believe that was happening. I mean, I know it’s a risk that comes with the profession but, man, I felt bad for those guys. I can’t even begin to think about how much time and money went into training that bird. (“Obviously not enough,” said our friend.)

Several hours later we went by the tent to see if the bird had returned. I would have been shocked if it did. We were in the middle of the street in a random city, it’s not like the bird was familiar with the area. Sure enough, it hadn’t been found.

Cah-razy. It was a crazy day. We’d been trapped in the middle of a flash mob, we had witnessed a bird-gone-rogue, and then this: