The Professional Webspace of Designer and Illustrator Kevin Cornell:
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Chicken about Chicken
I know a large number of people who find birds terrifying — my wife and brother being foremost in my mind. Both of them manifest their fears in different ways. Approached by a bird, Kim will just quietly whisper that birds scare her and edge a little farther away. My brother, a military man, prepares to defend himself, uttering curses beneath his breath and narrowing his eyes. His main problem with birds is that they have a tactical advantage, being able to retreat to the air, or ambush from above. A couple years ago during target practice on the gun range, he was almost overcome by the urge to ignore the targets and let loose on some nearby seagulls. Suffice it to say, birds don't bring out his beautiful side.
I, however, have no fear of birds. But I have found that under the right circumstances a bird can unsettle me a bit. For instance, if I were feeding ducks at the zoo. Here you are walking along, when you see a bunch of ducks and you think — awwww, cute! So you spend fifty cents on two handfuls of corn, and you sprinkle it about. But then, all these ducks start to realize you have food, and they tell their friends, and now ducks slowly make a ring around you, and you find yourself tossing corn faster and faster, your heart racing, an ever-quickening rondo of quacking drowning out all other sound, blank duck eyes glaring up at you in corn lust, and then suddenly a goose appears, and the ducks scatter like all those goblins did for the Balrog in Lord of the Rings and now this demon-goose wants all your corn and maybe your wallet and he's hissing and honking and your ears are hot with blood and fear and you toss the rest of the corn towards some nearby children and run to your car, crying.
But... you know... that's just special circumstances.
Comments on this Article
There are currently 22 comments.
3. testMonkey
Chicken about chicken, huh? Why not label this one with other birds that don't actually fly?
Penguin about penguins.
Ostrich about ostrich.
Kiwi about kiwis.
I guess "Flightless Comorants about flightless comorants" would have been too obvious?
4. Ian Corey
Scared of birds? That's silly. Now, spiders– that's a fear. Birds are just too delicious to menace me.
5. Stevie Killen
Spiders have the tactical advantage of being tiny and therefore able to pounce on you unawares.
I recently tried to befriend a goose by offering it the remains of my sandwich. Needless the say the situation soon required a sharp exit and a change of pants.
6. The Colonel
Rest assured, there is no more terrifying bird than the goose, UNLESS confronted by the ostrich.
They are the raptors that time forgot.
Given the opportunity, they WILL murder your face.
7. Ksutt
So I'm guessing thanksgiving is a rather uncomfortable time with the big turkey and all.
8. bearskinrug
Testmonkey - Well... I don't want to patronize everyone, right?
Ian - Obviously you've never eaten a spider.
Steve - Perhaps you shouldn't have offered your pate-and-lettuce sandwich.
The Colonel - Well... I do believe swans are even bigger jerks than geese.
Ksutt - Yeah, but only because we eat it raw.
10. Mitchell
Crows are infinitely scarier than any bird, ever. One day you're walking down the street, minding your own business, and then you see it. The devil bird. The black demon with wings, STARING AT YOU.
Scariest thing ever.
11. popo
The price of corn has really gone up. That would be fifty cents PER handful now.
Kevin, surely you've witnessed the scourge of the dreaded Grackle during your annual pilgrimage to SXSW... They forcibly take your fifty cents and buy their own damn corn.
12. Bananaglyph
I'll tell you a true story. Here in Australia we have an invasive species of birds called the Common Myna. They are considered a pest because they displace native birds by competing, extremely aggresively, for food & habitat.
I've never liked them - they are a sneaky-looking bird with very beady eyes. And you KNOW they are really smart. They behave just like the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. You can see the dinosaur in these birds...
Anyway, this one day I was walking to work when I came across a ring of myna birds on the path. They were surrounding two other mynas one of which was lying on the ground, barely alive, and the other was viciously laying into it with hard fast pecks.
And all the others were just standing there in this circle around them.
Watching.
13. Cliener von Cleanskin
I’ve had two horrific run-ins with feathered monstrosities. In my younger days, a rabid swan stole an ice cream clean out of my hands. A few years later, an emu – clearly in collaboration with the swan – did the same.
In a separate (yet clearly related) incident, my wife had a sandwich plucked from her hand by a psychotic pelican. To add insult to injury, the pelican laughed whilst swallowing the tasty morsel whole.
The only safe option is to exterminate each and every one of them.
14. bearskinrug
Glindon - I myself constantly crave Moaf. Too bad no one makes it.
Mitchell - I don't know... that blunt duck bill would hurt much more ripping your heart out than the surgically-precise crow beak.
Popo - Grackle? I haven't heard of this! You must inform me!
Bananglyph - *shudder* Your Prowler story might have just been out-spookied. Where are they from initially?
Cliener - See... in real life pelicans may be scary, but I only know them from cartoons, where they're funny. I have the same problem with storks. Their either doctors or pickle-vendors to me.
15. popo
Cliener, score one (or sixty) for mankind. (Don't believe the natural causes crap.)
16. KSUTT
if you really hate birds take out your rage with this game
http://www.mofunzone.com/online_games/damn_birds.shtml#
17. Lucero
Birds are cute sometimes, but sometimes they are in disguise with their cuteness. And with their disguises, they can destroy you.
18. Phyllis
Rats with wings!
We have militant seagulls where I live. They really do scream "Mine! Mine! Mine!" all the time, just like ones from "Finding Nemo". Thing is, those suckers don't just hang out at the beach and mooch off the tourists, they hang out in parking lots, in school yards, on playgrounds ... just like any other thuggish gang, really. Makes you wanna lob something at the lady who sings "Feed the Birds" in Mary Popkins. Lousy pests - waste of perfectly good tuppence!
19. opspraak
I once had a hat like this, in an effort to get better acquainted with our feathered friends. It was really great until I got a piece of cracker in my eye... now I only walk in circles!
20. Russer Butter
Kevin what are you going to do when I get chickens on the farm? I got my llama, so chickens are the next logical step, well after goats, but that's a whole different set of phobias for you to work on.
Personally, my big fear is spiders, well that and not being able to see what's beneath me in the water. Especially when I am wading chest deep in the ocean at dusk after chumming for sharks.
Thank god I moved away from the coast.
21. blipple bloop blop
That last paragraph was brilliant, and has happened to me on more than one occassion!
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1. Christian
A friend of ours is beyond ornithophobia -- anything that flies terrifies her. A tiny blimp hovering over the crowd and dropping coupons at a hockey game nearly caused her to convulse in panic.
Needless to say, she, your wife, and your brother apparently all share repressed acrimony towards Hitchcock.