The secret life of birds

My sexy mugs. Photo by Adrian Glover.

Sup, yo. Name's Benjamin Bartholemew Benedict Baker, but most people just call me Booby. Never heard of me? Well, I'm sure you know my cousin, Buster. Dude's got blue feet. Get that - a blue-footed booby. Freakin' whack.

Anyway, I'm just chillin' over the Pacific, catchin' fish, you know the deal. Just flyin' along, seein' fish flicker under the water, dive bombin' 'em like the world's gonna end. It's a pretty simple life. Na, but seriously dude, lately stuff's gotten kinda crazy up in here, ever since this ship full of dudes showed up. Freakin' humans, can't ever get away from 'em. It's like they think they own the world or sumthin'. It's like "Hey guys, just doin' my thing here! Why you gotta put your ship right where I was chillin'? You anti-booby or sumthin?"

Me and my buddies keepin' watch. Photo by Brie Maillot.

And the worst part is these human dudes, they keep dumpin' stuff into the ocean. Who you think you are? You can't just dump stuff! Yeah! That's right! Pull it back up! I usually fly a couple times 'round the ship just to make sure they listen. You know, you can't just go puttin' stuff into my ocean, man. I eat out of that thing. Yeah, but most of the crap comes back within a few hours, so it's all good. The humans get excited when it comes back, too. They like swarm on the deck. Like a feeding frenzy or sumthin, except I don't see any fish. It's all like mud and stuff. Whatever, dude. Freakin' weirdos.

Hey girl, how you doin'?

Yeah, so life is good. Just chillin' out here in the sun. I found myself a pretty nice perch at the front of the ship. I mean, I figure if they're gonna be invadin' my space and throwin' off my groove, I might as well rest my buns, right? Couple of my home boys joined in, too. It'd be a party if we just had some chicks. I mean, sittin' up here, all high 'n mighty, keepin' watch on the humans, I think I look pretty darn good. Yeah, that's right. You know you want some of this.

So the other day, my boys and I, we're just sittin' on the mast, doin' our booby thing, and then this, like, noise just starts up. Then I get like this blast of air up my butt, and it's freakin' me out, man. Like what the heck? So I jump up and fly around a little bit and then I see this hose thing been rigged up to the mast. It's like a wind tube or sumthin'. And there's this human, and he's like watchin' us get freaked out by it, and he keeps turnin' the thing on and off! What are you, freak? Like tryin' make me homeless? Tryin' to steal my swag? Freakin' jerk!

Standin' up to the Man.

Ok, so maybe we made a little bit of a mess. So maybe we pooped all over your ship, man, but really? You can't go takin' my mojo! Not cool, man, not cool!

My home boys and me, you know, we're survivors. Heroes. We tight, man, and ain't no human gonna steal our swag. We're just gonna sit on your freakin' mast and OWN that place. Yeah, that's right. We learnin' to tolerate your stupid wind tube. You can try, but we just gonna keep on partyin'. You want a clean bow? Well, we gonna COVER your precious ship in our poop. Yeah, that's right. How you like me now?

Peace, man. Booby out.