portents! =shudder=

not all of you will know that "portents of evil" is actually an inside joke between my best friend and i.  i do not like crows, or ravens or other similar big black birds for various reasons, and so whenever we saw one, i would shudder and say "portents of eeeeevil" in a really spooky voice. my friend loves this, and i suspect chose routes to get places that had a lot of crows (which i must admit is not hard in victoria)

the thing i hate the most about crows is when they amass in great numbers.  This is, in fact, a portent of death.  it is also unnerving to encounter.  when i was in fourth year university, they amassed at the top of the hill on the edge of the university grounds, behind the only house on the side of that street that was not owned by the university.  this house was owned by an elderly couple, and the husband was dying.  more than 200 black birds hung out in the trees around his house for almost the entire fall semester.  the trees were dripping with crows, and very little disturbed them into flight, but they called constantly.  I had to walk through these trees in order to get to class.  not a fun time.

then one day they were gone.

i heard from my mother that the elderly gentleman had passed away after a long illness.  

they didn't go far though.  they started amassing again around the corner from us in one of our neighbour's yards.  her husband had MS and had come down with pneumonia.  the birds were only there for a few weeks when her husband passed away.

i just went upstairs for a cookie.  there were five giant black birds in our backyard.  i opened the door to shoo them away and disrupted a much bigger flock than i had expected.  it encompassed almost our entire block.

i hope they are just passing through.