Wild duckies

This post is like 2 days overdue but it's b/c I didn't turn my laptop on even once yesterday. That has NEVER happened in the face of wireless internet! =O Lotsa things going on, but nothing blog-worthy except Tuesday’s events.

So, Tuesday was a random day of weird natural happenings in West L.A.

I was about to get into my car that morning when I noticed a grasshopper relative on my door handle. How strange, I thought. Not the typical ugly grasshopper; it was actually pretty, almost a fluorescent green in the dark garage. I took a pix w/ my camera phone, but it didn't come out clearly, so I nerdily Blingo'd for a pix. Sorta looked like that, I guess. Except my grasshopper was prettier. ;)

Instead, I went for a short walk, which is when I coincidentally ran into the wild ducks in the alley. These ducks are local celebrities for people who live around the neighborhood. They live almost a mile away in two man-made ponds. A few weeks ago, I even took a camera phone pix of them when I went for a walk and coincidentally caught sight of them at home (finally).

I wondered how in the world they got this far walking. I approached them to take another pix (I'm not really a camera-happy person or anything, but I kinda like these ducks). Unfortunately, I unintentionally chased them across the Bizzy Blondes parking lot and the main busy road we live on. Two gentlemen saw one of them land on the busy road so they got out of their cars to shoo them off the street. They ended up in a side-alley corner of the corner apartment building. So I raced back to my car just to find the grasshopper still on my handle. Okay, whatever. (Still weird and random.)

I jammed over to the duck owners down the street (the grasshopper was still on my car). I told the lady owner where they were and that they almost got run over (because they did!) and that the duckling seemed injured b/c it was walking funny. The owner didn’t care at all. She said, Let nature take its course. I was appalled. Even after I said they almost got run over, she said ever so nonchalantly, Yeah, 3 of the ducklings got run over a few weeks ago. I said, Well, sorry to bother you. And left.

Instead, I met a 23 y/o GF and 28 y/o BF who lived in an upstairs apartment of the building and they helped me catch the ducks. The smaller one was harder to catch; it waddled/flew down a few houses so two more older gentlemen helped us catch the smaller one in their front yard. Another strange thing is that one of them said he is part of some organization that sends him pamphlets, and he was just reading about a bird rescue foundation. I called the IBRRF and went on my merry way, transporting both of them to the IBRRF in 2 cat carriers. It all seemed so surreal (or perhaps it was my lack of sleep...).

But it made me think of one of my favorite flicks, "Crash." Random people’s lives colliding for just that brief moment in such a weird, cosmic way. The organization member had just read about the foundation not 15 minutes before. BG & GF said it was a weird day, too, and thought like me -- maybe doing this good deed would somehow make our lives get better. Y'know, karma.

What are the rules of karma? Does doing a good deed with the expectation of receiving something good in return negate the potential/expected good return?

BF & GF would have appreciated a good return b/c they were having a weird morning. They were on their way to the hospital again because GF's sister had just broken her wrist. They were just at the hospital the day before for her mom because she had a heart attack a month ago.

To finish my good deed, I dropped the two ducks off in San Pedro at the IBBRF. It turned out that the two ducks were a pair. The female was very sick and had parasites in her stomach, which is why she looked like she was limping. The male was a hybrid whom the ladies were afraid would mate with others and “taint” the breed. Heehee.

Apologies to the ex-owner for interfering with Nature’s course. =P It’s just funny – and sad – driving past the pond now…with no duckies. But I know that they’ll be happier and well taken care of.