The Adventures of Ferdinand Gaybeard

Never make eye contact with a bird of prey.

This, my friend, shall keep you alive far longer, and net you more friends indeed, than any other nugget of advice I can charitably pass on to you today.

For on the open plain, in the jungle or prairie, or even inside a genteel pet store on a sunny Sunday afternoon, the bird of prey remains a deadly foe, and an adversary not to be taken lightly.

Take for example, the seemingly-innocuous cockatiel. Child’s pet indeed! Alas, only if you fancy coming home to find your child dead upon the floor in a haphazard rigor-mortised pose, skull cavity already hollowed out to make a dwelling cave for this deceptively adorable assassin! Around the globe have I been, three times in fact, and seldom have I crossed the path of a more cunning dealer of death than the cockatiel.

However, sleep not well thinking the cockatiel your heart’s darkest bane my friend, for if my remembrances serve me rightly, there was in fact still one bird of prey even more lethal, which once lurked in the dark corners of the world, honing its pestilent skills of macabre ruination before the right-thinking empires of the world joined in unison to rid the globe of this ruthless black magician.

The dodo.

So feared was the dodo in its heyday that entire continents were left off maps due to its presence there, these blanks on the parchment marked only with a menacing doodle of said bird, warding off all but the most foolish of explorers, and, yours truly.

For I did once come eye-to-eye with this chilling wizard of doom, this stalking, slinking puppetmaster of fate and ruination. Forging my way through the dark back forests of Botswana, machete in one hand and crucifix in the other, searching out the mythical fountain of youth dreamt of by Ponce De Leon and the free public bathroom yearned for by my overstretched bladder, I was ambushed by a lone, alacritous death-bird as it crept up from behind and brushed by my naked calf in the deadness of the night.

"Montezuma!" I shouted, and the word echoed off the high tree tops and the canyon below, which I might not have known was there had I not screamed right then, so in a way it was a good thing. All but three of the hairs on my body stood at rapt attention as the dodo stepped into the light and spread its doomful, apocalyptic plumage.

My bladder let go wetly and all the blood in my veins changed direction as I realized I had just locked eyes with the world’s most deadly predator. Glowing in the dark like twin cigarettes of doom, the dodo’s eyes met mine with a stare that would sterilize a bull, and its fangs descended.

I josh you not, faithful reader, this bird had fangs! Long, menacing, poison-tipped fangs full of peril and pain, curved like the reaper’s blade and pointy like a phonograph needle. My heart dropped into my scrotum like an overstuffed purse as the dodo cocked its head and took an ominous step back. The bird’s horrible, atheist-making eyes glowed more intensely as it stepped back again, preparing to make a run at my huge, vulnerable jugular, hidden behind only a paper-thin sheath of skin and panic sweat.

The dodo stepped back again. And then it was gone.

I’m not even kidding; the stupid thing backed right off the cliff! It screamed a sperm-shearing scream as it tumbled into the blackness, and I thanked my fortunate stars that I would live to adventure for another day: older, wiser, and completely numb below the waist!


For more of this grippingly antiquated story, buy Ferdinand Gaybeard’s
The Adventures of Ferdinand Gaybeard

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