Death and the pigeon...

So spring finally arrived. It went from cold to hot almost overnight and I suspect we've gone from winter to summer without passing through spring. The trees have suddenly woken up and started to sprout green shoots. The grass has grown sufficiently to cover the copious mounds of dog turds that had steamed their way down through the snow only to emerge, like a sticky brown phoenix, during the thaw as a trap for the unwary.

But it isn't all joy. Those flying disease bags - the pigeons - are back. Worse still, there are two that are under the misguided impression that they'll be nesting again on our balcony. How naive. It is, however, more difficult than I thought to teach them that, under no circumstances, is this going to happen. I assumed a couple of good shouts of "shoo" - and a vision of me in a t-shirt, sans bills - would tell them they weren't welcome, but they just take no notice. I've started to get obssessive about it, getting up in the middle of the night to check if they're skulking round the plant pots; sneaking around in the morning in the hope of catching them cooing and crapping on the concrete; spying on the balcony from below to see if they have appeared again; tieing ribbons of flapping plastic to the rail as a bird scarer. I've caught one of them a couple of times now with a well-aimed brush up the tail feathers, but it still hasn't deterred them. I've started washing the floor of the balcony almost daily so that I know if they've visited while I've been out; the fresh piles of shit they leave as a calling card an obvious giveaway. Yesterday I raced out on to the balcony, waving my arms and shooing as loud as I could, like an over-excited steam engine. As I watched the pigeons flap away, I noticed someone sat down by the door of the mortuary (our view on one side), looking up to see what the fifth floor madman was up to. They continued staring for several minutes before getting up and going back inside.

Last year, I've been told, the pigeons nested in one corner of the balcony. They made a 'nest' by throwing a few sticks on the floor, keeping it held together with pooh-glue. At the end of the spring, when they left, a new mop had to be purchased to clean up all the gunk and crap that they left behind. This year I'm not prepared to let that happen, especially as the two boxes on the ledge are now full of seeds and my tomato plants will soon be big enough to plant outside. So for now, I continue to sneak around and then run manically outside, hissing and screeching, all because of my intense dislike of these feathered scumbags...

(Apologies to Andrey Kurkov for the title...)

Only time flies here...

A fledgling airline has been advertising in the press recently, offering dicount flights to Sweden and Norway. As these countries are so expensive it makes sense to fly by one of these budget companies to save your money for essentials like bread and cheese without having to leave your arm and leg at the till. We talked about going over to Gothenburg, or to Oslo, and it seems like it could be a good idea for a short break, especially if the days are sunny and long.

So it was with interest that I noticed an advert in the Gazeta Wyborcza jobs section. It said:

Wanted - Pilots. Must have experience flying a plane.

Or something like that, I paraphrase. It made us laugh, the idea that they have a route, a price, we assume they have a plane, but as yet - no driver.

It's been a long, hard winter in Poland.