sammy.

Upon arriving at the store today, I was greeted with a visitor. Last night a sparrow/small other brown bird had somehow gotten into the store. The store manager was convinced someone released it, but...um, I just couldn't get on that thought train. I mean, it wasn't a parakeet or some other house bird. So yeah, I think it just got in on its own.

The trouble is, it couldn't get out. And since I'm lacking wings or 12-foot-legs, I couldn't reach it either. We called the proper animal control places, who just advised us to leave the doors open. Which meant Sammy (as I named him after our fourth hour together), had to leave his perch in the ceiling, fly down ten feet, go down the corridor, and out the small door. Yeah, like that was going to happen any time soon.

Sammy would fly rapidly around in circles for a few minutes, rest, check out a light fixture, and then fly around again. I would check on him every 15 minutes, hoping he had escaped.

At one point I was sitting at the computer. A girl approached me and said, "I just thought I should let you know that there's a BIRD flying around in here."

"Yeah, I know," I said, waving my hand in the we're-on-top-of-it way.

"You don't seem very concerned. You should DO something!"

As this was about the twentieth person in the past 30 seconds who had accosted me, I just kind of sighed and said, "Do you have a suggestion?"

"DO something!! Don't just let it fly around!"

I had NO idea that booksellers were required to have super-human abilities. They totally left that out of the job description.

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The other weird bird interaction:

This girl walked into the store, noticed the bird right away, but instead of looking at us or even acknowledging that yes, it's strange that a bird is in the bookstore, just started TALKING TO THE BIRD.

"Oh hello pretty birdy! What are you doing up there? Oh you silly bird, you need to go back outside! Come here birdy, I'll show you the way out! It's this way! You don't want to stay up there!"

Her dialogue with the bird lasted a good minute before she turned to us, saying, "Birds are so silly! But it's good it's not a bat!" No introduction, no asking about the bird. She was so matter-of-fact about the bird being there. She then turned back to the bird and resumed her conversation while I buried my face in my arm to escape Hanley's look of "what the HELL just happened?"
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Sammy finally flew out the front door three minutes before my shift ended. I hope he's not too traumatized by his experience. Bookstore life is rough.