In honor of this thread, I thought I'd post this e-mail a friend sent:
So last fall, while out on
runs down here with the Vancouver boys, I was repeatedly warned, by one
Geoff Reid in particular, to watch out for owls when running at dusk. "The
owls man, they come out at night...they'll scalp your ass," Geoff would say.
"Hahaha, whatever man, thats such bullshit," I would scoff. And all fall I
would seem to run around early evening time in the extended set of trails
known as the UBC Endowment Lands, or at a loop encompassing Queen Elizabeth
Park, Nat Bailey Stadium, and the Little Mountain Sports Fields by my house.
Dozens of evening/dusk runs -- no owls.
So about a week ago, I am running through my usual Queen E Park loop and i
see this big ol' owl in this tree near me. I look over, the owl does that
crazy unhinged head loop thing that owls always seem to do on the National
Geographic specials. I stop, look up at the owl, and he/she/it looks back at
me, and that was it. No attack. Cool. Whatever.
Then last night, Friday night, I am again looping through Queen E,
approaching the same spot I saw the owl the week before. It's about 6:15 pm,
its pretty much pitch black out, and I am relying on my memory sensors to
know where I am on the winding trail, as I have done this loop dozens and
dozens of times.
All of a sudden I feel something sharp on the back of my skull. It feels
like someone mistook me for Jesus and is trying to slam a crown of thorns
onto the back of my head. I immediately think someone has just hit me with a
knife and I quickly turn to fight (for the non-runners reading this, when
running, you are more aggressive than usual) with my fists up and a loud
"WHAT!" Within half a second I realize there is noone there, but there is
something large that just landed in the tree above my head. Right as I
realize that it was the owls talons that just scalped the back of my head,
the damn thing pops off the branch, spreads it wings (size immediately
triples), and suddenly a very large and imposing silouhette of this beast of
the night is swooping directly at me.
My one thought: "You have to be shitting me."
I put my left arm up over my face, in particular my eyes, to act as a
defense shield. With the other arm, I swing wildly. The owl swoops away but
is not impressed, and returns at me double-speed from another angle. I throw
in a loud, "ARRGHH!!" to try to scare it off. The owl still doesn't seem to
really give a shit, and I have to duck and back up, almost falling over this
time, as the owl loops back up and plops down on another high branch jutting
out of a tree directly above my head.
At this point, part of me is indignant and raging, and wants to do battle
with this owl no matter what the cost. Then my non-neanderthal side kicks in
with, "How can you win this? Its pitch black, the most you're going to get
is a a bunch of owl feathers and maybe a cobbled owl toe, while it will
probably rip your thumb off, or at least gouge you enough so that you are
going to be spending your Friday night getting owl rabies shots at the local
hospital." And with that, with one arm still protecting my face and eyes, I
backpedaled out of the woods and booted it onto the nearest street. I
touched the back of my head, to see if there was any blood, and luckily all
I got out of this one was a minor scratch on my dome.
F-ing owls. As if this actually happens to people... I guess so.
Moral of the story: (A) Always listen to Geoff Reid, and (B) Owls are
gangsters in their natural habitats, so watch out.