If Gary ever gets a new love I will know how I will be treated. He will be treat me like trash, an impediiment to his happiness, a nuisance getting in the way of his new love.
How do I know this? I see how he treats the raccoons.
He stomps in from the backyard. “DAMN RACCOONS TORE ANOTHER BIRD FEEDER OFF THE TREE.”
I make the de rigueur “Oh sweet raccoons” noises I have made for the last ten years.
”STUPID RACCOONS NOW I HAVE TO BUY RACCOON BAFFLES SO THEY CAN’T GET TO THE BIRD FOOD.”
Seriously, THIS after a decade devoted to feeding the raccoons in the cone shape they and all mammals prefer, now his former beloved raccoons are getting between him and the birds. Ten years of a relationship thrown out because new tail comes along.
I think a big part of it is that the birds are not playing hard to get. I haven’t seem them flying away if I peek at them through the curtain. Where the raccoons would run off, the birds are now staying put when they see us. It’s very compelling when a bird stays on the feeder and looks you in the eye while pecking into a cylinder packed with black seeds and mealworms.