The story, which I am not making up, concerns a man named Neil from Devon, England,
who discovered an owl nesting in his garden.
Each night, Neil would go outside and hoot to the owl. To his delight,
he'd hear a hoot in reply; then he'd hoot some more.
This went on night after night, month after month; Neil
even kept a log of his conversations with the owl.
Then one day, Neil's wife got to talking about this with a neighbor,
who said that her husband, whose name is Fred, had also been going out every night to hoot to the owl.
At this point, the women realized that their husbands had in fact spent an entire year hooting to each other.
The owl was not involved at all.
The owl was probably inviting its owl friends over to drink owl beer
and listen to these two hooting twits and laugh until they fell off the branch.
I admit that this heartwarming story is not directly related to the holiday season,
but doesn't it make you feel better? You can say to yourself, "Maybe I will go broke this holiday season,
and maybe I will wind up hospitalized with injuries sustained in hand-to-hand combat
with other parents over who gets to buy the last Beanie Baby
at the Toys Sure 'R' Expensive store, but at least I will not be spending my evenings standing in some cold,
damp English garden exchanging hoots with a guy named Fred!"
Michael
Communing with nature
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