Issue 6: Don't Bother Me, I'm Thinking
By Galdrysyll Soeval

Bird Watching

Most people in our society prefer domesticated animals. It might be a dog or cat. Often it is even a fish or a group of fish. In some cases, it is a gerbil or hamster; this usually being the case for kids. In fact, when I was a kid I had a hamster. His name was Fuji and he used to run on his wheel all night. But I digress.

As of late, I have preferred watching animals in their natural habitat rather than watching domesticated animals. In particular, I enjoy participating in one of America’s favorite pastimes: bird watching. I would highly recommend bird watching to anybody, whether young or old, male or female, Jew or Greek, slave or free.

I began bird watching about two years ago when I lived in Atlanta. The studio that I rented backed up against a heavily wooded area. One of the walls of the studio contained a large window that faced the woods. As one would expect, I saw a large variety of animals, including multiple species of birds. In order to attract and observe the birds I put food on the ground, on my window ledge, and in my bird feeder.

It was most unique observing birds in this context because it was much different than a domestic feeder in at least two ways. First was in the diversity of birds that I observed. I think that it would be accurate to say that I identified between 30 to 40 different species of birds. These included, among others: common grackles, blue jays, robins, cardinals, mourning doves, brown-headed cow birds, red-headed woodpeckers, indigo buntings, song sparrows, house sparrows, eastern towhees, brown thrashers, wood thrushes, white-breasted nuthatches, and tufted titmice, just to name a few. Most domestic feeders attract less than ten different kinds of birds and some even fewer than that, maybe two or three. Another way in which my feeder differed from most domestic feeders was that I occasionally observed nature take its course. By that I mean I saw predatory creatures, most often hawks, kill and eat smaller birds. I imagine this never happens at domestic feeders.

After watching birds in this context for a long time I developed a soft spot in my heart for the mourning dove. I am not sure why I favored this bird. Maybe it was because I felt that this bird expressed the most personality of all the birds. These birds, in fact, would most often land on my window’s ledge. They would eat and drink, scuffle, flirt, take baths in the bowls of water that I had set out, and do many other fascinating things. I could literally sit and watch them for hours.

Because of my developed passion for mourning doves I became interested in learning some important facts about them:

• mourning doves feed their young milk that is much more nutritious, with a higher protein content, than either cow or human milk
• mourning doves are the most abundant bird in the United States
• adult mourning doves are 10.5 inches in length
• mourning doves are the most widely hunted and harvested game bird
• mourning doves make a sound that is best represented by the words “cooah, cooah, coo, coo.” (It’s a very low sounding moan, hopefully you get the picture.)
• mourning doves can produce up to six broods per year
• mourning doves are monogamous creatures
• mourning doves are one of the only birds that can drink water without cocking back their head

These are just a few of probably more than one hundred fun facts about these fascinating creatures.
Since I have moved from Atlanta to Oklahoma City, bird watching has remained fundamental to my way life. In fact, one of the first things that I did when I moved in was set up a bird feeder to attract birds immediately. I don’t get the diversity of birds that I observed in Atlanta due to my location, (I now live in a residential context instead of having an apartment that backs up to a heavily wooded area.) But I am still watching birds religiously and I am in the process of adjusting to observing them in this new context.

The Rescue
The other day I observed a mourning dove in the street right outside of my duplex. I saw a car drive real close to it and it didn’t fly away. So naturally I thought the bird was injured. So I went into the street, picked up the bird, and put it in a box. I put food and water in the box and placed the box in my basement to see if I could nurse it back to health.

The bird remained in my basement for a couple of days when I started to do some more involved research about the mourning dove. This was all in an effort to see if I could better prepare myself to take care of the bird. After browsing through some photographs of the bird I came to realize that what I had rescued from the street was a baby bird. The bird lacked the spots that an adult mourning dove has and it was smaller than an adult mourning dove.

With this revelation I realized that this bird may not be injured at all, but rather may just not know how to fly yet. So what I did was give the bird flying lessons. The flying lessons started with dropping the bird from just a few feet off the ground and watching it flutter back to earth. (It was during this process that I named the bird Maddy.) After a couple of days of this I didn’t think that we were making too much progress. So Ryan, my next door neighbor, came up with the idea that I should toss Maddy higher in the air, which worked out beautifully. After a couple of lessons using this methodology, Maddy was flying a long ways.

The third flying lesson, Maddy flew away.

I spent the next few days missing Maddy and wondering if she/he had survived. One afternoon when the pain of Maddy’s being gone was particularly significant, Ryan knocked on my door in haste and said “guess who is in the basement. The bird came back.” I ran down to the basement to find Maddy perched on the washing machine. It was so comforting to know that Maddy had survived and that she/he had come back to see me. I picked up Maddy and loved on her/him some. I then tossed Maddy in the air and Maddy once again flew away. Now I leave food outside my basement so Maddy can come back and see me and always have something to eat.

I believe that this story of bird rescue is significant. It was a time in which I moved past strict observance of birds to being actively involved in a bird’s life. I was able to share my life as Maddy was able to share her/his life with me.

I would recommend to those of you interested in bird watching to start just by observing. Through observing you can begin to learn the names of all the birds and observe all of their habits. Over time, you might have a strong enough bond with the birds that you can become an active participant in their lives, like I did.

Issue 2: Various and Sundry
By Galdrysyll Soeval

Choosing a Faction: Alliance versus Horde

Choosing a faction as part of character development is a common theme found in many early role playing games. Every player belongs to some group or clan that forms alliances and starts blood feuds with some other group or clan. So when early massive multiplayer online role playing games like Everquest started, the concept of faction was built right into the game play. At the time, faction was a relatively complicated endeavor and involved an understanding of a player’s racial selection, location and deity selection to help determine the character’s moral perspective.

As these games evolve into entities like World of Warcraft, the concept of faction, at least on the surface, appears in a simpler form- “good versus evil,” and is represented in World of Warcraft as being members of the Horde or members of the Alliance. Unfortunately, determining which group the factions of good and evil are tied to is a difficult aspect of the game.

At the outset of character creation, it seems obvious that the Alliance must be the faction for good when the choices are elves, humans, dwarves, and gnomes; while the Horde must be the faction for evil when its’ choices are trolls, tauren, orcs, and undead. Even the look and feel of each group’s environment makes the determination seem easy. On the one hand, the Alliance player discovers a land filled with lush green valleys and clear blue waters. They encounter villages and towns with a rustic feel that remind one of the romanticized days of Camelot. The places they visit have lofty names like Stromgarde and Aerie Peak and are filled with gentle forest creatures including bunnies and baby deer. On the other hand, the Horde player struggles in deserted wastelands with outposts and nomadic camps filled with siege engines and the evidence of war at every turn. They travel and have adventures in places with names like the Barrens and Desolace and face the ravages of wild boar, poisonous spiders and stinging scorpions. Who better to receive this kind of wretched treatment than the evil of the horde?

However, it’s not until game play and experiencing the players that their true nature comes to full view. In the newbie territories, it is not uncommon to find Alliance players initially preying upon the vile bunnies and fawns that plague the area around their villages. As Horde, you face the challenge of defeating those wild boars, spiders and scorpions and trying to survive the other difficulties of the terrain. Many of the starting quests for the Alliance involve stripping locations of value from squatters to expand and spread the wealth of so-called good to the other members of your faction. The Horde faces difficult challenges policing the minions who are no longer loyal to the clan and who show their disloyalty by seeking powers outside those considered “honorable” amongst the horde’s members.

As play progresses, an Alliance player may find himself on a raid to the lands of the Horde to free the world of their wretched nature by striking against not only the guards, but women and children in Horde villages as well. A Horde player may find himself in the position of defending his village from the lofty Alliance, overwhelmed by their numbers and, at times, powerless to do anything but watch in horror as Alliance players stand over their body and kill them again and again until the attackers grow tired and move on to new prey. At higher levels, an Alliance player may find himself setting out into the distant reaches of horde territory, hiding in the shadows to lay an ambush against those evil low level Horde players who may someday get in your way. As Horde, you might sneak out into the lofty reaches of alliance territory, dodging large alliance ambushes, to find the secrets that have created the imbalance that exists in the world. At which point, you finally face the darkest creatures that strangely bear an uncanny resemblance to those races in the Alliance who call themselves “good.”

In the end, identifying which of the two, Horde or Alliance, is truly “good” or “evil” depends on the player’s perspective. Just like in high school, if you are one of the beautiful people who find strength in numbers and take pleasure in the misfortune of others, Alliance is definitely for you and must be the side of good. If you are that stand- out, that geeky kid in the corner who faces life’s challenges with honor and stands by your friends when things are at their worst, Horde is for you and must be the side of good.

So, the next time you meet one of those WoW players, ask them “Alliance or Horde?” and you’ll know exactly where they stand.