Yesterday, while at my parent's house slogging my way through some research on their computer, which is even slower than mine, Dad called out, "Hey! Come look! Robins!"

I was thinking, "It's February 21. Hmm. I know Dad's eyesight kept him grounded in the Air Force, but who knew it was that bad?"

But Mom, who has great faith in robins bringing spring, and has much more faith in the man she has loved for more than 40 years, ran upstairs to look.

"Yep." she confirmed. "A whole flock! There must have been about 50 of them, all out on the front lawn. Of course, they looked like they had been blown around a little bit...maybe they were off course."

Robins look like that, though, when they first come back. They're all skinny and scrawny. You can sort of make out their red breast, but they just kind of drag themselves along the laws looking for worms or grubs. It's only as the weather gets warmer that they really get themselves together, plump up, shine their feathers and start singing....the guy robins, I guess.

To us it sounds like "Rockin' Robin" but to other robins I think it sounds like, "Hey, baby come on over to my branch and check me out. I got great bi-lateral symetry in my feathers, I've staked out a territory, and I'm looking for LOVE!" or, alternatively, "Hey, punk! Stay off my branch! I don't care how red your breast is, you looser, I pluck your eyes out!" etc. Humans walk around in the spring hearing bird song but I bet that, the birds themselves are like, "Jeepers, why did I have to move to such a crowded neighborhood? Too many cat birds....my realtor never said a WORD about that hawk, and those blue jays never shut up! The only good thing about this yard is that enourmous dog down there sheds tons of soft hair for a nest and, if he'd ever get motivated, he could keep some of the cats away. But all he ever does is sniff them. Arrghh!"

Something to think about. But I do hope for an early spring.