Bird in hand....

A Bird in Hand is worth 2 in the bush.

Why do people say that? According to www.phrases.org.uk, the earliest similar version of the proverb comes from a 13th century English translation of the bible, in which it is stated "a living dog is better than a dead lion". Hmm I'm not sure I agree with that. It is interesting though that in the bible phrase, two different things are compared, whereas in the phrase we use today, it's one or more of the same thing?

But things are not the same. For instance lets say I had a pigeon in hand. It's a bird. But it's GREY and all it's really good for is coo-ing like mad, shitting like crazy and generally making a big mess. Ok, sure some of them can be trained to carry messages, but on the whole, they're rather lacking in personality. Now, take a Parrot. Even your more mundane parrots are on any given day more lively than a pigeon. They're colorful, at least learn to mimic sounds but also capable of math and communication (see Alex), knows and differentiates between people, and generally happy even flamboyant birds.

In the Bird Kingdom, Parrots would be the life of the party, the person everyone loves, and who enriches everyones life. Pigeons would be like the Accountants that work for the revenue service.

So here is the dillema. You have a pigeon. It's not like you wanted a pigeon, or even looked for a pigeon, but the pigeon just landed on your window sill one day, and something in you made you feed it. Then it came back the next day and the next, and well you just kept feeding it, because you're nice like that. And although you have some sort of liking for the pigeon, you wouldn't feel bad if one day the pigeon landed on someone else's sill, and that person really loving pigeons decided to give the pigeon super-pigeon food, that made the pigeon no longer come to you. You might miss the pigeon a bit, but in the end, you'd just be glad the pigeon is happy.

But then there is this Parrot. And well you really like the Parrot. The problem is, that although the parrot is friendly and pretty, there really is no place at the window for both the parrot and the pigeon. And in any case the parrot wouldn't land there if she knew about the pigeon. And yet, there is no guarantee that if you were to get rid of the pigeon, that the parrot would land there.

What to do? Get rid of the pigeon, and just hope for the best? Conceal the pigeon, by putting the pigeon feed on the other side of the house, thereby clearing the window sill for the parrot, and then should the parrot land and stay, then get rid of the pigeon? OR should you forget about the parrot, and continue feeding the pigeon until one day you resent the pigeon so much for your mundane existance that you load your shotgun with birdshot, turn the rifle on the pigeon and then yourself.