Pigeons: aka Rats of the Sky

Pigeons have to be one of the most annoying creatures of all time.  Not only are they everywhere, pooping and dirtying up the city, I'm pretty sure they can be classified as the rats of the sky.  

They have always been a minor annoyance to me, but more recently, they have become a nuisance of a whole different level.  This has happened over the course of two incidences.

The first, I am sitting on a park bench off of 9th avenue, near between 56th and 57th street.  I'm dodging my duties as a flier distributor to have a snack and take in a little sunshine.  Per usual, there's a homeless man sleeping to one corner of the park, and a small flock of pigeons wandering around looking for some obnoxious tourist to feed them.  

However, in the midst of my much needed relaxation and rest to my feet, the pigeons start acting a little nutsy.  They are getting anxious and cooing more loudly, generally exhibiting signs of agitation.  This one, especially agressive pigeon keeps getting closer and closer to me, which is really freaking me out since there is no one to witness it's weird behavior.  First it hops up on the bench next to me, and after I shoo it away gets right up next to my feet.  Then it starts hopping onto my Ugg boots like it is trying to roost on my feet.  Needless to say, I find this very distressing, and instantly shake my feet to get it off as soon as it starts to settle in.  This happens three to four times, and in typical New Yorker, not phased by much, style I continue to sit on the bench despite the pigeon's weird activity.  I think it's a little strange, but I'm not going to let it deter me from my goal.  

Then, out of nowhere, a gigantic hawk swoops out of the sky and directly onto one of the pigeons in the middle of the flock, a mere four feet from where I'm sitting.  It clutches one unlucky bird in it's death talons, and turns to look at me before taking off again with the whole dead pigeon in its claws.  Weird, huh?

Now I've recently moved into a new apartment and feel extremely blessed not to have windows overlooking the street because of the loud street noise that tends to wake you up in the middle of the night.  Yet, the scourge of the skies has been disrupting my peaceful nights, by congregating in alleyway onto which my window currently opens.  

At any given time, there are one to two pigeons sitting on my windowsill scratching around and cooing, constantly.  I would just like to know why no one has invented a pigeon zapping device.

A Least I Know My Neighbors will Rescue Me if I'm Being Assaulted

So tonight, as I was absentmindedly opening my mail and unlocking the door to my apartment, without really looking at the door I had the horrifying experience of having a roach crawl onto my hand as I was turning the key. This resulted in me screaming and thrashing about to get it off of me, and then screaming and thrashing about more after I got scared that it might have flown off my hand and into my hair. I eventually calmed down enough to spot the offending little parasite on the floor of the hallway in time to loudly stomp it to death. Luckily the boys that live downstairs from me heard my girlish screams and came out to see if I was ok, wondering from all the commotion if I was being assaulted. Then, they laughed at me for being so scared of a harmless little bug. I, on the other hand, was not amused.

Now, your typical New Yorker doesn't understand my terror at these common little fiends, but I challenge anyone to have one of the awful creatures actually crawl upon them, and then not spiral into complete hysteria whenever one shows its hideous armored little body.

The first time I ever saw a roach ever was while dining at an outdoor restaurant in the Village. i won't name names, but I have doubted its cleanliness ever since. I was sitting there enjoying my brunch in the sunshine, when suddenly I felt something brush on my foot. Then I fell something crawl upon my foot. I looked down, and started screaming and kicking my leg frantically when I spotted a roach resting comfortably on top of my sandal straps. This display was greatly entertaining to the passers-by and my dining companions, but I needed a white russian at the restaurant across the street to calm my nerves.

And now tonight, even after the roach is safely flattened in the hallway outside my apartment, the feeling of something crawling on my skin lingers, so that every time my sweat pant leg brushes the top of my foot I jump and gasp a little bit, remembering my first encounter with the most awful pest to ever live, the roach.