I smoke, but I don't want the smell in my house, so I go outside when I light up. So there I was a few minutes ago, sitting in a lawn chair, gazing out in the yard and thinking of nothing in particular. Suddenly a hummingbird darts in, parks about six inches in front of my nose, stays for maybe half a second checking me out, then darts away.
Weird. Is this some sort of omen?
You used the word "darts" twice. "Dart" is Canadian slang for "cigarette." Your citizenship should arrive within 6-8 weeks.
shareI believe it's used in Ireland also.
shareThat's why Ireland isn't part of the UK and Northern Ireland is. Them Northern Irish respect us.
shareAh, that explains it. Most of my ancestry is English and Welsh, but my maternal grandmother was near 100% Irish. Born in the US, but her forebears emigrated to here during the potato famine. Must be that DNA coming out in me.
shareWe use the word dart for a smoke in Australia too. But, we mostly use the word durrie.
shareI have a hummingbird story that I do not tell people IRL because it sounds like bullshit. My anonymity online makes whatever perceived notions of falsehood moot.
Circa the wild roommate days of the 90s. Our garage was really the game room at the time. Lots of Magic the Gathering, beer bottles, and the haze of weed smoke. The garage was separate from the house so it had a door that led outside. I came out for a cigarette and heard buzzing inside the garage. There was a hummingbird straining against an inside window for escape. So I thought if I got close, it would spook and fly out the open door. Nope. It continued to fly at the glass even though I was only a few feet away. So I grabbed a pencil and held it out for it to perch on. It ignored it. So I took a deep breath, emptied my mind, and calmed myself way down. Then I extended my index finger out to it. It immediately landed on my finger and began needling the cobwebs off itself with its delicate beak. I stayed calm and slowly walked toward the open door. In about 15 seconds (that's how slow I was moving), it took off out the door.
I sat in the garage for an hour wrapping my mind around what happened. The whole thing felt magical. I decided to not tell anyone what happened. A few years later, I did share it with someone but got the expected reaction. And, of course, my wife believed me when I told her about it. It is a special memory.
Perhaps they trust us smokers? (I sure did like smoking. I miss it)
They must like garages because they enter mine and buzz around for a while with some frequency
shareI believe it.
> It immediately landed on my finger and began needling the cobwebs off itself with its delicate beak. I stayed calm and slowly walked toward the open door. In about 15 seconds (that's how slow I was moving), it took off out the door.
Good thing you did. From what I've heard, if a hummingbird goes more than a few minutes without food it can be in real trouble.
That's so cute! I wouldn't expect a hummingbird to be so friendly, considering how skittish they are. I guess the little sweetie trusted you :)
I had something similar happen at the Wild Animal Park in San Diego with these cute Australian birds called "Lorikeets." None would come over despite me holding a cup of nectar, so I calmed my mind and closed my eyes, and suddenly I felt something land on my outstretched arm. I opened my eyes and saw a cute little Lorikeet that was in the middle of molting, dipping its brush-like tongue into my cup of nectar. A couple more landed on my arm and I had dad take a picture.
speaking of cigarettes, or the uses thereof, you might find this interesting :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VV3CjIWeVBo
LOL -- didn't watch the whole thing, I'll check it out later.
shareGotta love Phil!
He was hilarious and his voice was great
They do that. The bird thought you were a flower
shareCould be. I was wearing a red tee-shirt, and they're attracted to that color. I'm just glad it didn't jam its beak up my nose.
shareDefinitely the red shirt. I had a hummingbird feeder and had to add red food coloring to the sugar water to attract them to it.
shareI used to have a hummingbird feeder in my backyard, hanging from a tree branch, but a storm blew that tree down and there's no other good place to put one. It was fun watching them, they'd get vicious sometimes fighting for the food -- one would be hovering, feeding, and another would zoom in at full speed and body-slam it out of the way.
shareMy dog killed one so I had to take it down. ☹️
shareI don't think so. I think the little sweetie was just curious about the smell.
We have hummingbirds in my area. I've been able to identify them as Anne's Hummingbirds, and they like the honeysuckle that grows around my house :D They're very cute birds. Their little bodies are no larger than my thumb. I remember a few years ago sitting under the pergola in our yard (it looks like a big, open frame with plants growing on it and we have a set of outdoor dining furniture underneath). I heard what sounded like a big insect buzzing, but I looked up and saw one of those little hummingbirds, which brought a smile to my face. There's a tree that stands outside my bedroom window, and I've hung two bird-feeders on it: one with seeds for regular birds, and a special one for hummingbirds that I put this red juice in for them to sip. They seem to like the juice, because I've seen the little birds fly over and poke their beaks into the plastic flowers, and the juice disappears over time ;)