We’ve always had these very aggressive Canadian geese on our campus. They leave their droppings everywhere. In the last couple of months, the administration cut the janitorial services in anticipation of the imaginary funding cuts that an administrator invented to force everybody to be “more creative.” As a result, the campus has been drowning in goose shit.
The geese have long made entering buildings on campus a difficult endeavor, especially during the mating and brooding season. They make their nests right in front of buildings and attack anybody who approaches. People have been bitten by the geese, the disabled students and faculty members have been prevented from entering the buildings, older and pregnant people have been scared out of their wits by angry creatures rushing at them.
The geese are such a burning issue that I use them whenever students stop paying attention in class. To get them involved in a discussion, I ask them to share their geese stories. Five seconds later, everybody is awake, engaged, and yelling at the top of their lungs.
This week, everybody noticed that the geese were not around. Immediately, a rumor got started that “the government” was removing the geese and killing them. Endless emails circulated, outlining the horrible scenarios of what was happening to the geese. They were slaughtered, starved to death, tortured, and killed.
I was cursing every time I had to open my university mailbox because I now needed to weed out legitimate, work-related emails from underneath the barrage of horrifying stories about tortured and persecuted geese. Gradually, the tone of the emails became extremely confrontational and descended into, “Oh, you are so egocentric” and “Would you just kill me off if I had cancer?”
Finally, “the government” responded saying that nothing has been done or will be done to the geese. They probably just left temporarily because of the tornado.
If you have been reading my “campus drama” stories, you probably understand that this announcement has done nothing to diminish the virulence of the Goose Drama debate.
Clarissa's Blog 
Geese are very tasty. I’d say server them up at some of the on-campus dining facilities.
LikeLike
Say that to my colleagues, and you will be pilloried. 🙂
LikeLike
Maybe someone brought a border collie to work. Enough herding by a collie, and the birds may feed elsewhere.
LikeLike
Of course, I’d rather have geese around than dogs.
LikeLike
A border collie is not very dangerous, especially attached with a leash.
LikeLike
This feels like it could be a part of Alice in Wonderland or Gulliver’s Travels… serious nonsense going on in strange lands.
LikeLike
Geese, nothing a good 9 iron can’t remedy. 😉
LikeLike
Off-topic… http://www.flickr.com/photos/71042056@N08/6435382893/in/photolist-aNF28t-dy1h9e-dy6HC7-dy6GYw-dy6JLS-dy6JH5-dy1ePe-dy1ghe-5TR2E5-6hqHPf-7ovizm-7ovig5-9VmMkj-7ovipo-7orpfR-7orphH-9pZ6xG-dy6JfL-5VVepF-o1Jnv-7qBLos-dR4rw5-Fm3cv-7hJMaV-7DRZeZ-7DVNFG-aqMcZ6-6TPQWR-aqtRRw-arknZZ-4BTZ6B-eebdoj-82QYDZ-apPNEp-qr78X-bwpyZR-7ovirG-7ovihd-764JNk-9fDHWK-dL61fV-dajPcB-dQXT2n-dXxX59-dXxXVy-dXxYcY-9Do11p-94XwJE-9jFHub-cVi7zw-cVi7HC
LikeLike
Still looks very scary.
LikeLike
But this is in 1916, when the swastika didn’t have the same meaning.
LikeLike
I know, but we can’t subtract ourselves from our personal frames of reference.
LikeLike
Oh the horror! http://www.contrainjerencia.com/?p=68463
LikeLike
Oh, I think that the original source is a fake. She really hates the poor, but this seems to be satiric.
LikeLike
Are you a Spanish-speaker, too?? Is there a limit to your talents? 🙂
LikeLike
No, even though I know some words, but I’m not even a English speaker. But fortunately, the original (In English) is a fake.
LikeLike
Ah, that’s good to know!
But yes, your English is phenomenal. If only I had such level of French!
LikeLike
My English writing is not so bad (I write often in English) but my speaking is bad, i.e. about Pauline Marois-like bad English.
In fact, this is one of my main raving lunatic behavior in my life, I don’t know very much about languages…just because I’m too lazy.
LikeLike
This story reminds me of Richard Russo’s Straight Man. Local legend has it that the goose-filled campus in that book was based on your sister school.
LikeLike
I’ve been wondering if I should read this novel because his Empire Falls is a masterpiece.
LikeLike
I wouldn’t call Straight Man a masterpiece. Russo tries too hard for the jokes.
I would be interested in what you think of it. My acquaitances focus on how the campus culture stifles the characters, but I see patriarchy and family expectations outside the campus that encourage the men to stay in a suspended adolescence.
LikeLike