Area Ornithologist Identifies Misrepresentations In Pop Song For Daughter

Warwich, CT – In what was at once a show of fatherly benevolence and depressing uncoolness, local ornithologist Bob Narver tried to educate his daughter, Jennifer, age 10, about his general area of expertise, birds, by pointing out the falseties about birds presented in Nelly Furtado’s “I’m Like A Bird” while they listened to it on the radio in the car on the way home from school.

“Now, you and I both know, Jennifer, that birds don’t ‘fly away,' right?” asked Bob, looking at his daughter until she patronizingly nodded in response. “That’s right. Flight is their means of escape in a situation of danger, but they also build nests and have eggs to protect, which means that even if they do fly away, they’ll come back pretty quickly to guard their territory and their kids. Birds definitely do know where their homes are.”

“Now on the question of where a bird’s soul is …” continued Bob, but his daughter had ceased paying serious attention, instead devoting her concentration to attempting to send some a telepathic message to Bob that this song was “sooo last year!”

“My dad is such a doofmeyer,” thought Jennifer to herself. “Why does he think I care about birds? I like chicken, that’s it. Cooked chicken. I wonder what’s for dinner tonight? Maybe I’ll ask him and then he’ll shut up about the song. I don’t even like Nelly Furtado. Although her videos are pretty good. I wonder if Mom will let me watch TRL tonight.”

“…and so while guys like Aristotle and Plato like to debate about souls," continued Bob, "the guys in my department just try to figure out why birds do the things they do. It’s songs like this that only increase public ignorance about how birds really behave. So you be sure to tell your friends about all the things that are wrong in this song.”

“Doofmeyer,” Jennifer mentally retorted, again.







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