The scene: Bus stop near Union Station. I’ve just seen Kyla homeward and I’m waiting for the #9 that’ll take me home. It’s at least fifteen minutes away, being a Sunday and all. There’s an older woman with a variety of small traveling bags already at the stop, which is unusual as I’ve never had company for my bus wait there before. (Suffice to say I’ve done this a few times.)

After a few conversational forays I discover that the older woman is, indeed, not the sharpest marble in the bag. I settle in for a few rounds of Solitaire on my phone as a way to pass the time.

“Oooh, look at all those birds.”

I turn around and see a vaguely W-shaped formation of about thirty waterfowl flying south. “Yep,” I reply in as uninterested a tone as I can manage without being rude.

“Geese, you think?”

I look again. The flyers aren’t big enough or quite the right shape for geese, at least not the Canadian variety we get so many of around here. “Actually, I’m pretty sure those are ducks.”

“Oh, so not birds then.”

I freeze completely still for a few moments, processing what I’d heard and deciding whether I should say anything. I decide against it.

Luckily for my fragile sanity, the bus arrives a few minutes later.