Don't feed the birds

Today was a fairly low-key day. I headed into Dun Laoghaire to grocery shop at Tesco with Colleen. Now, it's true that there are two other grocery stores much closer to our dorms. However, they don't have the amazing (microwaveable) Tesco pot pies. Our dorm kitchens lack conventional ovens, so the cooking we do needs to either happen in the microwave or on a stove. I discovered the deliciousness of Tesco pot pies (steak, chicken and mushroom, etc.) almost two weeks ago and quickly went through my supply. So off to Dun Laoghaire we went.

Our first stop in Dun Laoghaire was actually a clothing store called Penny's. It is basically a discount store filled with tons of fashion and accessories. The trends over here are outrageous but fun. Never before have I been so interested in clothes, accessories, and all the different looks they can create together. Since my hair has grown long enough now to get bed head, Colleen and I decided to mess around with the idea of me wearing a hat. As you can see, I don't think it really suits me ha. Colleen was really rockin' the shades but, alas, I couldn't convince her to buy them.

After Penny's it was off to the grocery store. I won't bore you with the details, but I will say that I finally bought a mixed bag of bite-sized candy bars. Most of the time here I really haven't had any craving for sweets. But ever since last Sunday, when I had some chocolate fudge cake, I've been wanting something sweet to finish off my dinners. The funny thing is that over here, Milky Ways are actually like U.S. Three Musketeers, and the Mars bars are the U.S. Milky Ways. And they also have things called Magic Stars, which are really just chocolate bits in the shape of stars.

While waiting for the DART back to Blackrock, I decided to open the bag of candy and have a mini-Twix. Colleen was having some Magic Stars, when one accidentally fell on the ground. Big mistake. One of the many pigeons decided it looked pretty tasty, but he wasn't the only one. Soon there were two more pigeons trying to grab the chocolate star from him. In an attempt to keep the other two pigeons from taking his chocolate star, the first pigeon tried to take the whole thing in his mouth. Big mistake. The star was too large for him to swallow but too big for him to close his beak or spit it back out. The star had lodged itself so that it was propping the pigeon's beak open and he couldn't get it to move (see photo). I told Colleen the pigeon was going to choke on the Magic Star and she looked horrified. This went on for almost a minute, with the pigeon shaking its head, swatting its claw up towards its face, and so on. I'm not sure how he did it, but finally the bird had swallowed it down and closed his beak. So note to self - don't try feeding birds chocolate stars unless you want to possibly choke them.