Last week I was reading the paper and an article caught my attention. It was about a Kailua man who died in a freak accident while at work. He was doing maintenance on his roll-off truck when two rails came down and crushed him.
It was a tragic accident and the paper had a sizable write-up of the whole event. It had quotes from family about how he was a hard worker and about his character. Then they had a quote from a lady that met him through, and I'm not making this up, pigeon racing. I had to read that paragraph again because I wasn't sure if that was a typo. But then again, what letter could they have omitted or added to come up with the word pigeon anyway?
This brought out the curiosity in me. Pigeon racing? Is there really such a thing? Maybe I've led too much of a sheltered life. There isn't a huge pigeon population in Boise like there is here on Oahu so maybe it's just that I never had the opportunity for pigeon racing. So, I did what most curious people do these days...I Googled "pigeon racing".
I was surprised to get 197,000 hits. The first item that popped up was from the website pigeon.org. Wow, pigeons even have their own website. And here all along I thought they were referred to many as rats with wings. If the darn things only knew that they have their own website, they'd really start taking over the world. Gee, do other, say, more lovable birds like penguins have their own website? I'll leave that search for another day.
There were all kinds of websites devoted to the topic of pigeon racing: pigeonracing.homestead.com, speedpigeon.com, racingpigeondigest.com and my favorite... racing-pigeon-fancier. Like, fancier than horse racing?
After devoting just fifteen minutes of my time I found out more about pigeons than I have to say I cared to know. One website was loaded (too much actually) with "buttons" of topics that you could click on to get more information. There were "buttons" for message boards, a place for people to show off pictures of their prized pigeons, and one called pigeon milk. I kid you not. Apparently pigeons produce crop milk while the parents are brooding the eggs. And as if that information wasn't enough, they broke down the milk to discover it is 70% water and the other 30% is fat and protein. The website goes on to say what vitamins and minerals are in this wonderful protein. Hey, it even has more vitamin A than cod liver oil folks!
If I was really desperate for a new hobby I could join the American Racing Pigeon Union and subscribe to Racing Pigeon Digest, The Thinking Person's Journal of Racing Pigeons. Uh, I think I'd rather be known as a non-thinking person in this case.
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2 comments:
Let's see if this is right. A dead man had a hobby of which you weren't familiar. Then you research it a little bit and slam it on your blog. Here's a sport world wide, with members of such status as famous athletes, actors, politicians, scientist, royalty etc. A world class pigeon can sell for over $50,000. Yes, YOU probably should avoid a sport that is full of "thinking men" (and women). I respect your right to slam us....but not in the context of an obituary. No respect.
Interesting sport, pigeon racing. Now if you want a real sport, try attending a combine derby. That is pure nail biting excitment. Although, I don't know of any famous athletes, actors, scientist, or royalty that participate, just regular people and some pillar of the community types that participate.
It is all in how you interpret things.
Patty
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