On the avian flu ...

1848 -- Seagulls may or may not have saved my ancestors

1913 -- Seagull Monument is built

1955 -- Legislation passes making the California gull, or Larus californicus, the official state bird of Utah

2008 -- Standard-Examiner makes the bird its mascot, convinces underpaid employee to wear yellow tights and oversized bird costume and distributes mass amounts of water bottles decorated with StanBird -- get it?? Standard? StanBird?

You can see a picture of the live version of our mascot here.

Which brings me to this picture, the stuffed version of StanBird:

One afternoon I exited the restroom and almost had a heart attack. It was staring at me. It was perched in the window. And it looked like it was going to shatter through the glass and fly right at me.

Someone keeps changing its position, ever so slightly in the window sill. Somedays it catches me when I'm coming out of the lunch room. Other times when I'm headed for the exit. But always, always I want to scream in terror.

I acknowledge this bird's contributions to my state, my family and my company. But MUST its eyes be so menacing?