Sometimes I wonder, okay, often I wonder, what is going on with all the shouting and yelling I’m hearing these days?

It reminds me of a commotion a couple of years ago.

There is a drainage area running between my house and the one behind me, it’s filled with a layer of stones and the weeds like to grow in between them. I was out there cleaning things up one day and this bird starts making a terrible racket. He (I’m assuming it was a he) was making all this noise and then he starts with the theatrics. Down on the stones he’s flipping himself around, dragging one wing and flapping the other one wildly.

I’d never seen a bird do this before and I’m thinking What in the world? I’m looking all over and I can’t see a nest anywhere in the trees or bushes around me. I’m not seeing any other birds. He’s obviously trying to protect something but I have no idea what.

The memory of that bird reminds me of the shouting and yelling I’m hearing these day and makes me wonder all the same things. What in the world is going on, what is someone protecting?

I don’t know if it is appropriate or not, but the first thing that comes to my mind when I hear the frantic commotion – two names, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Swaggart. Those boys had somethings to hide.

Yelling usually means smoke screening. A dead give away someone cares about something.

Inquiring minds jump on things like this and start looking around to see what the fuss is about.

The first place my mind goes is to a movie with lovable funny man Tim Allen where he had all these wives and ex-wives and he kept adding more. Even worse, he involved his unwilling daughter in the cover-up and deception.

It all came crashing down when he was on a Caribbean island with a friend. Tim was having a good time romancing the locals until he and his friend went parasailing. Somehow his friend fell out of his harness.

Trouble started for Tim when his family was mistakenly notified of his death. The uproar between his known wives was bad enough but when unknown wives started showing up for the funeral, well…

This week one of the books I read was a stressful story where a well known, pillar of the community family, had a deep dark secret. Lots of yelling with fists flying.

In the end the secret wasn’t that this paragon of virtue had a wild temper and was abusing his family. No, the secret was that he had a mistress and was planning to kill his present family to be with his new family. He managed to murder his wife and one daughter while the other was rescued almost too late by her guard dog.

In other books the secret has been much bigger. A Hugh Heffner wannabe with a fabulous mansion filled with mistresses, a vast organization bringing in millions, and an off-shore bank account in the trillions.

When I think about it, the possibilities behind the yelling are endless.

Sometimes, it’s not just one bird squawking, sometimes a whole flock is involved.

One day there was a huge racket in the back yard. I looked out to see what the threat was, it was a band of kittens eyeing up the birds.

All the shouting makes me wonder. Will it be the guy with the mistress or will it be the Hugh Heffner wannabe?

For sure there is a secret. Smoke screens don’t happen without reason.

I wonder… do we need to be nervous?

So, the bird I couldn’t figure out?

As I worked my way through the weeds I went to move a cute little stone and realized it was an egg. Just sitting there on the other stones. Obviously that was what had his shorts all in a knot. What a crazy place to lay your eggs.

I googled birds to see if I could find this guy and I think it was a Plover. They lay their eggs on curbs and other unlikely places on the ground. They protect their nest by making a big fuss pretending to be injured. It didn’t work on me although I did give that area a wide berth as I kept weeding. I didn’t want him having a heart attack but at the same time I can’t work in the yard on your bird schedule either, thank you very much.

They didn’t show up the next year. I guess they moved on to safer parking lots.