Come on," I said, feeling tired and angry. "You don't really think that. Nobody thinks that any more, do they? How can the public image be so far off… - Kenn Kaufman

The whole thing might have been erected by a demented billionaire—which it was, I reflected, since it had been built by the U.S. government.

One thing was becoming obvious to me now: list-chasing was not the best way to learn birds. It had been a good way to start, an incentive for getting to a lot of places and seeing a lot of species. But the lure of running up a big list made it all too tempting to simply check off a bird and run on to the next, without taking time to really get to know them.

But I should have known—when the gods seem to smile, they may in fact be laughing.