Last Friday was my last day of employment at a company located on the Tektronix campus in Beaverton. I'll miss a lot of things about the gig- chatting with coworkers, a daily sense of accomplishment beyond folding laundry and catching up on Achewood and, of course, a regular paycheck. But, most of all, I'll miss the geese.

Every fall, several flocks of Canadian geese descend upon the campus and turn it into their daily stomping grounds. They hang around through the winter, killing time until they return north in the spring. Many employees consider them pests but I've always secretly enjoyed their bad behavior.

The geese have no fear of humans and hiss if you get too close to them. They spend the off-season chewing up the lawns, floating around in the fountain outside the campus Starbucks and they live to cover the soccer field in green doodie. Often, the geese gather together in large groups to block auto traffic during rush hour and sometimes, when the mood strikes, follow the suggestion included in a certain Beatles' song on The White Album.

You know the one.

They're the feathered Tyler Durdens of the Tektronix campus, doing what they can to interrupt up the workings of an otherwise boring business park. It'll be hard for me to forget a foggy night last winter when, in a rush to meet up with friends, a flock of geese camped out in the middle of a dark street nearly caused me to drive my car onto a lawn and into a picnic table. Or all the mornings during the spring when I had to patiently wait as they marched their goslings from the campus to a stream near the MAX stop. Trying to pass groups of geese on the campus' walkways during my lunch break without them hissing at me became a daily game I often lost.

And there was also the time two of them jumped up onto the cab of a Tektronix employees' brand new, supped-up truck and covered it in poop, perhaps to protest its lousy gas mileage and poor emissions standards.

Yes, the Tektonix geese are surly little brats with dispositions usually reserved for bored teenagers that spend most of their time camped out in front of Plaid Pantries. Wherever I wind up in the coming months, it is my sincere hope there will be geese. They keep things interesting.

Labels: anipals