With grateful thanks to Dr. Fred Gavitup, reformed County Lister alias Robert Wallace of Florida
Gloster
Birders:
Do you lie awake at night planning
your next birding trip?
Do you wake up at 2am thinking that if you get up now you could be in the
field before dawn on the other side of Gloucestershire?
Do you spend inordinate amounts of time comparing Google Earth to your Garmin
GPS?
Do you pour over lists of lists and figure out what you have, what you don't
have, and what you have the best chance at getting in the County?
Know where Hornbeams grow in every wood and forest in Gloucestershire?
Know
why you need to know?
Do you know where all the reedbeds and marshes are in Gloucestershire?
Do you spend all of your disposable income on petrol?
Do you eat Mars bars and Ginsters pasties to save money when on the road?
Do you sleep in your car in out-of-the-way locations in the woods?
Sleep in roadside rest areas between noon and 3pm when there is little bird
activity?
Watch the weather channel to figure out how to time the passage of fronts to
hit fallout spots along the County coastline?
Have you driven more than 5,000 miles in the County in the last year?
Do you know where to find Jack Snipe in Quedgeley?
Do you know where Quedgeley is?
Can you name all of the Counties 10K squares?
Have you seen Marsh Tit in all of them?
Has your spouse threatened you with divorce because of your birding?
Have you thought that might not be a bad option?
Have you missed work because of birding?
Have you opted out of a promotion to be able to bird more?
Have you chosen a job to allow you to bird more?
Have you birded during work?
Do you sneak off to bird, and don't tell anyone about it?
Do you bird alone?
Have you ever lied to others so they wouldn't know you were birding?
Do you go to shady places, at night, and play tapes?
Do you spend time in chat rooms, reading about other people's sightings?
Are you planning on ways to beat out your competition?
Do you know who is ahead of you in the County (besides Martin McGill)?
Do you fantasize about something happening to your competitors so you can get
the lead?
Does your wife threaten to cut you off if you keep birding?
Has she tried to delete your birding software?
Do your kids still remember your name?
If you have answered yes to more than 5 of these questions, then you have CL Disease
or CLD. Face it, admission is half the battle, and the first critical
step to the road to recovery.
County Listing Disease is a common, progressive illness that occurs to many
birders once they have seen all of the common birds around their home.
And when they start to get a reasonably sized County list, all of the sudden,
the realisation occurs: This can't be it!
It starts out slowly, insidiously, over time, when you start writing down
birds you see when driving to the kid's away rugby matches, or on family trips
to Grandma's for the holidays. Just a few species, here and there, on a
piece of paper. Then one day, you sit down, and put them into a
spreadsheet or some birding software, like eBird, where you keep your Life
list. Then on business trips, keeping a list of the birds along the
motorway, and when you leave one County and go into the next. Pretty
soon you carry a small notebook everywhere. You guard that notebook as a
critical possession, right up with your wallet, bins and keys.
The next phase is more serious. You start arranging trips to new parts
of the country, maybe on "business". Your wife is surprised
you have customers all the way at the other end of the country, but you just
tell her you are prospecting, trying to build your business. Local birding
trips no longer seem to fill your needs. There is the letdown of not
getting a new tick. The next new tick is somewhere else, not where you are at.
Then you look up all the Counties, and start figuring out what you haven't
seen in each County. That's when you know you have it. County
Listing Disease. It's progressive, because it takes more and more ticks to
keep you happy. The first trips are fun. Hundreds of new ticks,
all of the easy ones, like Blackbirds and Coots. But then all of the
easy ticks and nearby Counties are used up, and it gets harder to get new
ticks. The cost per tick goes up, and the kid's inheritance goes down.
You keep having to go farther, spend more, work harder, for each new tick. You
don't get that high of the first time. But you are hooked. And without that
next tick, you're not happy.
There is some good news - it's not congenital, so your kids probably are not
going to come down with it. But it is serious, and can be debilitating for
your marriage, family and work. It is an addiction, but it can be treated.
It is not life threatening, unless you have an incendiary spouse.
County Listers Anonymous is a non-profit, internet based treatment system for
those who are inflicted with CL Disease. It is available 24/7/365, so
when those CL urges strike, you can seek help immediately, even if it is at
2am, and you feel the need for a road trip.
For just 3 easy payments of £99.99 (about 3 tanks of petrol), County Listers
Anonymous will send you a 10 step cure to help you with your affliction.
The cure is relatively easy, fairly painless, and works in just weeks.
Best of all, once you have joined, you can go back and repeat the treatments
at no additional charge!
Email today! Counselors are standing by!
Dr. Fred Gavitup
reformed County Lister
PS - another check - if your spouse does not find this warning funny, you need
to be honest with yourself. You've got CLD.