Intellectual magpie in TFDL just wanted to study in peace

By Derek Baker, April 24 2018 —

Feathers were ruffled this exam season in the Taylor Family Digital Library, where students’ studying sessions were interrupted by an allegedly trapped magpie on the first two floors of the building. Efforts to catch and release the bird led to the school closing the library for a night during exam season.

However, the magpie’s recount of the series of events leading up to his attempted capture tells a slightly different story.

Charlie Chirps, the magpie, claimed he was just trying to study for his exams, too. He planned on pulling several consecutive all-nighters in the TFDL so that he could ace his finals.

“I’m in the last year of my BS degree — Bachelor of Squawking — and I was just trying to study for my last exam for BIRD 501: Shitting on Car Windshields, Statues and People,” the magpie lamented. “I was just minding my own business, but people wouldn’t leave me alone.”

The bird’s presence in the library culminated in a standoff between staff and the magpie on the evening of April 21, during what was euphemistically termed a “bird removal effort.” Not wanting to leave his studying location, Chirps put up a commendable resistance to being removed from the library.

“I shat on everything and everyone. It was glorious,” Chirps said.

Many library staff and students are confused as to how the magpie even got into the library in the first place. Chirps said he entered the library by shimmying through the book return slot and landing on a pile of ornithology books, which he immediately claimed were filled with “lies and misinformation.”

Stuck on the ground floors of the library, Chirps complained that it was never quiet enough to fully concentrate on his studies. He said his goal was to make it to the seventh floor but that he was unable to reach those heights.

“I waited for the elevator, trying to get up to the quiet floors, but people would just shoo me away,” Chirps said. “I thought this was supposed to be an inclusive campus.” Chirps went on to say that not all of the students were mean-spirited, though.

“A few people were kind enough to throw their sandwich scraps, granola bar crumbs and other delectable carbs,” the magpie said. “I even found a little orange candy lying around on a desk with ‘A D’ inscribed on it. I actually studied really, really well after I ate that.”

However, things went too far when the magpie queued in the line of Good Earth, hoping to get some more good eats. As the bird had neither shoes nor a shirt on, he was unfortunately denied service.

“I just wanted some goddamn mac and cheese,” Chirps said.

This is not the first time the TFDL has been invaded by outsiders during exam season. However, several students claimed that the magpie’s presence was much more tolerable than the Mount Royal University students using the space.

Chirps wrote his exam at the end of April, which he passed with flying colours. We wish him all the best of luck on his future endeavours.

This article is part of our humour section.