owls and pigeons

Have you noticed how many owls are showing up in TV commercials these days? They are promoting everything from colleges to medicine. I'm not sure if they have become so popular because of their supposed wisdom or because they work cheap, in which case they're not so wise, after all.  Maybe they are just really easy to train.  In most of the commercials they are just sitting and blinking their eyes.  That doesn't seem like too much to expect from an owl. Now, I might be more impressed if they were training pigeons. I'n thinking about pigeons lately because, for some reason, they have discovered my balcony this year.  They don't come near when I'm sitting out there but every once in a while I'll see one strutting around out there. Generally a tap on the window is enough to send him (or her) flying away. Recently, however I lightened up on my no pigeon rule. It was during the last really bad rain storm that we had and I spotted a pigeon huddled in a corner out of the wind and pouring rain. I let that one stay.  I'm not totally heartless.