Two juvenile seagulls, all mottled gray and nervous as heck, were trying in vain to get an adult seagull to notice them over by the Fort Point Channel. They circled around, making loud keening sounds and occasionally nipping at the adult's bill. The adult seagull was having none of this but instead of retaliating or nipping back, just stood there and tried damn hard to ignore the two. I sat on a rock and watched them for a while. Two middle-aged women strolled up and watched, too.

"Board meeting?" one of them asked me. I laughed.

"No, I think the mama gull is weaning the kids," I said.

"Oh, that's so sad!" said the first woman. "I can't watch this."

"It's not sad," said the second woman. "She's just cutting the apron strings, that's all. She's telling the kids okay, no more free ride, now you gotta go out and work for your own food."

"You can probably tell which of us has two kids in college," the first woman said to me.

"I wouldn't have been saying this after the first left," her friend replied, and they both laughed.

Meanwhile the seagulls kept keening and keening and keening.