Playing the piano

The other day The Girl and I were both about the house. I was down in my studio (which has been mentioned in these pages before) and The girl was in her office (which has not). There is at some point more to be said about her plans for the future but this is not that moment. By way of enabling progress thereon – however – she has established a rather plush office/consulting space on the main floor of our splendid abode. As the gentle reader may discern we are slowly turning our dwelling here into our perfect living/working space – the which makes us both very happy…

Where was I?

Oh, yes!

Suddenly we were both – in our different ways – disturbed by a solid ‘thump’ from somewhere upstairs. Intrigued and somewhat concerned we convened above in an effort to discover the cause. Opening our front door revealed the sad answer. A bird – a robin – had flown into our kitchen window.

Now – two things you should know. Firstly, though a reasonable size with regard to the kitchen itself the window is not really that big. It is also tucked back underneath the broad roof overhang that forms a sort of veranda outside our front door. In other words – it is not that big a target at which to aim and it is not clear why a bird would do so.

Secondly – this was a North American Robin. This – from InterWebNet site ‘Metafilter’:

March 3, 8:17 PM
With spring just around the corner (Mother Nature swears for real this time), North Americans are eagerly on the lookout for one of the earliest migratory harbingers of spring, the robin.

Wait, what? Robins are a Christmas bird! Hey, that’s not a robin at all!

Indeed not! The North American Robin is actually a thrush. It is roughly twice the size of a British Robin and – in the winter – it ‘fecks off’ to Mexico (or somesuch!) thus completely avoiding appearances perched atop snow covered Yule logs outside 18th century coaching inns or whatever (insert your own favourite clichéd Christmas image here!).

The Brits amongst you might well imagine the British equivalent flying into a pane of glass and simply bouncing off. Sadly this North American cousin (though not actually a cousin at all!) packs a fair bit more weight. Our new windows are no pushover, however, and the poor thing simply killed itself outright. The Girl was quite upset and I had to take the formerly feathered friend down to the bottom of the garden and return it to nature.

Now – the more astute amongst you might yet be racking your brains as to where the piano player (see post title) comes into all this. The answer is that – being a Brit – I am blessed with the obligatory dark sense of humour. My first observation upon seeing the recently redundant robin was thus:

“Well – he won’t be playing the piano again!”

…which didn’t go down too well.

It occurred to me afterwards to wonder as to the origin of this handily apposite phrase. For once the InterWebNet let me down. There were to be found many an example of the phrase in use (and not all such from the UK) but nothing as to its inception.

So – if anyone could please advise…