Crows

America is a strange place:

A friendly, if somewhat foul-mouthed, crow became a temporary mascot at Allen Dale Elementary School in November when the bird took up residence at the Grants Pass school.

[…]

It turns out, talking crows aren’t just something out of an Edgar Allan Poe poem. And this crow, or possibly and more in line with Poe, raven, knows at least 40 words.

“He knows a lot of words, I’m not going to lie,” said Daphnie Colpron on Thursday. “His vocabulary has expanded quite a bit in the last few weeks.”

How can you not want to read more after that?

[Via MetaFilter, which in turn led me to this earlier MeFi post]