I think I have been a writer of columns about pigeons and pigeon sport for 25 years or so now. It may also be 24 years, who the heck cares. I do not know if I have achieved much but what I do know is that I mostly liked it and honestly speaking sometimes I did not. And that was not because of the readers. Throughout the years it very rarely happened that some one criticised on me, but that was always a LOSER.

That means a man who did not mean anything, who had not achieved anything and who did not possess anything apart from a head full of frustrations and complexes of inferiority.  As a loser he even was a loser:
One of those people who think they are too fat, too tired, too stupid, too lonely and too much untalented and therefore sometimes troublesome. Because losing one race after the other is in their mind not because they are ‘untalented’ pigeon men, they think that champions are lucky or ‘use’ something and keep that a secret from them.

MELANCHOLY

There is much stuff indeed to condition your birds now, at least that is what many sellers of those ‘wonder products’ claim.
In the past this was different and thinking about the past, those ‘good old days’ that I started writing sometimes makes me melancholic. 
Take my grandfather’s brother. He was always gay, I could live with that but he also played the organ in a local bar for gays. 
He was a ‘hero of the war’ as in 1944 he openly burnt a course ‘German for beginners’. He was jailed for that and the one time I wanted to visit him he had just escaped. 
‘That bastard’ I said to the jailer. ‘Now I am so kind as to pay him a visit and that son of a gun escapes’. 
‘Yes he is not an easy going man’ the jailer agreed.
‘To whom do you tell’ I said and and asked him if there was a possibility to visit another prisoner. 
I could, a beginning serial raper (only one rape so far) ‘was free’ but he watched my girl friend with such a hot look in his eyes that I said ‘let’s get out of here now that we still have a chance’.
Because of the numerous interviews I give on the telly all over the world, everybody will surely know I also love nature. I liked cycling in the woods, preferably completely naked in a heavy shower, imitating the song of a blackbird. 
You must know the song of a blackbird is my favourite sound apart from the music of Prince. I also remember quite well my first date. That was not unimportant as dates are the second most important things in life (cigarettes are the first). 
She was ‘well shaped’, shockingly pretty and o so blond. I taught her how to read without her eyes popping out, I made her clean (go to the toilet if necessary) use a handkerchief instead of her sleeves and broke the relationship.
I also broke up with the past as the combination of having a dumb sex bomb, visiting people in jail and being a successful writer at the same time was something in which I did not believe.

A CHANGE

From then on cigarettes were the most important thing in life with pigeons on a nice second place.
I also became member of a pigeon club. 
‘Because how would life of a pigeon fancier be without being member of a club?’ I wondered. Just as boring as being a member of a club I found out.
So I started writing about pigeons. That was about 1,500 articles and 4 books ago.
And the more articles I wrote the more I hated to write another one. Because it made no sense I sometimes thought and got problems concentrating myself.
That was because of my IQ my shrink said. He claims that my IQ is 280 but you should not take that too serious. I think he meant 180, shrinks often exaggerate. That is because they are so unsure of themselves.
He also tried to convince me that I had many talents but you should not take that too serious either. I think shrinks say that to all persons with an IQ of 180.
I also broke up with him. 
That was when he said I loved myself too much.
‘One more remark like that and I tell your wife that you are a nigger’ I threatened him.
You must know his wife is blind which she found out when she found herself not laughing when reading one of my best columns.
You know what that shrink also told me?
‘I can make you a normal human again.‘
‘I know that shit’ I said. ‘You told the same thing to my sister when she discovered that she had no tits when she was born.
‘Are we going to be cynical?’ his irritated reaction was.
‘No not cynical, I would not dare’ I said, ‘just a bit aggressive’ and knocked him down. 
Since that time I began to love myself a bit less but never did I turn into a modest man. I liked to laugh but did not laugh often as there was not much to laugh about. Certainly not in pigeon sport. How come?

WHO IS TO BLAME

I think it is people of the pharmaceutics industry who are to blame, those sellers of  magic bottles that will turn your bad pigeons into winners and other ‘savers’ of this sport.
I do not feel at ease in the company of these people, even worse, I feel like vomiting and do not even need a finger in my mouth to get that feeling.
Their slogans and schemes that tell you what extra stuff you absolutely have to give your birds seven days a week attack my mind, eat my heart, trap my soul. Everything these sellers of illusions do disturbs me.
I hate their hair cuts, their eloquence, their mobile phones, their brochures, their arrogance. For 25 years I have been fighting them.
25 Lost years I sometimes fear.
‘I sell you stuff that will make you a champion’ they cry out.
‘I have something, I know something’ always I, I, I. 
Skip the word ‘I’ from their vocabulary and those brokers in castles in the air are speechless. The stories about their magic stuff never contain new truths but always old lies.

TERMS I HATE

Golden drops, carnitine, enzymes, pro bio tics, speed pills, endurance powder, tea against stress and so on are terms that I can neither hear nor read any more.

-Because they destroy my mind as I said.

-Because they mislead fanciers.

-Because they rob people of their money for which they worked hard.

-And especially as they may be a reason for fanciers to quit as one disappointment will follow the other and disappointed fanciers is the last thing we need.

After having read this you might think: 
Has Ad Schaerlaeckens become neurotic or paranoid?
Or is he depressed as from now on it is not him but his son who attracts young girls? Not at all sir. Not at all.
But Ad Schaerlaeckens feels like Don Quichotte fighting windmills with a lance as never before so much rubbish was sold than after 25 years of writing.

‘Why don’t people believe me?’ I sometimes wonder.

-Is it because I win too many races? (yes I changed but not into a modest man).

-Is it because I do not have golden teeth?

-Or is it because fanciers who keep on losing just do not want to face the truth?

I don’t know. A problem with these so called ‘pocket fillers’ I referred to is also that they are so different and there is no way to recognise them. 
Some look so poor that I feel like giving them some dollars which would enable them to buy a cheap bullet, 
Others are so inconspicuous that I wonder if they have a shadow.
Some I would not like to have as a neighbour even if I got the house free.
And some even do NOT show off with a mobile phone.
Idiots they are, clowns dressed as men, a danger to pigeon sport.

WHY?

Why I am torturing my keyboard in such a way right now?
Everything has a reason indeed.
I was inspired after a visit by a man who was a great champion in the past but had turned into a nobody recently.
He had all kinds of schemes with him which he had got out of the pigeon magazines. 
He even had a real brochure titled ‘how to guide your birds’. In it fanciers were advised to put something in the water seven days a week but that was not all, they were also pushed to add something to the regular food every day.
‘Pigeons must be strong animals’ as they can survive all that shit which will hurt their livers more than alcohol can do to Jeltsin’s.
Despite the great successes my visitor had known in the past he began to doubt if he was treating his birds well now. 
Had he become old fashioned?
Were good birds in good shape not sufficient any more? 
Were there secrets indeed of which he did not know?
As I said, he was full of doubts.  

JUST AS BAD

When even people who were great champions before begin to doubt about all they read you can imagine how novices must feel.
They also read that shit which may make them at their wit’s end and desperate. 
In my area some have been searching for better drops, better pills, better powders, better vitamins and even better vets for many years. 
Successes never followed.
Meanwhile I was searching for better birds, for about 25 years now, or maybe 24 who the heck cares.
Sometimes I indeed successfully imported birds that produced winners.
And when races were won I was seldom asked what kind of birds the winners were. 
What people did ask me was what I had given to my birds.
Those were the more decent questions, the gossip is not worth mentioning. 
 

DO NOT WORRY

I realise quite well that some sellers of food additives and medicine are not too happy with articles like these.
I would advise them not to worry.
There is also serious stuff that do birds a lot of good. Why worry if the stuff you sell is of good quality and not shit?
Sellers of real good quality products should be HAPPY with articles like these.

ANECDOTE

Let’s finish with a truly happened anecdote.
There was this man who was talking bad about me in a pigeon store. 
‘That guy (he meant me) should be expelled. His pigeons (so mine) are flying chemistries and make competition unfair’ he said. 
‘You should tell Ad S himself’ a man who had noticed my presence reacted: ‘He is standing behind you.’
The ‘gossip man’ turned round, looked at me and said: ‘Are you Ad S?’
‘From head to foot’ I said.  
‘I do not recognise you man’ he said, ‘your hair has become grey’. 
‘That is true’ I said, ‘people like you are responsible for that’ and left.
And now I find myself writing an article again. 
With no future as a soccer player, two left hands not even able to make a cup of coffee, as cynical as can be and as long as fanciers refuse to believe that the most important thing in this sport is QUALITY BIRDS IN GOOD HEALTH I feel like failed as a column writer. 
It is time to stop. Don’t know what to do: Find myself a good drink or a good shrink.

by Ad Schaerlaeckens
© Ad Schaerlaeckens