The murderous magpies of Yerrabi Pond never saw it coming.
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The birds, already the target of an ACT Government-ordered fatwa for having snatched one sanger too many, saw their habitat invaded by a horde of cape wearing crusaders and superheroes on Tuesday afternoon.
Understandably, when faced with Iron Man, assorted Supermen, Captain Risky, a very chilly Wonderwoman and even a Batman [woman] in a pink tutu, the survivors of last week's purge were on their best behaviour.
With the exception of one crazy-brave daredevil who did a low-level pass before zooming across the pond out of range of Iron Man's palm pocket energy beam, the rest of the crew did their best "there's nobody here but us chickens" impersonation.
Little did they know they were actually witnessing a rather inspiring fundraiser organised by Gungahlin College to raise money for not one, but two, good causes.
According to the college's Craig Edwards, aka Captain Risky, the college was holding its inaugural fun to raise money for muscular dystrophy.
"It is a cause the students feeling strongly about and we have a member of the school community who is affected by it," he said.
Students and staff members taking part in the run had the option of dressing up as their favourite superhero in order to raise funds for the Year 12 farewell.
Craig didn't mean to come as Captain Risky by the way; he didn't even know the character existed which explains why his outfit was a bit naff.
"I came as Mr Risky," he said. "It wasn't until I got to school the other teachers told me there was a superhero [of that name]".
I just hope he didn't come in by bus.
A senior school, Gungahlin College has Year 10, 11 and 12 students.
Even dinosaurs like myself, who went to school when the tablets were made of clay and cuneiform the language of choice, are aware of the immutable tradition that this year's leaving class's farewell is organised by the year below.
But I digress; the home territory of the magpies was invaded by well over 200 runners many of whom were extremely eccentrically dressed [and that was just the staff].
They seemed a cheerful, albeit chilly and slightly damp, lot. I clearly got the impression most felt running, walking, sauntering or loitering around the pond, even in 11 degree temperatures, beat the living daylights out of memorising lists of pommy monarchs, parsing latin or doing differential calculus on the back of your sandwich wrapper any day of the week.
The front runners completed the event, over a four km loop, in very short order and the last time I looked a Year 11 student called Connor Davies was streets ahead with nothing but daylight in sight behind him.
One unfortunate reminder I took away was just how young everybody, from police officers, to colleagues, veterinary surgeons and, in this instance, school teachers seems to be getting.
Before I spoke to Connor I hailed another fit looking young chap whose Reeboks were positively eating up the tarmac.
Just as I was about to ask "what year are you in?" he came out with "I'm a teacher".
Blow me down! When I was 18 our teachers were positively geriatric. Most were at least 23 or 24 and some were even in their 30s.
On a slightly different note, the one exception to my observations about everyone getting younger is my GP.
He's a grand gentleman, not a day over 85, looks 72, and plans to work until his physically incapable of making it into the office.
Yep, my doctor (name suppressed) is definitely the type of taxpayer Joe Hockey is looking for.