It's easy to take birds for granted, especially when you live in an urban setting. The prevalence of pigeons, sparrows, and starlings here in New York is such that you can forget that they're kind of cool. Yes, even the pigeons. The hatred humans have for them has long been dispelled as misguided and unfair. In fact, contempt for pigeons didn't really exist until humans started building cities – and pigeons started adapting. Which is exactly what most humans were doing, too. Whenever I leave th…