This poor pigeon reminds me of the Chinese story about a man who died from starvation. He was so lazy that he couldn’t even be bothered to eat the necklace of buns that was put around his neck.

Famine by Xu Xi at Ploughshares tells a similar tale:

She used to tell me an old legend about sloth.

There once was a man so lazy he wouldn’t even lift food to his mouth. When he was young, his mother fed him, but as his mother aged, she couldn’t. So he marries a woman who will feed him as his mother did. For a time, life is bliss.

Then one day, his wife must return to her village to visit her dying mother. “How will I eat?” he exclaims in fright. The wife conjures this plan. She bakes a gigantic cookie and hangs it on a string around his neck. All the lazy man must do is bend forward and eat. “Wonderful!” he says, and off she goes, promising to return.

On the first day, the man nibbles the edge of the cookie. Each day, he nibbles further. By the fourth day, he’s eaten so far down there’s no more cookie unless he turns it, which his wife expected he would since he could do this with his mouth.

However, the man’s so lazy he lies down instead and waits for his wife’s return. As the days pass, his stomach growls and begins to eat itself. Yet the man still won’t turn the cookie. By the time his wife comes home, the lazy man has starved to death.

via Neatorama

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