Tsunami Ahead

"So many people hate the ducks," she says. "In this area, people are cruel to them. They get annoyed because the ducks poo on the sidewalks. Who cares? Just leave 'em alone."

Payne — who, depending on your perspective, is either a candidate for sainthood or the neighborhood's biggest pain in the tush — has a detailed understanding of the duck community, like Margaret Mead keeping track of the Samoans. Most of the ducks have names.

The first to go was Frankie, she says. "He was in charge of the lake." Then Frankie's brother Fred. Then Henry and his girlfriend, Blondie. "I've lost so many recently, I can barely remember all their names."

Her neighbors give her grief about feeding the ducks. A woman living near Payne, who asked not to be named, says the neighbors are tired of being attacked by overly eager ducks that are used to being fed by humans.

"They shit all over the place," she said. "There's nothing like walking to your car in the morning and getting duck shit on your shoes."

Undeterred, Payne makes a monthly trip to a feed store in Boynton Beach for a 50-pound bag of proper duck food — dried cracked corn. "There are no more cornfields in this area," she says. "They're living on grass, poor things. It's not good enough for them. Soon there will be no more ducks, and people will wonder where they all went."

When she saw her ducks turning up dead, she says, she reported the deaths to the SPCA. From the symptoms she described, they told her it sounded like lethal botulism toxins, probably from bread distributed by human feeders. The solution: Stop feeding the ducks. Bread thrown into lakes and canals, they explained, can become toxic and fatal to fowl.

"The SPCA people don't care about the ducks either. Their answer to everything is 'Don't feed the ducks, don't feed the ducks.' If you call them about a sick duck, they'll come out in the middle of the night and break the duck's neck."

Luckily, Payne says, a favorite of hers never got sick. Mamacita, one of the oldest females in the colony, seems to have an immunity, she says. "Mamacita has seen so many die. So many generations. It's a shame. This one duck, bless her, has been through so much."

Tailpipe says: God bless Mamacita, God bless Tanya Payne, and, God, please keep them both away from the 'Pipe's neighborhood.

Mr. Marlin

Jeff Conine knows how to play baseball — you don't get nicknames like "Mr. Marlin" if you can't swing the lumber. But he doesn't have a clue how to retire. Instead of packing his belly full of early-bird specials and driving slow in the fast lane, the recently retired outfielder is headed to Hawaii for the Ironman Triathlon, to begin this Saturday morning.

That's the one where you warm up with a 2.4-mile swim through choppy ocean waters, then hop on a bike for 112 mountain-strewn miles before finishing your day with a marathon: 26.2 miles over terrain that has hardly cooled since it was volcanic lava.

"Pretty much the consensus is that I'm nuts," says Conine, speaking of the reaction he's gotten from former teammates.

He got the idea from Marlins President David Samson, and shortly after playing his last game in 2007, as a member of the New York Mets, Conine came home to Weston to embark on a grueling training regimen. "The first week, it was a 40-minute run, an hour bike ride, and a 500-meter swim," he says. About nine months later, it was three-hour run, seven-hour bike ride, and 6,000-meter swim.

Conine spent a month in North Carolina training in the mountains to prepare for the steep climbs that await him in Hawaii.

So the 41-year-old Conine will celebrate the completion of one of the most grueling human endeavors by doing crossword puzzles and channeling his competitive instincts toward shuffleboard or golf, right?

"I don't know," he says. "I'll definitely take some time off. But my brother-in-law is nationally ranked on the professional racquetball circuit, and he's invited me to play on his doubles team. I might do that."