Ducks can't tell time, and time doesn't stop in the Alberta Oilsands. So it should come as no surprise that my Blackberry buzzed Saturday evening with Greenpeace on the other end. I WAS driving at the time, but pulled over before I returned the call.

They called to tell me about more waterfowl on a toxic waste pond, but this time it was Conoco Phillips, not Syncrude.

Premier Ed Stelmach talked about it on Sunday in Calgary, then Monday morning, Greenpeace held a news conference on the steps of the Legislature. They were savvy enough NOT to call it a demonstration.

With a world accustomed to seeing crowds in the hundreds of thousands on the internet or TV, a few dozen at the legislature is almost laughable. The reporters out-numbered Greenpeace 30 to 1. CBC Newsworld went live from the scene, and other networks placed the story prominently in their noon newscasts.

Also in the crowd, quietly taking notes, was a non-reporter. She was working for a "client."

I know her to be a consultant or something like that for Hill & Knowlton. H & K has a wide range of clients, but you might recall them as being the company hired to put up a website billed as a grassroots movement by oil workers. The website (www.getitrightalberta.ca) was tied into an oil worker demonstration also at the legislature on October 17, 2007, at the height of the royalty debate.

The duck story has (pun intended) legs. It doesn't just come and go quietly. It develops over the weekend, and continues to feed the public interest, which at this point, shows no sign of letting up.