Something on my Mind

Go ahead, make the obvious observation that I'm a bird-brain.

We had quite a few animals around here before Janis mentioned that one of the nurses at work had a cockatiel she needed to give away to a good home. We only have five dogs, three cats (the two inside cats are de-clawed), three horses, and a pig, but no bird. We've actually never owned a bird in 31 years of marriage, and so, of course we took the bird.

For the first several days, Hollywood, our new cockatiel, was pretty shy. But he does love to get out of his cage and for the past few days he's mounted the shoulders of Janis, Ashleigh and Kelsey. This afternoon when I got home he was on the dining room table interacting with Janis. When I went into the kitchen, he flew in there and perched on the ceiling fan (powered off, of course). Twice while I was fixing something for dinner I heard unexpected fluttering near my ears and ducked. Janis said I should be more calm because "Hollywood seems to like you." I brought my snack into the living room, and Hollywood followed. Watching me from the living room ceiling fan, Hollywood seemed to size up the possibility of landing on my head. I was prepared for him and sure enough here he came! After enjoying the view from my head for a while, he moved onto the computer keyboard, at which he pecked for quite a while.

Now he's on Janis' shoulder. Ansel, Janis' cat, is watching him at close range with great interest. So far, the dogs and cats simply seem curious about Hollywood.

Stay tuned for further developments