Frankie's the dusky-headed conure I got last year. What was I thinking - another animal in a menagerie? But this little bird stood out - even among the dozens of other Petco green birds all ready to be flightlessly sold. This one kept his eye on me and I asked to 'see' him. They obliged me by opening the cage and he flitted away when the employee stuck his hand in. When I reached in for him, he jumped right on.
The boy don't fight fair.
I put him back, told the guy I would think about it, got the dog and cat food and went home. But later I read about this breed of birds and found that this particular one is known to be affectionate, smart and 'relatively quiet'. That last part has struck home keenly. The decibel levels of his fussing can get so high that you swear there's a large angry dragon inside of him, trying to get out.
Anyway, I went back to buy him a week later. He started jumping up and about when he saw me. As if he could remember. Silly of me to think it - I thought. But the 'bird lady' who was there said that was nonsense. She said birds were brilliant. I squinted my eyes. I love meeting people who've found their calling. This woman was right at home in the coop. She went on describing the attributes of this tiny feathered thing and I liked him more by the moment. Got a cage, some boid grub, took him home.
He was just a year old in May and won't mature til he's two or three. (By the way, the whole gender is a guess. I'd have to get a feather with blood in it to sex him and he hasn't made me that mad yet.) I was told he might, perhaps, possibly, one day - TALK. There are those who could suggest that a house with even one person who talks as much as I doesn't need another living thing where such talent lies. But I got Frankie anyway.
Tonight, he's practicing. I can hear him in there about six feet away from a television that plays the blues. All the time, every day and night. Frankie, he digs them blues. He's singing, playing with his bells and I swear he's developing rhythm. When my boyfriend stuck his head nearly in the cage playing harmonica for him, Frankie loved it. Hopped right down to peer in the instrument. Then he put his beak near it and you could imagine a weird duet. The bird wanted to play de blues.
He does complex trills that can pebble up some to build or continue simmering. He can holler, spit, gawk and fascinate. He sure is growing on me.
One out of the three cats has an eye on Frankie. I fear that this eye is not the protective variety. It seems fearful - at times. I have twist ties that bind Frankie's door - and if cats or birds had fingers, I would have a cage full of feathers about now. So they each watch and wait. But tonight, I noticed an armistice of sorts. Ted, the orange and white cat in my photos was actually asleep and purring by the cage. And Frankie was being very quiet, eating near Ted's head. When they met, it was not thus so - Ted hissed and Frankie got a beakful of water and sprayed it all over Ted's face.
The look on Ted's cat face changed.
Two dear friends have been kind enough to try and teach Frankie how to talk. They did this until I heard the actual lesson plan. Suffice it to add that the suggested verbage would make Ron Jeremy blush. But I have one of those minor dark hunches that if or when Frankie talks, it will be a dreadfully accurate impression of me. (My voice, I know, is the love child of Ben Johnson and Elvis Presley.) Worse, he could impersonate me scolding another animal.
My filly Tommie had to have scary surgery last week and is on the mend. Thank you for the kind thoughts of her.
Sorry the menu's so dull tonight. The cook fell in big fat love and is using up all her good stuff for the Seatbelt Man.
