Great Thanksgiving Story! Let me add a bit to this, it was my daughter’s birthday a weeks ago (that’s right a Scorpio…”One badass piece of tail!”)I bought her this Toucan, from Cracker Barrel (a great restaurant and store) This toucan is like a parrot, and…it records everything you say to it and repeats it back! Which made me think that was, where your story was heading. I showed it to a friend of mine, and his comment was “That can be one very dangerous gift !”, and after thinking about it for a second, I realized, how true that is. And I came to the realization of everything we say and do in this Life can come back to bite us right suare in the ass-teroid belt (if you catch my drift !)
Happy Thanksgiving
LUV 2 ALL
Wisdum

I’ve heard this one before. Cute story.
Polly wanna drumstick?

Great joke! We own Edgar, an rather impetuous African Grey parrot that my husband had before we met. Fortunately, he’s not profane, but he does have a lot of ‘tude. The bird is the butt of many a joke in our household. Yesterday my daughter and I went to pick up a fresh turkey at the Amish market. When we returned home, I set about mixing up a batch of the brine where it would soak overnight. My daughter asked what I was doing and I told her, “I’m mixing up a nice saltwater bath for the bird.” Her eyes became like saucers! “Mom, where are you going to give Edgar his bath? Can I watch you?” I assured her that, no, I was going to be bathing the turkey we’d brought home and not the parrot.

The only bird story I can share deals with a time when some animal “experts” brought a cockatoo to visit my sixth grade classroon. The naturalist took the cockatoo out of its cage and let it sit on her arm ala “the johnny Carson Show. Then she walked over to see if I was game to allowing the bird to sit on my arm (also ala johnny Carson, which should have made me think twice) eager to show my students I was unafraid(the bird APPEARED calm and friendly) I held out my arm. I would have set a much better example if I had asked a question or two first, but that didn’t occur to me (that 20/2o hindsight again.) The cockatoo hopped over onto my arm which fortunately was sweater-covered (A bird’s talons are, after all, their first line of weaponry Not knowing any better, I extended my arm and (fairly calmly akllowed the creature to walk up to my shoulder. When I turned my head to look directly into the gorgeous bird’s eyes, it promptly bit me on my nose (second line of weaponry. Iwas unaware that you should never allow your face to be within six inches of a large bird’s beak and you NEVER ALLOW it to BE ABOVE YOUR HEAD. I knew this was a sign of pack dominancewith canines, but it evidently is with many large birds as well! By allowing the bird to assume the dominant position and compounding that error by looking directly into its eyes with my face so close to its own, I was inadvertently issuing a challenge which was why the bird struck out. Luckily it went for my nose and not an eye! I, of, course reacted by jumping back a little which gave the cockatoo the impression that I was yielding to its “superiority, but that didn’t satisfy! The bird promptly hopped onto my HEAD, WHICH OF COURSE WASN’T CLAD IN A SWEATER (OR ANY OTHER FORM OF PROTECTIVE COVERING BEYOND MY HAIR. tHE COCKATOO THEN PROCEEDED TO BEND DOWN AND METHODICALLY BEGIN PLUCKING HAIRS FROM MY HEAD WITH ITS BEAK AS IT DUG ITS TALONS INTO MY SCALP FOR PURCHASE. eACH TIME IT SUCCESSFULLY PULLED OUT A STRAND, IT WOULD “crow” (or whatever you call the sound a cockatoo makes) much to the delight of my sixth graders and equally to the dismay of their suddenly harried teacher! The naturalist held out her own arm to the bird and began making little kissing notices, but this bird knewwhen it had won a fight and wasn’t interested in releasing its latest conquest! When it finally decided for itself that it had enough red hair for whatever purpose it wanted it, it flew straight up into the air. Infortunately, ceiling fans aen’t often a hazzard in the rainforest of its natural environment, and the poor cockatoo was totally unprepared for the whirling blades which knocked it several feet to the side Again the naturalist ttempted to give the bird a perch, but it had evidently determined that the fan’s attack was connected to ME and so it dive bombed my head again before it flew (a little lower this time) around the room causing all my female students to screech in fear and grab their own heads! My principal appeared in the doorway at that moment, armed with a camera to record this visit. for our school yearbook. She was startled to find pandimonium, since classroom management was among my strengths, but she DID succeed in getting a fairly comical shot(in color, of course! of a beautiful white bird clutching several hanks of bright red hair in its beak which subsequently–and to my great embarrassment–found its way into that year’s school yearbook. Eventually the naturalist enticed the bird with a palmful of its feed and was able to get it back into its cage. One of the district nurses happened to be in our building to examine a student who had come to school with a prominent rash on his stomach(it turned out to be the onset chicken pox) and found herself treating my poor scalp instead. Needless to say, when the naturalists returned the following year(this time with a small constrictor, this was ONE teacher who wasn’t quite as blindly willing to allow the animal on her body even though I have no inherent phobia about snakes.

Wonderful! Birds are a hoot! Yep, pun intended. I had a cockatiel named Ernie when I was divorced and living on my own. He was the only source of conversation for a period – while I stayed in the cave of my own making and licked my wounds.
Anyhow, Ernie was always happy to be involved in whatever I was doing. I would let him perch on my shoulder while I did dishes, the laundry and even when I lifted weights. One evening I was lifting weights in the living room. It was warm so I had on a pair of cutoff sweats and a t-shirt. However, I was “commando” as the saying goes. Ernie eventually wore out his welcome when he made a deposit on my t-shirt, so I held out my index finger for him to hop onto so I could return him to his cage. He wasn’t ready for his parole to be revoked, so he ran to my other shoulder. I switched hands and extended my finger for him to climb onto. After three or four more of those switches from left to right and right to left, I lost patience I decided to take off my t-shirt and he would either fly to the ground or get wrapped up in the t-. He was having no part of the scheme so he dived for my cutoffs and lodged upside down with his tiny talons in the back side of my shorts. I detected a little nip in a most tender area and was worried that he was plowing right through the well-worn shorts and would find yours truly in his natural state, so I slipped off the cutoffs and was standing in my birthday suit with the stupid bird squawking as he tried to figure his way out of my newly shed attire. It was a tad embarrassing – even being there by myself. Ernie survived the evening but just barely.
My new cockatiel, Captain Jack Sparrow, is better mannered and I have learned my lesson.
Frank,

Great stories! All funny. Saltwater bath for Edgar? Not. Cockatoo Gone Wild – poor Margaret and I would have been in the same position, since I had no clue until I read this story about the positioning on the arm and looking at them directly. I would have wanted to be the unafraid “cool” teacher also. The constrictor, no so. But Frank – what a laugh out loud story. That was so funny and thank you for sharing it with us. I’m laughing as I’m typing right now (what a good feeling, since I woke up feeling crappy today). I’m sure that Captain Jack Sparrow got the excelerated course on who’s the boss in your household, or at least you were the one that learned the valuable lesson with Ernie. It’s like something you would read or see on TV and think, Nah, that could never REALLY happen. What a scenario!! Thanks everyone, I needed that!

This is particularly funny to me as I recently was told a alternate version of the rude parrot joke. In this one, the parrot was in a store and would speak rudely to one woman when she went by. She complained and the next time she went by the bird there was a change. Waiting until she was close the bird quietly said, “You know.” Your version is better.