What I learned today:

For 10 years one of my clients showered and shared her bed with a cockatoo named Elvis.

Cockatoo

Elvis liked to ride in the car and eat cheeseburgers and ice cream at the DQ.

He would hold up a foot and scream “Raspberry!” and want you to blow on his toes.

Client has nine other birds in the parrot family, and Elvis was never really part of the bird population. He preferred to perch on the shoulder of his master. He was kind of an attention whore, and had to be near (or on) when master was in the house. Folding laundry, watching tv, or going to the bathroom, there he was. Evidently, it’s not uncommon for the cockatoos to live to be 70 or 80 years old. Even with all that love in the room, Elvis only made it to 10.

This is the bird urn his owner selected. While my client prefers a traditional burial for herself, she has instructed her kids that Elvis’ ashes will be placed in her casket when the time comes.

A Home for Elvis

Rest in peace my cheeky little cockatoo.

Other posts on our bird loving families.

Might be a good morning to step outside to the tune of Santana and Chad Kroeger. Birds are cheeping and we’ve been a penguin this week.

Management at the UA (Undercover Assignment) tries to suppress this natural human urge to grow your fur out. I’m not crazy about beards either.

Gentleman, friendly reminder that we ask that you come to work, each and every day (7 days a week), clean shaven. The exception to this rule would be if someone is growing a beard or other facial hair pattern (stache, soul patch, etc.). Growing one of these means consistent progress towards the goal (shaving every third day is not progress). Please let me or your super. know if you have questions.

This policy is clearly stated in the manual and I don’t think we need a memo on it.

I’m not a gent. I DO have questions about my facial hair. I’m not talking to my super about it.

Let’s give it a goose today!

Salty Grey Goose.

Grey Goose martini and a beach chair? Sounds Good!

In the Garden, our friends are looking for bird urns. I assume that’s a bird design and not bird urn.

Bird Design

Our condolences to the Marmot den on the loss of the fussy bird known as Maxine.

Bird Stories: Blanche, a friend of the family once had a renter who lived in a furnished room upstairs. Blanche had a tendency with previous renters of going upstairs and “getting in their space” a bit. It was her house after all!

When the new girl moved in, Blanche’s son advised her to pull back and not get as “familiar” with the tenant.

And she obeyed. For once.

Well, when the girl disappeared, Blanche and her son ventured upstairs to discover that the girl had a pet parrot. And the parrot had completely pecked and eaten Blanche’s antique furniture and wood trim, including the door. The room was covered in parrot poo. The girl slept on a garbage bag on top of a mattress on the floor. She peeled with her pet and left her clothes and dil*o for Blanche.

Yes, that really happened.

And then my sweet Etta, we call her place the Fowl House because she’s crazy for birds and it shows. I once started counting birds in her front room and stopped counting at fifty. On one shelf.

When I mentioned it to her, she said, “Oh! Patsy counted 75 in the kitchen!”

“Come look at my new bird sculpture!”

Enjoy the weekend!