Finishing Up

The book is mostly finished -- well, the writing of it anyway. Now I have to get Charli to pose for the cover picture -- ha! Then I have to format it, do an index and table of contents, get my ISBN, then get it converted over into PDF to match CafePress' standards.

Sugar has been sneaking around and laying eggs now every ten days or so. Enough is enough, so this week she's going for a Lupron shot. Plus her preen gland is getting impacted again.

Who knew such a tiny little bundle of feathers could be so much trouble and so expensive?

I've been invited to a concert out of town in a couple of weeks, which means I'd be out of town for maybe 30 hours. Which means I'll have to find a bird sitter to check on my babies lest they (the birds) open their cages and trash the place. Only there are only two people that I know of who bird sit, and they're both expensive and overbooked. I'm almost tempted not to go to the concert because it'll be so much aggravation arranging things.

Rain, Rain, Go Away . . . .

Things have been normal (whatever that means) around
the house for about a week now. Sugar laid another
egg, and when I threatened to take her to the vet for
a Lupron injection, she stopped.

Stormy here today; sudden rain interspersed with
sudden sunlight.

I know my birds mostly sleep while I'm at work, but I
can't help but suspect they do some communicating,
too. I mean, there are four of them in the same
room, sharing the same environment and the same
human. Anthropomorphizing again, but what the hell.

I've gotten the too-short first draft of my book
done, and am waiting on some feedback from a couple
of folks who know the technical stuff better than me.
I wish they'd hurry back with their suggestions; I
want to get the thing finished and done with.

I was busy last night and didn't have time to take my
birds out for individual scritches. I'll be busy
tomorrow night, too, so I might skip my chorus
rehearsal tonight in order to spend some quality
avian. And maybe even get my laundry caught up.

Spring Drought

It's been very hot here for the past week, with no

relief in sight. And it isn't even officially summer

yet.

We're in a moderate drought status, and talk of rain

now comes easily into conversations with strangers.

My birds, of course, are oblivious to all this.

Their environment is cool, they have abundant food

and water, plenty of toys for amusement, and a staff

person to cater to their every desire.

But something in their physiology responds to what's

going on outside. They've all been molting more than

usual this season. I come home and there are

feathers all over the floor, as if a wild animal had

caught one of my babies and left behind only

feathers. But all the birds are intact, with bits of

down feathers and the occasional flight or contour

feather falling out.

The new feather sheaths are itchy and prickly, so I

have to be very careful about helping them preen

themselves. Once false move in the wrong place and

I'll re-learn a valuable lesson.

Eggs, Eggs, Eggs

This morning Sugar Franklin presented me with her third egg since Saturday. I've taken her in for four hormone shots already this spring, and I thought she was over for the season. She lays them in her food cup, using the pellets as a sort of nesting material, I guess.

People wonder why I worry about her laying eggs. The eggs aren't fertile, and laying can be hard on her little body. Deplete her levels of calcium, danger of becoming egg bound, and so on.

Of course, she's quite full of herself. She'll rip the flesh from my hand if I dare stick my hand in her cage but otherwise prances around like she's the first and only creature to give birth.

So I put her fresh pellets in another dish. I rearrange things in her cage to off-set her sense of safety, and I put her to bed early. Today I've got a call into the vet to see if she needs another hormone shot.

sigh . . .

I made orange cupcakes on Sunday, and Charli's been in heaven with the bites of cake I give her. I think oranges are her most favorite food, though almonds come in a close second. And blueberries. And peanuts.

What do the Bobbsey Twins and Sugar Franklin love the most? Almonds and peanuts. Vegetables, they seem to think, are to be avoided at all costs lest a molecule come near their beaks. Unless, of course, it's mashed potatoes or birdie bird stuffed full of mixed vegetables and squash baby food and crushed nuts.

When I die I’m coming back as my birds.

Sugar's Upcoming Appointment

Tomorrow I'm taking Sugar Franklin to the vet for a follow-up visit. She's had an impacted preen gland, which I only noticed by accident. If I hadn't noticed, I wonder how long it would have been before it began obvious. It hasn't seemed to hurt her or bother her in any way, though she was furious and quite indignant when I examined it. It hadn't seemed to affect her preening activity at all.

And she was even more angry and more indignant when I dared allow the avian vet to examine her. The vet gave me some medicated pads with which I was to daily dab at the gland, since there seemed to be some slight discharge. A week later, after daily dabbing, I took Sugar back for the first follow-up. The swelling had gone down a lot.

Now, a month later, her preen gland is back to normal -- well, as far as I can tell. Sugar has been preening as normal.

Last night, about an hour after I covered her, she made several whimpering chirps. I peered at her under the cover, and she was fine. Perhaps she was having a bad dream.

I definitely think parrots dream. There was a period when Charli was still a baby that she would settle in for a nap and practice talking. It was so cute and endearing I could barely stand it.