our gray had decent vocabulary. he loved to sing (whistled stardust, bridge over the river kwai theme and wandering star), boy could he wolf whistle loud. annoyingly loud. herman leaned to mimic sirens, the dog bark, called the dog, and could mimic running water, a toilet flushing and peoples voices. herman was my fathers bird. he loved toast and vanilla ice-cream and chicken meat. if you were making toast or eating ice-cream or fired chicken, you'd better share or herman would annoy you by banging the swing in his cage against the roof of the cage until you gave him his cut.
kind of a long winded story on how he came to be a member of our family...
when i was just a child we lived in port hartcourt, nigeria. since my father was involved in oil/gas exploration we lived there very happily with several pets until the biafran civil war broke-out in 1966-67. herman was abandoned on an apartment house balcony by some roughnecks. my father who stayed behind to move his company, lived next door. after about a week of feeding and watering the bird with a pole, it was clear the owners weren't going to return or send for their pet as they had likely evacuated. my father wasn't going to leave the bird to die or turn it loose as he would not have survived being domesticated, so he jumped the balcony got the bird and cage and sent my mother a telegram informing her to expect herman on the next charter to the canary islands, where we had since been relocated. my mother was furious he hadn't consulted her, she want to the airport to pick him up thinking all that would be arriving was a parrot, instead it was both the parrot and my father. he was ordered out on the last chater as port hartcourt fell in 67. when he told my mother the story of how herman came to us, she finally gave in and we kept him. he outlived my father. herman died in 1996 almost 11 years after my father. i miss them both.
a vet estimated herman to be approximately 1-2 years old when we got him, so he lived to be around 40. he would have probably lived much longer, if it weren't for a an accident by one of my siblings who was caring for herman.
--DL
Topic: Working for peanuts...again (Read 7540 times)