HAPPY 2007

You may be having a Happy New Year but this parrot isn't. This is a parrot plotting revenge.

First of all this is an overtired parrot. Making all those fire engine siren sounds at midnight was exhausting. Second he got into the Christmas Cookies and is probably having a sugar crash. Third and this is the biggie, someone had the effrontery to prop the New Year's Eve sunglasses, a new item he's not used to, a major breach of parrot etiquette, next to his perch.

How do I know Silver is plotting revenge?

Lesson one: Parrot Posture and Feather Position, Signal Parrot Emotion.

Look at his feet. They are at the furthest possible point on the perch away from the sunglasses. He does not like them--at all.

His body is expressing annoyance. He's tense, hunched over a bit and if you look closely at his feathers they are ever so slightly raised. See his right wing. If he were over the top angry, angry enough to behaviorally or verbally lie for instance, every feather would be on end and he'd be perpendicular to the perch in a kind of lunge position.

Then there is that straight-on binoc slitty eyed look. A parrot will often look at a person with one eye are the other. True, sometimes with both but never with the long lasting intensity of, well, let's face it, a glare. Unless they're annoyed. And an annoyed parrot is a parrot thinking about getting even.

Being firm believers of serving their revenge up cold for etiquette breaches, I may have to wait for several days for the other shoe to drop.

I'll let you know.

Donegal Browne