If you have read my introductory page, ‘About Julie’s bird blog’, you will realise that much of my birdmania has been an attempt to brighten up my husband’s life and to distract both of us from the hell of his Parkinson’s disease (I know that sounds melodramatic, but hell is what this disease is, as some of you may know.)
So when my husband said that as a child he’d wanted Indian runner ducks, I found him a few; when he said he’d always wanted turkeys, I found those too; when he said it would be great to have chooks, I got chooks; and when he mentioned guinnea fowl, I remembered where to go (we’d done this before when he was well) and, instead of just a couple, we purchased 15 of them!
But there was another kind of bird he’d mentioned a lot over the years – a weiro – so I ordered a hand-raised weiro from one the local petshops (yeah, those petshops love me!) I imagined this weiro would perch on Husband’s shoulder and watch Doc Martin or Parliament with him in the afternoons.
So why does this weiro keep interfering with my work? She has a cage on our enclosed veranda but, for most of the day, the cage is open so she can come and go anywhere in the house she likes. However, as my office is at the far end of this veranda, she keeps flying to me. At first I was flattered, but it’s not me she’s interested in; it’s the computer.
She watches me type something then drops from my shoulder onto the keyboard and tries to copy me! I take her to Husband but she flies back to me – well not to me but to my computer.
It’s sweet (actually, no, the sweet factor has soured somewhat); it’s also extremely irritating. I mean look at her in the photo below – she seems smug like she has just finished the first chapter of her autobiography or something.
So, due to the fact that this weird weiro keeps stepping on my keys, please blame her for any future grammatical errors, and any boring or offensive content. Her name is Buttons and – high alert – she is NOT my editor no matter what she tells you (this is just in case she figures out email – you never know with these clever-type birds).
jmgoyder 