Here I am in Key West, covered in parrots. In re: that white cockatoo:
I was sitting on the couch of the crazy place I was staying.
Tangent: “Crazy place” is an understatement. I was staying in a crack house – literally – on a quiet sleepy street. The crack house was this rambling place with patios and back porches, etc., making it seem like there was no legitimate interior. The rooms inside were filled with naked mannequins draped in beads, and they were everywhere. Not kidding. The wall was covered in colored tiles, there were wind chimes hanging everywhere. Random people went up and down the stairs with crack pipes. Don’t ask me how I came to be staying there. It’s a long story. I don’t do drugs. I don’t smoke pot, let alone smoke crack. Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore – (it’s notable that it was the lack of privacy that got to me, not the drug-fest going on around me) – and I moved into a cheap Holiday Inn. Where there were no parrots). This is also the trip where a group of friendly Hooters waitresses took me under their wing. Because CLEARLY I needed it. But that’s another story.
So anyway, back to the crack house.
One day, I was drinking a Bloody Mary, ignoring all the foot traffic from my comfy spot on the couch, and reading a book on the collapse of Communism, because of course that’s what you do when you’re visiting Key West and staying in a crack house with a naked mannequin looming over your head.
A white cockatoo, the one I’m cradling in my hands in the picture, strutted into the room. He stopped dead in his tracks, staring at me. I stared back at him. It was a standoff.
The parrot then shrieked, “YOU’RE A CUNT.”
It was tremendously rude and uncalled-for. We were best friends from that moment on.
Clearly an Australian bird.
Back in Providence we had an African Grey. They’re not boisterously rude, like cockatoos and Amazons; they’re cool, sardonic, and they bide their time. Instead of imitating generic human speech, they imitate specific people. She did my husband’s voice dead-on. (She loved my husband and loathed me; even though I had her for over 20 years, I’m not sure she was female; parrot-sexing is a Mystery.) I’d be in one room, talking (I thought) to my husband, and then I’d find out I was talking to the parrot. “How was class?” “What?” “I asked, did you have a good class?” “What?” Are you deaf?” I miss that bird.
Jincy – // “How was class?” “What?” // hahaha!!
this is all so interesting to me. I don’ t know anything about parrots and their characteristics/preferences. A friend of mine works in a parrot sanctuary and that’s as close as I’ve gotten.
African Greys are sardonic – that’s so funny! Like, they don’t get worked up about things? Are cockatoos more excitable?
and – putting aside the aggression of the words he said – what was my cockatoo doing in that moment? Was that a greeting? A friendly, “Hey, what’s up, you’re new here, who are you?” Or was he being territorial?
He ended up following me around from room to room. It seems that he liked me immediately.
Here’s a typical Grey:
http://jezebel.com/murderer-fingered-by-parrot-1798536658
Please tell me you’ve seen “Paulie”.
To quote Dad, “Nevah heard of it” – so I looked it up, saw the first sentence of the description, and burst out laughing.
I have to see it!!
GENA ROWLANDS
It’s wonderful.
wow. I’m on it!!
Sheila
Hahaha! So hilarious!
And in the middle of all this, “Reading a book on the collapse of Communism.” There are several stories in here I want to know more about including the Hooter’s waitresses.
For a short time about 2 years ago a big red, green and blue parrot, Ruby moved into a store across the street from me. I could hear him say “Ruby” and squawking from my window. I went down to see him with his usual crowd around him and said “Hi Ruby!” He turned and looked me dead in the eye and said in a really deep sexy masculine voice, “Well, hello there.” It was such an intense come on in this male human voice that it freaked me out and I stepped back. The owner said, “Oh he never does that till he knows someone, he likes you!”
// said in a really deep sexy masculine voice, “Well, hello there.” //
hahahahaha I can’t stop laughing.
Oh and yes, a gaggle of Hooters waitresses! With Southern accents!
I was down there on a weird adventure, trying to “look over” and protect (??) my ex – who was in dire straits. I had broken up with him and then he moved down there – but I was worried about him. I was right to be worried. He was doing some bad BAD shit down there. By going down there and trying to figure out what was happening with him – I put myself in danger. I tracked him down to a couple of places he was working and it was so sketchy – and illegal – that I backed off, and basically just wandered around Key West, tracking down Ernest Hemingway’s haunts, and Tennessee Williams’ haunts.
For about a week, my ex had bussed tables at Hooters. He had already been fired by the time I got there.
The Hooters waitresses had also all looked after him while he worked there – one of them bought him a pair of sneakers because his were falling apart – heart-crack. These women were wonderful. Really good people.
so I would stop by there to ask if they had seen him. They would crowd around my table, telling me how worried they were about him, what a nice guy he was (he was). They gave me lunch for free. They all gave me their phone numbers in case I needed anything. They were the sweetest women who were ever born!
Sheila
Oh yes, I remember those (heartbreaking) stories about that guy.
But the whole thing is so visual between the trip down there trying to find and save the guy, the crack house with the parrots, the waitresses, to only finding the haunts of Hemingway and TW, etc that I think you have a screenplay here for a strange road trip film!
Please excuse the intrusion:
//you have a screenplay here for a strange road trip film!//
Yes, and I really, really want to see it! What a story!
Sheila
I couldn’t sleep so upon the recommendation of ‘Paulie’ I found it on Youtube. It is wonderful! It’s a sweet movie, but not overboard on that and I laughed a lot. Everyone is great in it and with that said I do have to say, Gena Rowlands is on a whole other wavelength. Without any better dialogue or anything more extraordinary to do. Her delivery is always unexpected, different and original. And, like with all the great ones, I don’t know how she does it and without seeming to try hard at all or force anything. Great recommendation!
What a colorful episode from your life! Thank you for sharing and I agree, this should be a movie!