Ziggy's Story by Ziggy, the Wonder Bird a.k.a "Poor Ziggy, poor little Ziggy"

My name is Ziggy, and I'm a Goffin's Cockatoo. I'm a pretty cool bird so I'm going to tell my own story. I live in Sussex and I'll introduce you to others that live with me, in their order of importance. First there is me, Ziggy ... then there is Gail (a human) and she is pretty important because she feeds me, plays with me and gets me lots of toys. Then there is Ollie, a seven year old Eclectus parrot. I like him because he plays with me every evening. And last, there is Indy. She is another seven year old Eclectus parrot. I put her last because she doesn't like me, and I don't like her much either.

Now, back to the beginning. I was hatched on August 4, 1998. My father and mother are "Awesome" and "Sam", who live in Dieppe with Diane and Aurel (Schofield). Diane and Aurel hand fed me for about three months. I remember I used to get food all over me and Aurel would brush me with a toothbrush. I really liked him. He held me a lot, so that I would become a "nice" bird. I have a little sister, "Scamp", who lives with Terri and Andy (LaBonte). When I was a baby, we went over to visit Scamp a few times to compare notes. I was the biggest! Aurel took lots of baby pictures. It hurts my feelings when people look at them and laugh. It wasn't my fault that I was bare naked, and my crop hung down below my knees.

When I was four months old, Aurel and Gail got to talking about me. They decided that I should live in Sussex (nobody asked me!). I was pretty anxious about the move, but when I got there, I found a big white cage with lots of toys, so I looked it over and hopped right in. Gail felt I might be lonesome the first night, so she slept on the chesterfield right next to me... and that was her first mistake! The next night, she thought she could go upstairs to her own bed, but I cried until she came back down. That worked great for several nights, but after a while she said "enough is enough!". Then I was all alone (Gail works you know), so my days were pretty long. I wanted other birds to talk to,, like I had before I moved.

Indy and Ollie have their own "bird room", it used to be a garage, and it is built right into our town house. Carpenters came in and remodelled it, and Gail decorated it, even painting a big mural on the walls with lots of parrots, it's real nice. Indy and Ollie have a big cage but they don't stay in it, they just go wherever they please. They have ropes to climb on, which takes them all over the bird room. I wanted to live with them. It sounded pretty good to me, until I learned that I would have to stay in my cage, because they are big and might hurt me.

It wasn't long before Ollie and I learned we could work together to get the doors open so I could get out and play on the ropes and play gym, while Gail was in Saint John working. The play gym couldn't have been much good, as it only lasted a short while ... it just gradually disintegrated. Ollie can't think of "fun" things to do, but I show him all kinds of neat stuff. I'm a fun lovin' guy, while he is quiet and reserved. We got to picking at the mural of the parrots. We tore big strips of gyproc tape off, now it has white strips through it in a few places. Gail seemed to be upset about that. She moved the ropes so we couldn't get near it any more. What a "Kill Joy"!

The next time Ollie let me out, I discovered a pinhole in the wall, where a picture hook had been. With very little effort, I made the hole bigger. Ollie came up to help me, and we made a big, big hole, and pulled all the fuzzy pink stuff out. Wow! What Fun!! Ollie has a large beak, he's really strong and can work really fast, once I show him what to do. Once the "pink fuzzies" were gone, I could see some fancy wires in the wall. I chewed through them until there was a big bang, fire and puffs of smoke.. It really hurt too. My face was black and scorched, you could smell burning feathers and beak, and my eyes hurt ... I was in deap shock! When Gail finally came home, I was sitting very quietly on the rope, near the big hole. She went right off the deap end, saying "poor Ziggy, poor little Ziggy" over and over again. She checked me over and put drops in my eyes. Every once in a while she would scold me saying "it's a wonder the house didn't burn down!" (she works in insurance you know). I didn't feel very good, and I was real quiet until later that evening when I said "Poor Ziggy". That got her going all over again, with all the billing and cooing. She called her brother, he taped the raw wires, and they took all the ropes down (darn it!). Indy and Ollie were not pleased about that, not one little bit, and they blamed "poor little Ziggy".

It was decided that padlocks were needed for my cage. The first one was a little luggage combination lock. It took a couple of days of steady work by both Ollie and me, to ruin that one. It had to be cut off with a hacksaw. Then came a bigger, more heavy-duty lock. Ollie and I learned that if we fooled around with it, we could get the door open just a little over an inch, enough for me to get my head out. Gail came home from work and discovered me lying on my side, with my head jammed in the door. She went into her act all over again, "Poor Ziggy, poor little Ziggy". She managed to get my head unstuck so everything was Ok, except I had a sore neck for a few days.

Indy was down in the bottom of her nest box most of the time, tending her eggs. One finally hatched, and I could hear him making little noises in there. I decided I would sneak through the hole and have a look at him, maybe he would like to come out and play. Indy came roaring up the ladder, her eyes narrowed down to pin points. I knew she was really mad, so I turned to scramble up the ladder and out of the nest box, but I met Ollie coming down, and I could see that he was really mad too. I jumped over Indy and landed down in the bottom with the baby. Was I ever lucky, because Gail came running in, opened the view door and snatched me out of there, just in the nick of time! One of them had pulled some of my tail feathers out and hurt my leg, so I limped around for a couple of weeks, saying "Poor Ziggy, poor little Ziggy".

That ended my days in the bird room, and now I'm in the living room all alone ... again. Ollie has forgiven me and plays with me every evening, under "close supervision". Indy's not so forgiving. When she gets a chance, she drags me around by my tail feathers, which is not much fun for "poor Ziggy". Now, all my doors are wired shut, except the main one, which is very secure with a third miserable padlock.

I'm an understanding guy, when I think Gail has had about all she can take, I turn into a cuddly, loving bundle of feathers. We snuggle and watch television. She thinks I'll grow out of my mischievous ways, but I'm in no hurry. I'm having fun! Long after she goes to bed, I'm still saying "nighty-nite" to her (which she likes). First thing in the morning, I greet her with "Hi Guys". When she goes to work, I'm sad, but I pretend I'm happy and cheerfully say "Bye-bye" and get to work on every toy that needs destroying. At the end of the day, I'm "Good little Ziggy!!"