Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Sniffle . . . Sniffle . . . Sniffle . . .

At approximately 9:36 p.m., our doorbell rang. The gong sounded more ominous than usual. Aaron answered the door. "We heard you have our bird!" a deep voice said.

The man followed Aaron into the study to identify our feathered friend. "Yes. That's him," he said gruffly.

"Him? Her name is Hannah!" I shouted in my head, already envisioning how I was going to break this sad news to the kids in the morning.

Goodbye, Hannah. Goodbye bird poop. Goodbye happy children.

The bird done flew the coop!

4 comments:

Mary Todd said...

Dear Vanessa,

In the world of ornitholigy we would describe this event as a birdnapping (and not the kind where our little friend is sleeping in her cage). Bird predators can be a neighbor, a stranger, or even your favorite hairdresser.

I was apprehensive about one final suggestion that might have worked to keep Hannah and that was disguising her as a seagull. However, the cage was probably too small and the costume may have been suffocating.

As we say in our small ornitholigy department at the University of Utah, "Our thoughts and feathers will be with you."

Mary

The Everyday Housewife said...

Thanks, Mary, for all of your love and concern. I like your idea about the seagull costume, but received the message after Hannah was already taken. The seagull's wing span would've been longer than the cage, so the bird predator may have become suspicious. I may use that idea the next time we find someone else's bird in our maple tree though. Thanks again!

Sincerely,
Vanessa Heber (a heartbroken ex-bird-owner)

The Heaton's said...

The girls were a little disapointed when Nyah told them you didn't have the bird anymore. Are you still planning on getting another one?

bryan said...

I think it's time Aaron make good on that promise for the replacement bird.