by Patrick Corcoran

Created on: September 28, 2008

With the exception that there was no loss of life and it wasn't Valentine's Day, it was an incident that could easily have surpassed the Valentine's Day Massacre.

My wife likes birds as pets. That in itself is hard for me to understand. I'm not into pets that don't perform a function or contribute to their upkeep. For instance, I've owned many horses and I obtained great joy from riding them or watching them run across the field on a snowy morning. The dogs I've owned have helped me at getting horses on the trailer or herding our cattle.

But what can a bird do? I mean besides poop outside the cage and make hideous noises, what good is it?

This is the argument that existed between my wife and me for years. I had managed to win this debate until one day I finally gave in. It was near Christmas time several years ago and I made the mistake of asking my wife what she wanted as a present. I had no idea she would use the spirit of the season for such a diabolical plan as to request a bird.

It must have been the eggnog or the season of giving and all that nonsense because I said, "Yes." I added a caveat though. If we were going to get a bird I wanted one that actually provided entertainment or performed some kind of function. She mentioned a parrot that talked. I researched the idea and discovered that the best talker was an African Gray Parrot. For those of you who don't know what an African Gray looks like it's a grotesque little bugger that stands about 11 inches tall and is all gray with red tail feathers. The best way to describe it is to say it resembles a small vulture.

We decided to contact the most reputable bird dealer we could find within a day's drive of our home. That turned out to be a bird farm in Pennsylvania. We entered the facility and were immediately impressed with the operation. The people there told us that they don't sell birds but they consider it more like an adoption process. They require you to do research and make sure you know what you're getting into. They also require that the buyer get a very young bird that can be bottle fed for bonding purposes. Okay I'll play along with this for a while.

My wife was really taken by the entire experience, walking around looking at and interacting with many types of parrots. I was looking at prices and going into sticker shock! We then had to meet with a bird counselor. Yep! A bird counselor! As she talked to us I had a difficult time trying to keep my composure. I was suppressing a colossal belly

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