constance | Houseguest

I don't have any updates as regards my neighbor, Miss B, actually. She's still in the hospital, and has called a couple of times in the past week, but I've been at my parents' when she calls, and phone reception isn't great at my parents' house. And she doesn't offer much information in her messages. Just that she's still in hospital, and can I make sure her Sweetie (yes, that's the parrot's name) is fed and watered. So I haven't managed to talk to her yet -- but at least she's not back in that absolutely unlivable house.

I've been calling my local council on aging at least twice a day since Tuesday, to no avail. I don't know exactly which two minutes per week they're open, but I haven't managed to reach them yet. Not even a voicemail system! The phone just rings and rings, and no one ever picks up, and every time this happens, I get a little more pissed off on behalf of the local aging. They don't even have voicemail! What kind of advocacy group sets themselves up so it's impossible to get hold of them? My mother's back home now, though, and has promised to talk to a couple of friends who do volunteer work to see what our options are.

In the meantime, I do have a bird update. I've been checking on Sweetie every couple of days, making sure she's got what she needs, knowing that she shouldn't be in the house at all, and last night I broke and decided that this morning I was going in to bring her home with me; I couldn't stomach the idea of going in every couple of days indefinitely, and I couldn't stomach the idea of allowing anything to continue on in that house when it was within my power to make sure it didn't. So I went in, first thing this morning. It took me ten minutes to get the cage from the hall to the door because the path and door weren't big enough to fit it through. Then I left her on my porch and went to borrow an ornamental cage from my mother, just to have something to put her in while I cleaned out the cage, which was about two inches deep in dried-out, bug-infested muck. I sprayed it down for about twenty minutes with a high-pressure hose, wanted to bleach it but didn't, since I expect birds react at least as well to bleach as everything else does, and left it to dry while I went to get some fresh birdseed. It was all-purpose birdseed, and I'm sure there's something better to be had, but I'll look into that soon -- does anyone have any advice on the care and feeding of parrots? She's eating, at least. Loves the sunflower seeds, tosses the dried corn straight onto the floor.

She was pretty freaked out when I moved her out of the house, and then from her dirty cage to the ornamental one, and then again when I moved her back again -- I was kind of freaked out, too, though, and I'm glad I thought to wear leather gardening gloves while handling her -- but for the most part she's pretty sweet, and seems to calm quickly. I cut up some little cubes of apple for her at lunchtime, and she took them from my hand, very politely. Here she is, in her clean and dry and I-hope-to-God-completely-bug-free cage, which is set up in my dining room so the other pets can't get too close (don't know how healthy she is, have my suspicions as to how likely they are to see her as a gourmet lunch).