Yeah, so he's cute. He lives his life by his beak, as I suppose many of us do, except that most of us don't tend to try to shred everything within reach, and then throw it on the floor.
So.
My kitchen looks like a ticker tape parade, even though I sweep everyday. That's him above actively tearing at the paper that lines his cage. I place magazines inside a shoebox that has a little door cut out of it, so that he can go in there and root around and shred for hours. You know you need to replenish the magazine when most if it is on the floor and he is avidly searching other surfaces in destructo-mode.
It doesn't help SSW's boredom or my inability to keep up with the mess since Jonesy has been utterly unavailable for fun, as she has been studying for the Very Evil Exam, or the VEE. Soon the VEE will be done, and SSW will have his gab-pal back and they can chitter away like two school girls.
Meanwhile today, I, finally, in a small, manic cleaning episode, vacuumed out a kitchen cupboard, where SSW had taken over the drawer above the sieve, Cuisinart, salad spinner, and waffle iron. This was his first take-over of previous public space. He had moved into the drawer and was seen to poke his head out every so often amid the shredding of paper. The paper fell to the shelves below, and sometimes when I didn't hear him, I would open the door below and find him sitting on the colander, shushing me and making himself small and adorable. I let him do this for awhile, then he got bored with the drawer and I wanted the drawer back, so I closed it, and got him a shoe box. Then I discovered he gnawed his way through the waffle iron cord. Arg. And he's not sorry. He would do it all over again if he had the chance.
It's good we don't have cockroaches or mice (yet) from the far-flung crumbs I find under his large nighttime cage. You need the vacuum hose to reach and this is not going to be done every day, for it is a pain in the ass. (Read Providence of a Sparrow if you want to read about a great mouse and moth takeover of a home filled with free-range sparrows and finches.)
The dogs have learned where to scrounge for parrot biscuit bits and dregs of veggies. They help out in any way that they can.
No one but the humans in this house seems capable of tool use. For all the fur the pets shed and food they dribble, it would be swell if they would try and pitch in a little more. Their utter lack of thumbs makes them exempt from every having to learn how to use a broom or a vacuum.
They are very good at sleeping, though, if they could ever get paid for that.
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