Pickles The Parrot Returns: My Continued Adventures with a Bird Brain (26 page)

I took Pickles back to the house to feed him
and Neil stayed outside. Later, he told me a couple of women, who
live down the street, walked by and asked if the parrot was
outside. Neil told them he’d just gone in and they were
disappointed because they had heard him earlier and were hoping to
visit him. Neil said, “Yeah, he can be pretty noisy” and one woman
said, “Not as noisy and annoying as some of the dogs barking in
this neighborhood!” Then Neil said, “Well, Pickles barks a lot too,
and she said “Yeah, but it’s cute coming from a bird.” Small
favors.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Quick update: We’ve started spraying Pickles
with a water bottle since I first wrote about the feather plucking.
It’s been about a month since we started and before we started,
Pickles was almost completely featherless on one whole side of his
chest. Now, I’d say there has been a 75% improvement. We didn’t
want to force him but we’ve tried making a game out of it and he’s
accepting it. So, it looks like it’s working but if it doesn’t, we
will be taking him on the long trek to the vet.

Georgi Abbott lives in the small town of
British Columbia with her husband, Neil, their Min Pin dog, Neeka,
and of course, Pickles. They spend most of their time working on
wild bird habitat in their yard and sitting around their trout
pond. Georgi took early retirement and has been working on her two
books the past year – Pickles the Parrot and Pickles The Parrot
Returns. She has been writing PickleStores for each issue of Good
Bird Magazine for the past few years and has penned some nature,
environment and conservation articles over the years.

www.picklestheparrot

Follow Pickles on Face Book -
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001506453441

Pickles The Parrot videos on Youtube.

Georgi Abbott, PO Box 629, Logan Lake, BC V0K
1W0

[email protected]

Since the First Book

“
I've been particularly
talkative and animated today while mom's been trying to concentrate
on writing her book.  I yelled at her and she told me "Put a
sock in it!"  I liked those words so I started yelling
"Sockinit! Sockinit! Sockinit!".  Mom got frustrated and
hollered "PICKLES!!!!" and I said "That's my name, don't put a
sock in it!”

“
Toast is confusing. 
Mom&dad made a toast when mom's first book was published. 
Mom tells me if I keep teasing the dog, I’m gonna be toast. 
Then in the morning, with breakfast, she asks if I want
toast.  I'm never really sure if I should answer
that.”

“
Soooo, mom had been saving
some of my feathers but they were kinda dusty so she washed
them.  Then dad washed a big jar that her dill pickles were in
and put them in there to keep them clean. She just went to pull one
out for somebody and all my feathers smell like pickles - Not
'Pickles', but 'pickles'.  She ragged on dad for not cleaning
the jar good enough but I found it kinda fitting.”

“
When I write my own book,
I’m gonna have scratch&sniff pages and also peel&lick
pages.  That way, if the book's lousy, people will still say
it smelled and tasted excellent!”

“
If mom plans on being an
author, I think she should start looking for a real
job.”

“
Now that mom's book is
finished & at the printers, I decided I should write my own
book. I have been working full time on it and after much thought
and effort, I have already chosen the font and numbered the
pages.  It's coming along beautifully.”

“
I'm getting pretty famous
because of mom's book.  I think they should make a movie about
me and make me the star of that movie.  But I heard the camera
adds 10 pounds so that would make me 11 pounds!  That
might make it a scary movie.”

“
Sometimes, when you read a
good book, it's like the writer is right there in the room with
you, telling the story.  So I just tape everything he says
rather than waste my time reading.  That way, I can play with
my toys while listening to a good story.”

“
Mom has finished the book
and it's now at the printers!  How bout a big square of
applause!”

“
Mom thinks her ancient
computer stifles her writing.  I don't think it stifles her
enough.  Probably the only people who buy her books are
the kind who moves their lips when they're reading.”

What a ride! So much has happened since
Pickles and I published the book “Pickles The Parrot” and what fun
we’ve had! It all started a couple of months before the book was
finished and while I was still working on it. I had already quit my
job back in May/2010 and decided I was going to finally write a
book about Pickles while I was looking for new job. People who had
been following Pickles’ antics through the stories I had been
writing for Good Bird magazine, had been pressuring me for years to
write a book about him, including Barbara Heindenreich, the
owner/editor of Good Bird. So, I began to write.

By August, as the book was winding up, I
sought a bit of a distraction and, on a whim, I started a Face Book
page for Pickles TheParrot. At first, Pickles’ ‘friends’ consisted
of family & friends and it was fun because everything we wrote
was from Pickles’ perspective and it incited some pretty
interesting and funny conversations. Of course, Pickles can’t
actually think and say, let alone type, the things he posts but I
try to stay true to his character and his wit and intelligence. If
Pickles could talk, you just know that’s the way he’d be. He’s a
deep thinker with a sick sense of humor. He can be demanding and
sometimes cruel. He has a touch of evil but mostly he just likes to
screw with your head. Aside from his tyrannical tendencies, he can
really turn on the charm and will even cuddle when he gets the
urge. But I see the way he scrutinizes things, thinks about things
and reacts to things. He’s a deep thinker with the ability to apply
his thoughts whenever physically and mentally possible. So, if he
could talk, I know damn well he would express things as I do, for
him. I am Pickles, and Pickles is me (on Face Book). I understand
him so well because I’m as sick as he is.

Not only do I begin to think I’m actually
Pickles but everyone he talks to starts thinking they’re actually
talking to a parrot. My mom, Zoe (Pickles’ Nana), wakes up every
morning to coffee and Pickles. She reads his posts, comments,
argues with him until she has to snap out of it and remind herself
it’s Georgi she’s talking to, not a BIRD! I get FB messages all the
time from people who say how silly that they always forget that I’m
behind the voice and they’re surprised at how easy it is to get
caught up in it. Indeed, one woman sent Pickles a nasty message,
demanding he stop writing such mean things about his mommy! I had
to forgive her because, honestly, I sometimes worry that I myself
might one day teeter over the edge as I take on his persona on
Facebook.

It didn’t take long for Pickles Facebook page
to catch on and before long he had over 1500 friends – most of them
as fun and weird as Pickles. His page got busier and busier to the
point it was hard to keep up, what with visiting our friends’ pages
and posting on our own – it takes time and effort to come up with
clever posts each day. Pickles even got engaged to a sweet and very
humorous Amazon named Fiona Happy-Tater who lives in
California.

Fiona’s mom, Tamber - bless her heart - even
came to the rescue when I was trying to develop the cover for my
last book. She did such an awesome job that I had her do this book
too. Blatant promo – Tamber makes the most beautiful jewelry and
often uses special little stones and incorporates birds into the
pieces. She does this for rescue centers and when you buy an item,
you can choose any place you would like the proceeds to go. You can
check her out at
www.etsy.com/shop/biggreenbirdstudio
The
networking that occurs on FB is mind-boggling and the parrot
community provides entertainment and camaraderie like no other.

The last year has provided more bonding time
between Pickles and myself. Since I wasn’t working and I was
writing books about him and posting on FB, it allowed more time
with him for observation and material. Neil and I have always spent
a lot of time with Pickles anyway but this provided more quality
time for us. I told Pickles I was writing a book about him and he
said “Now?” “Yes, Pickles – and you have your own FB page too! What
do you think of that?” “That’s crap” he responded. Oh well, I was
having fun and wasn’t about to let him put a damper on it.

I’d like to thank every one of Pickles’
FaceBook friends for all the advice, laughs and entertainment but
mostly I’d like to thank you all for making my first book such a
success. You bought the book, you reviewed it, you promoted it for
me on you own pages and I can’t thank you enough for being a part
of this.