The bird is the word

So I bought this bird for the cats several months ago when I was still in my old apartment. I found it in the pet aisle at the grocery store. According to the packaging, it "chirps." So I brought it home and tossed it onto the floor; it chirps out two identical verses. Luanne hid from it immediately, Oliver couldn't have cared less, and Teen Baby wasn't sure what he was supposed to do with it.

Eventually, Luanne decided this chirpy, jingly thing was probably okay, because it had FEATHERS, which she took maybe a day to pull completely out. The bird brought out the true wild cat in her, and she would hoard it, defend it, then sit by it once she was done catching it 80 billion times a day. One day I couldn't find it and suspected she probably hid it from Oliver and Teen Baby (even though they didn't care about it). So quelle surprise to see it fall out of some wet laundry on its way to the dryer. It dropped from inside some jeans back into the washer...and it still chirped when it hit the bottom. It had been wingless for awhile (because those were the feathers, and the spots where those were stitched on had broken open to reveal the white plastic box inside the felt, obviously the home of the chirper). So back upstairs it went to be released back into the wild.



I don't know the exact day the bird eventually "died" but it did. I tried to resuscitate it by dropping it on the floor over and over, but the only noise was a dull clunk from the chirper mechanism. Luanne, I figured, would surely not give a hoot about it anymore if it didn't show any signs of life. A few nights later I woke up to Luanne's meowling, the same meowling that accompanies her carrying around fresh kill (mousies). I yelled out "Luanne!" to see if she would quiet and I heard a little clunky thud. HMM? When I turned on the light, there was the birdie next to the bed, at her feet. OK, so she had no problem with its lack of wings or noise, and from then on she would alternate bringing that or a mousie over to me to play fetch (Luanne will play fetch FOREVER).

I did eventually buy another new chirpy birdie when there were more in stock, and mute birdie still of course has a forever home with us (and still gets more play than the one that yaps). Both have accompanied all of us to the house, but the only one Luanne still really cares about is the mute one.



As karma would have it, the other day immediately after Dorothy witnessed Luanne playing with HER pink mousie, Luanne then had to tolerate Dorothy finding, beating up, and killing HER mute birdie.


I'm squeezing. Why isn't it making any death noises?


It's still moving! (NO, I AM NOT DOING THAT MYSELF)


Listen here! I am taking you somewhere to kill you.


Wo--! Wha? How? You @#$%.


Are you dead? Hmmm, maybe I DID squeeze hard enough.


[Sigh...] OK, what now? I'm bored.