Long Live Woolly Booger

Tribute to a Wonderful Timneh

5/20/01: Memorial Day, how appropriate because Woolly Booger died today.

I noticed she was not quite herself last Monday and started watching her closely. I discovered about a year ago that Woolly had ‘somehow?’ gone blind and that fact made me hesitant to say that she was definitely ‘off’. Blind birds act a little different, more tentative and not as aggressively playful, still she seemed a bit subdued. By Thursday night, when we met at my house for the Central Coast Avicultural Society board meeting, I was convinced that something was wrong and vowed to call Bear Valley Animal Clinic in the morning.

Laurie Bescoe answered the phone the following morning and gave me a 10:30AM appointment. Dr. Choy was her usual, gentle self and Woolly was very co-operative. Susan wanted to keep her in hospital because she was dehydrated and had lost some weight. My heart was clutching but, of course, I agreed. (Even though she died at the hospital I’m glad I let her stay there. If I had taken her home I would have always wondered if there wasn’t more I could have done.) I visited her on Saturday and she was very loving to me but not herself. When I spent an hour with her on Sunday she was very down and my tears soaked her little head. Dr. Choy called me this morning to tell me what she hated to say, “I’m so sorry, Tani, but Woolly Booger has passed on”. Do I have to tell you how much she will be missed?

Woolly and I were together for fifteen years. She was the first Timneh I ever hatched and, like me, an only child. (Her parents were together for many years after she was born but they never had any more eggs, let along babies.) I sold Woolly after she was weaned to a woman who never appreciated her and ended up buying her back for more than I sold her for a year later. My plan was to make her a breeder but that was not to be. Woolly decided that she loved no one as much as me and would have nothing to do with the eligible males that I paraded past her. I’m sure that, over the years, I have often referred to Woolly as ‘my pet’ but truth be known she was really my friend and companion. I also called myself her ‘pet human’ and I’m proud to wear that badge. You see Woolly Booger was a parrot of delicate and discerning taste. Lucky me!

Woolly was with me through some emotionally crucifying times. I don’t know if I could have made it without her help. I remember one time when I was laying on the floor just sobbing my heart out. Suddenly I felt the lightest touch on my cheek and when I opened my eyes she was standing in front of my face licking at the tears. As soon as I looked at her she cocked her head to one side and said, “Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh1” with such a sad tone that I know she understood and wanted to comfort me. She could inspire me to smile in my darkest hour.

We had a lot of fun together. I liked to take Woolly with me because she was so dependably cheerful and trustworthy. She has given kisses to hundreds of people without ever pinching let alone biting. She ‘rode the wild mom’ with genuine athleticism and she was a wonderful dancer. I like to sing and Woolly Booger had a great sense of rhythm. One of her favorite songs is called ‘The Snake’ and when I sang it she would make finger-snapping sounds with her beak as perfectly as a metronome, (she also did her ‘African dance’ with all the grace of a prima ballerina). Often, when I came to the end of the song she would add a “Phew!” Once I took her into the KOTR studio to make an announcement about our coming Bird Mart. The Disc Jockey, Richard-I, asked me if my bird could talk. I said, “Let’s see” and held her up to the microphone where she promptly made three ‘snaps’ accompanied by graceful head bobbing. Richard said, “Well, I guess snapping your fingers is good enough”; to which I replied, “Yes, especially when you don’t have any hands”.

Woolly’s sense of rhythm and her sense of humor combined to make her quite the ‘cut up’. She would sometimes exclaim, “Whee”, “Woo Woo” or “Whoopee”. She had a move that she made with her head that I called “Sneaky Snake” which looked like Stevie Wonder and she would use that to get my attention. If she wanted to sing and I didn’t she would try to get me started by dancing about and ‘snapping her fingers’; it worked every time. I’m a very poor whistler but, somehow, Woolly did a credible job and she would make up jazzy little ditties whenever the ‘spirit’ moved her. Woolly’s sense of humor was most apparent when she watched TV with me. I rarely watch anything that has a laugh track but I do enjoy comedy, especially a funny movie. I guess you would say that I have a ‘high threshold’ because it takes a lot to make me laugh out loud. Not Woolly, she laughed in the appropriate places even if it didn’t tickle my funny bone. Do you think she understood what was going on? I do.

In her youth, Woolly was more loquacious. She sang the ‘Booger Song’ to the tune of ‘Bonanza’ and had a number of words and phrases that she regularly used. Gradually she incorporated more sounds and gestures into her repartee and some spoken words fell by the wayside. She knew the power that words gave her and she doled them out like hundred dollar bills. One day I was ignoring her as she sat on the towel bar in my bathroom. She went through a dozen or so of her moves but got no response from ‘yours truly’ who was too busy putting on makeup. Out of the blue, she half turned towards me and announced, “Woogie, Woogie, Boogie, Boogie, Boogie”, which was so darn cute that it brought tears to my eyes. I swear she made it up. Another word that she invented was very popular with any bird who chanced to hear it, “Do-E-U”. Do-E-U was always said with such gusto that I have no doubt it was an exclamation of joy. To this day and for countless days to come, I can hear a joyful Do-E-U from the many birds who were lucky enough to hear my sweet Woolly shout it.

Woolly was far too dignified to live in a cage, although her accommodations looked like one. Indeed, Woolly had the ‘Booger Palace’ when she was upstairs with my husband, John, and I. In her ‘Palace’ she had many accouterments including her ‘Crystal Spa’ for bathing adventures. I can still see her as she daintily dipped first one foot and then the other a number of times before she abandoned any semblance of reserve and waded in. A terra-cotta wine cooler became her “Booger Tower” which was where she liked to sit and sculpt pizza cardboards into fanciful shapes. I always said I was going to do something with her creations but, of course, I never got around to it.

John has a Blue-fronted Amazon named Wego who also lives upstairs. She hated poor Woolly with a ‘purple passion’ and has thrown herself off her own cage in an effort to attack ‘the Booger’ as we walked by. Never the less Wego and Woolly had a relationship and I know her feathered adversary misses her. Woolly learned to say much of what Wego uttered and vise-versa. Among the phrases that Woolly learned were, “Why you, I oughta”, “Hey, hey, hey you little B------“, “Make the call”, “No way” and “Wo,wo,wo,wo,wo” like the three Stooges. (Wego was a rescue bird and came with that part of her vocabulary.)

The best trick she ever taught me was her ‘Cat Bird Trick’. She had a plastic recycling bin where she liked to hang in the bird room kitchen, high on a shelf, (the Booger Cave). She spent many a quiet hour there chewing on a cloth toy or meditating but she came alert whenever she heard me mixing baby food or cracking nuts. She would make her presence known by calling her name and I knew my lines by heart. I would say, “Where’s that little cat bird?” “I know I heard her.” “Woolly Booger, what does a little cat bird say”? To which she would immediately say, “Meow”. This earned her a nut and the acclaim of many a visitor to my Nursery.

During our monthly board meetings Woolly would referee. If emotions began to heat up she would call attention to the individual even before voices rose. Beginning with an occasional “Woo!” she would progress to “Phew!” at intervals throughout our discussion. This made us all laugh but if it didn’t calm us down she would eventually graduate to “PHEW, “Phew!”, “Phew!”, “Phew!”, “Woo!”, “Woo!”, “Woo!”, ”WHEE-OOO!”. She was a good weatherglass and I hope we can moderate our behavior and run our meetings without her good-natured intervention.

Dr. Choy is going to post Woolly and I will bring her home tomorrow. I plan to bury her under a yellow rose bush that I will plant by my bird room window where I can easily see it each time I look out. Yellow is for friendship and she was certainly my friend and then some. Companions like Woolly aren’t common. I’m very fortunate that I was able to know her and share the time we had. I will always love her and I believe that her spirit will live forever. I hope we meet again someday. Once, when Michele Baker and I were on the Dave Congolton radio show he asked me if I had anything to add to our hour’s commentary. I said, “Well you know Dave, Angels have wings and so do birds, maybe this is a coincidence but maybe not. Perhaps birds are little spiritual emissaries from Heaven sent here to guide and observe.” From the way he rolled his eyes I’m sure he thought I was putting him on but he was wrong.

Booger Haiku………

Far too brief

Our time together

My dear friend