My Buddy ran away from home !!!!!

When my son was seven years old, I gave him the choice of a Nintendo or a cockatiel. Okay I know that was kind of a weird choice, but he had seen the birds in the store and the bird was a lot cheaper than the video game. Sooo I kind of manipulated a seven year old and we took home the bird for his birthday. Buddy spends most of the time in the corner of the entry way to our home. Other than feeding him everyday and cleaning his cage everyweek, he doesn't get a lot of attention. He whistles a lot, usually wolf whistles. The babies like to talk to him, and dear husband gets him out occasionally and sneaks him Tostitos. But, for the most part he's kind of a decoration.
His name is Buddy, but most of the time he's referred to as "bird". I was cleaning Bird's cage on Wednesday. In the Summer I put him out on the Patio while I clean the cage. The sunshine kills the mites and it gives him a change of Pace. I didn't quite get the whole bottom of the cage on to the table, I was a little distracted as usual, Bird fell off his perch and flew out of the bottom of the cage where it was open off the edge of the table. Now, Bird has never flown farther than from one side of the living room to the other. Even then he usually hits a wall and ends up being scooped up from the floor. Somehow in his first solo flight in the great outdoors he managed to go all the way across the street into the big tree in the neighbors back yard.

Dear Daughter jumped the fence to go after him. I called dear husband who left work and went to assist her. Neither of them could see him in the tree. I left a message on the dear neighbors phone to watch for him, and to not let their dogs eat him. I really thought he was gone. Dear Daughter #2 two figured he had probably just kept flying. Dear Granddaughter just kept saying "Bird Free, Free". I finally figured out she meant "Bird, Tree, Tree". I was just starting to have visions of Bird enjoying his retirement years in the Bahamas and never having to vacuum up bird seed again, when I was outside shaking the rugs and heard a distinct and very familiar wolf whistle. "Bird" I yelled, "Come home". Of course all I got back was a wolf whistle, so I whistled and he whistled, this went on for a few minutes, and then it got really quiet again. I guess it was around 8:30 that night, the dear neighbor called. Bird had been spotted in their tree above the garage. Dear Husband ran across the street, dear son zoomed home from where ever he was, someone found a butterfly net, dear neighbors husband, who also happens to be the Chief of Police, climbed up on the garage and proceeded to scare bird out of the tree into another neighbors tree. Permission was granted to go after bird in that neighbors yard, so dear husband, dear son, and all the neighbors kids converged on this neighbors back yard with net in hand. Unfortunately they couldn't see beak nor feather belonging to bird. Dear husband was about to give up and try again in the morning. Bird apparently didn't want to be left in the great outdoors, because he chose that moment to whistle. It was one of those "Did you hear that?" conversations. Then another whistle and they had him spotted. Out came the pole and the net. This time they managed to chase him onto the roof. Dear Husband climbed up on the roof but was still unable to get him into the net. I guess finally bird just decided he'd had enough and flew to the ground. Dear Son was able to just pick him up at that point. There was lots of cheering and back slapping. Bird seemed glad to get home to his cage and birdseed. He was one tuckered out Cockatiel.

I saw my neighbor, the Chief Of Police, at the park. He told me to take better care of my bird. Next time he would have to give bird a ticket for disturbing his peace.