Picture from “Adweek”

I have a dirty little secret. Well. It isn’t dirty; rather it’s a very clean secret.

Now you all know that I’m the thrifty sort. I come from a long line of toothpaste tube squeezers, “Use the Celery Tops in Soup” makers and “You know…you wash those out and you can use them again…” kind of background. Don’t get me wrong. I can be the “girliest” girl at times. I like to smell nice, look pretty and I love shoes. Love shoes! I kind of feel the same way about shoes and boots that Mozart did about wigs:

But in order to have the limited amount of “nice things” I do have, I need to cut corners. And believe you me, I have learned how to do this. One of them is a secret I have been somewhat quiet about for the past two years. It lives in my shower. It flies in the face of “decadence.” And it saves animals. But

I’m gong to tell you now. “Does she or doesn’t she?”

Why yes! Yes. I do. I use Dawn liquid dish soap as a shower scrub and as a shampoo.

I can hear you now:

I don’t know how much Dawn liquid is. All I know is that I can get a pant load of it on sale for about a fifth of what I would pay for “Designer” stuff at the “Shower Store” at the mall. How much is shower liquid? I don’t know. If someone gives me some as a gift, it makes me happy. I love sandalwood. But I’m not about to shell out 12 bucks for a bottle of the stuff so I can smell like it while I’m battling with people about turning off their electronic devices on a 757 to Caracas. I really don’t think it’s worth the investment.

And to be honest? As long as I’m clean, I simply don’t give a damn. Dawn also has its own wonderful properties. First of all, they use it to help clean up wildlife. I like that. And if you think about it, if it can clean up an oily pelican, don’t you think it will clean your “bits and pieces?”

It smells clean, it feels good and it works. Relatively speaking, it’s cheap. It doesn’t dry you out like bar soap does and you step out of the shower feeling good about yourself and about pelicans. Now if it works on an oil-soaked penguin, why wouldn’t it work on you?

I know it sounds weird. But trust me. It works. It smells good and lathers up a storm. You don’t need much so it goes a LONG way.  Makes you feel positively “fluffy.” It does the job. They support a great cause. What’s not to like?

I like the Dawn people because of what they have done. There’s a lot more otters, pelicans and other creatures alive today due to the Dawn people.

So, if you think about it, you’re not only saving money, you’re helping to clean up wildlife we screwed up. Now get out there and buy some Dawn, drag it into your shower, lather up and save some money. Long live suds!

Want to see more from Hagen? Click on Rudy’s nose!

I’ve been getting a workout every morning driving down I95 to Miami Airport, to fly hither, thither and yon. If you’re unfamiliar with I95 south to Miami at morning rush hour, it’s not unlike the boat trip up the Nung River in the film, Apocalypse Now:

And of course, being as it’s Christmas time, there is a downpour of Christmas music on the radio. One morning while I was busily avoiding a pile-up involving what appeared to be an EPA field inspection vehicle and a toxic waste hauler just south of Hallandale Beach Boulevard, Gene Autry’s version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer began playing. And I began thinking about the lyrics because they bothered me.

 I don’t know if Santa’s reindeer are girls or boys but they’ve always bothered me. Such snobs! Even when I was a kid, I thought they were just so “Junior High.”

 You know Dasher and Dancer

And Prancer and Vixen,

Comet and Cupid

And Donner and Blitzen.

But do you recall

The most famous reindeer of all?

 You know what? You guys are a bunch of snotty brats. Jealous, mean and “nose-ist.” Just because Rudolph had a nose that glowed, and was big and red, you had to be mean to him? Nice.

Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer

 Okay, so maybe he has sinus issues.

 Had a very shiny nose

 Nothing a little powder wouldn’t fix.

 And if you ever saw it

You would even say it glows

 I don’t know what the issue is here, but there’s no reason to pick nits.

 All of the other reindeer

Used to laugh and call him names

 (Bitches…)

 They never let poor Rudolph

Play in any reindeer games

 Am I the only person that ever noticed this? He may get picked last, but he should at least be allowed to play.

 Then one foggy Christmas Eve

Santa came to say,

“Rudolph with your nose so bright

Won’t you guide my sleigh tonight?”

 This must have done wonders for Rudolph’s self-esteem.

 Then all the reindeer loved him

 (Two-faced, brown-nosing, social-climbing battle axes…)

 And they shouted out with glee,

“Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer

You’ll go down in history!”

 Coattail riding, antler-knocking, Real-Housewives-of-Orange-County, “Whoo-Hoo!” screaming harridans. They’re just seeking approval from the Big Man in red.

Cartoon Brew! 

Now this isn’t fodder for kids. It teaches a bad lesson and I can’t believe we let them get away with it for as long as they have. Now it’s just my opinion, but could someone re-write this stuff and make it a bit more politically correct?

And it’s not that I’m into being entirely politically correct in a huge way.  While a stereotype may be a general impression or picture of something; right or wrong, it might just be somewhat accurate.

 But this isn’t stereotyping poor little Rudolph as being the underdog that makes it to the big time because he has heart or guts or spunk. He has a physical deformity that ends up being exploited by someone else for their own gain.

 However, I’m sure Rudy was thinking, “Whatever shuts up those two-faced, social-climbing caribou and gets them off my back is fine with me.”

I can’t blame him. I hope your Holiday season is going along swimmingly. And don’t forget: “Never get out of the boat.”

The problem is that I have very little drawing ability. Photographs have had to do.  I’ve made a few of them and hope you get a laugh.

This news release was just posted by Best Friends Animal Society. Media Relations Manager Barbara Williamson just emailed it to me and asked that I post it here on “Parrot Nation:”

Exploding parrot population in U.S. will cause crisis, predicts national

Best Friends Animal Society

National animal welfare organization Best Friends Animal Society

http://www.bestfriends.org

has long advocated for homeless pets and parrot experts at the Society’s sanctuary say the pet

parrot population explosion is troubling:

http://www.prweb.com/releases/Parrot/crisis/prweb8847401.htm

Mattie at the Vet's Office before her surgery

What a weekend. It’s been pretty tense around here. Mattie the dog started going downhill over the weekend and completely lost her appetite. She wasn’t moving around, she was listless and didn’t even want to go out. As soon as my Vet’s office was open, I called them and made an appointment.

Mattie is an old dog, a Shih Tzu I found in my parking lot. She was dirty, matted and had multiple infections. 600 bucks later, I had a dog on my hands instead of this limping train wreck: 

Mattie, minutes after I found her in the parking lot.

Like the fungus they found in her ears, she grew on me. I grew to love her. She’s old, stately and quiet. More like a cat, she prefers to lie around, yet she perks up when there’s food around. She’s a good dog and even goes on appearances with me when it’s possible. Here we are at a Petco kissing hands and shaking babies for BIRD TALK:

This weekend, that wasn’t happening.

I got her into her Vet and Dr. Bob Schactner started working, trying to find out what the issue was. We figured it out. After X-rays, we knew she had something in her intestinal tract, but we didn’t know what. Mattie doesn’t play with toys and she’s old so she isn’t much for doing much investigation. She goes out, does her business and we go back home.  But there was something stuck in there. Bob went right to work. Time for surgery. We were hoping Mattie would live through it. She’s no spring chicken, but whatever it was, it had to come out.

I went home to wait and worry. Bob said it would be about an hour. An hour passed. An hour and a half. At two hours I was wigging out. But finally he called. Mattie was stable. He had found one nasty looking hunk of something in her bowel just beneath her stomach. And it had perforated her bowel in two places. The object to the right of the quarter is what he pulled out of Mattie’s gut:

We have no idea what it is. It’s not metal, but it has the consistency of plastic. But it stinks to high heaven and seems organic. God knows where she picked it up or even what it is. Mattie is in the hospital on an IV with antibiotics and fluids with glucose.

She had a tough time snapping out of the anesthetic:

Here is John, a vet tech that helped Mattie. (Yeah, I know…he’s hunky) :

And she’s still not out of the woods. She survived the surgery and she survived the first night. She’s a tough little dog but I’m still worried. I want her around for a good while longer.

Have you ever met a person who just isn’t cut out to be a bird person? You know what I’m talking about. We’ve all met them. They have no business having a parrot in their home. You know this in your bones and can feel that understanding in the deepest darkest reaches of your soul. You know this as well as you remember your own name.

They. Should. Not. Ever. Have. A Bird. Ever.

But why? Why shouldn’t they have a bird? I have listed some reasons below, the imagined quote from the person acquiring the bird and a few comments:

No time:

“They’re so little! They should be easy to take care of, right?”

(Sweetie, you think you’re short on time now? Get a bird and you’ll see how little time you have…)

♦ ♦ ♦

No patience:

“This should be a snap! He can just stay in his cage! They like that, don’t they?”

(I’ve seen you throw a fit when the person giving you a pedicure used the wrong shade of polish on your toes. Get a bird and that pedicure money is going to end up being used for food. Or toys. Or perches. Then you won’t have to worry about what the hell shade she used, because you won’t be able to afford to get a pedicure.)

♦ ♦ ♦

You know damned well they have no idea what they’re getting into:

“Awwww! He’s so cuuuuute! I want one!”

( Ummm, no you don’t. We’ll see how cute you think he is when you don’t train him and he’s hanging by his beak from your earlobe.)

♦ ♦ ♦

They’ve already unloaded the first two birds they ever had:

“Well, I think I just got a couple of bad ones. This little one seems kind of nice.”

(And now you’re getting ready to screw up a third bird. Great….)

♦ ♦ ♦

They think it’s a “cheap” pet:

“How much can they eat, right? And seed doesn’t cost very much, right?”

(How do you feel about selling all of your hideous knock-off designer purses in a garage sale?)

♦ ♦ ♦

They have no idea what they eat, and just think seed is fine because that’s what they “heard” you should feed birds:

“They just eat seed, right?”

(No comment here. Just the sound of my head banging against the wall: Wham! Wham! Wham!)

♦ ♦ ♦

They want to give one to someone else as a Christmas or birthday gift:

“Oh, he’ll love this little guy! And I’ll also buy a bag of seed and put it in a Christmas stocking! That’s a really cute idea!”

(Continued head banging…)

♦ ♦ ♦

They think because a bird is relatively small, they aren’t much work and won’t take up too much space in their apartment:

“I think I have space in the back utility room. It’s nice and dark back there. He’ll like that right?”

(The answer is, “No. No, he won’t like that, you blithering idiot.”)

♦ ♦ ♦

They were a big fan of the show, “Baretta:”

“Fred was soooo cute! They just do those tricks naturally, right?”

(I’m in pain now. If you don’t shut up and do some research, I’m going to end up going completely through this wall.)

♦ ♦ ♦

They refer to a Cockatoo as a Cockatiel. Or they reverse that:

“Those are like parakeets, right?”

(Could someone call the paramedics? I seem to have damaged my frontal lobe.)

♦ ♦ ♦

They want one just like their neighbor’s bird because he can do tricks and he talks. You ask them what kind of parrot their neighbor has and they answer, “Green:”

“He was just the cutest thing. And he could swear and everything!”

(Gee, how cute. I’ll bet he’s a big hit at the church picnic. Why is the room spinning?)

♦ ♦ ♦

They like the idea of a bird as a pet because they don’t need to be walked:

“You see, if I get a bird, they don’t have to go outside and they’re easy, because they don’t need much work or attention. And they’re small, see? So no barking and they’ll just sit there and chirp and…”

(No comment. Just the sound of an ambulance siren slowly fading away.)

Good God. First, I decide I’m not going to the Houston Parrot Festival. I can’t take the time off of work. I need to save money for a new computer and the second generation iPad that everyone said is going to be so sleek and sexy. So I need to fly more and stay home and not go to the Festival.

I find out the maintenance on my condo has gone up. So I can’t go, because I have to shell out money for that. I need to work more. So I can’t go.

I need to start cranking out the quizzes and the “Memos” for BIRD TALK so I shouldn’t take the time out and go to the Festival. So I can’t go.

Irene Pepperberg is coming to Florida for a fundraiser for The Alex Foundation and that’s pretty important to me and that’s going to cost some money, so I can’t go to the Festival.

This time of year is always rough on me because my condo insurance, my car insurance are all due in December which is when Christmas comes. So I can’t go.

I have to prepare for the “Chop” Demo I’m giving in April at the Midwest Bird Expo and coordinating that is going to be a nightmare. So I can’t go.

And I made a bunch of feather items that I could just send so they can be auctioned off. I could simply pop them in a box and send then to Cheryl Rose, one of the Festival Coordinators. I’m sure they’d be glad to arrange to put them in the auction for me…

Screw it. I’m going.

Link: Houston Parrot Festival