We had two parakeets (one at a time) when I was a small child. The first one was Tony, and he ended up with arthritis in his feet from a wet perch. The next one was called "Pretty Boy". He could say his name, and a few other phrases as well. One time, when my mom was calling to my dad (whose nickname was Pinky) to get up for work, she yelled "Pinky, it's time to get up!" and Pretty Boy repeated it several times. Another time, out of the clear blue, he heard my sister's footsteps on the back stairs, and said "Vicki's home! Vicki's home!".

I believe I was responsible for the death of Pretty Boy (when I was small). His cage had been set on the back porch, in front of a screened window, to get some fresh air. I decided to give him a bath with a squirt gun. He died a few days later. :-(

Shortly after my dad remarried, my step-sister and her husband had frozen waterpipes in their mobile home. They were able to find a place to stay for themselves, but needed a place to park their lovebird for a while. We volunteered.

Lover was very tame, and loved to sit on your shoulder. If you had glasses, even better! She would sit on the earpiece and try to get behind the lens with you! She allowed you to kiss her forehead, and would gently nibble your lip in return. My sister did this with bright red lipstick one day - bad move! LOL

She was very good about returning to her cage to do her business. Very rarely did we have to clean up after her.

Because of the favorable experience we had with Lover, I told my dad I wanted to get a parakeet. My sister decided she wanted one, too, so we went to the pet store and picked out a pair.

We debated and debated over what to call them. We knew we wanted a paired name - "something and something". After much deliberation, we settled on Felix and Oscar, like the Odd Couple, in that we were pretty sure Felix and Oscar were both male. They were a bit young to sex-identify for sure, but we found out later that Oscar was a female, so name-wise, they were an Odd Couple!

I found the picture above on the Internet, in a public domain area. The two birds on the right look very similar to Felix and Oscar and I've put their names by them.

Oscar was mean, and wanted nothing to do with humans. Felix, however, appeared to be tameable. He would sit on your finger reluctantly, but he did it. You could pet him in the cage, too, while Oscar huddled in a corner and snapped her beak at you.

We would let the birds out to fly around every few days. Oscar pretty much stayed on the cage or the kitchen curtain, but Felix would wander around. Very often, he would sit on the living room curtains (the next room) and would chirp loudly, then quietly, as if he were chirping for both of them, over the distance! LOL

At this point in time, we had an elderly dog. Felix took great delight in buzzing Sam, knowing he couldn't be caught. When Sam died, we got another Irish Setter two days later. The first time Felix buzzed the new dog, he nearly got caught!

About a year after getting them, I noticed that Felix didn't look healthy, so we took him to a vet. It turned out he had a tumor in his mouth that was preventing him from eating. He needed to be put to sleep or have surgery. Since he was the more personable of the two birds, I opted for surgery.

The vet sent me home with special food and a feeding tube. I had to stick the tube down in his craw and feed him a liquid diet, to get Felix in better shape to withstand the surgery. After a week, I took Felix back to the vet. He had gained an ounce, which was very good, and looked much better. So Felix had the surgery, survived and did well.

But only for a few months. The tumor came back. The vet said that the only other option was to remove the part of the beak that was hosting the tumor, in the hopes the cancer would not spread, but that Felix would have problems eating from then on. I decided it was best to have Felix put to sleep.

After putting Felix down, Oscar seemed to get meaner, as if she might be missing having a bird companion. So we decided to get another parakeet, and in keeping with Oscar's name, this one we called Emmy.

They got along okay, thankfully! Shortly after this, my sister and I moved out of the family home and into an apartment.

She decided she wanted to get a cat. While I wanted one, too, I was hesitant about it because of the birds. But we went ahead and got Adolph. He wanted those birds so bad, he could almost taste them! LOL

We ended up putting the birds in the spare bedroom to keep the cat away from them. This worked out fine until winter. The spare bedroom ended up being very drafty, and Oscar caught pneumonia and had to be put down. So, in fairness to Emmy, we decided Emmy needed a new home and found a friend who would take care of her.