Thursday 14 May 2009

No Place for a Nervous Budgie

If only I had had a camera. Yesterday afternoon I was walking along the ground floor corridor connecting the Humanities buildings. (Which looks like this -

- not very nice hey)

And I happened to look down and to the left, and I saw a little blue budgie standing in the corner with his face to the wall, looking uncannily like Phillipe in the inaugural instalment of Achewood. I bent down and put out my hand and little budgie turned around and walked onto it. Budgie was very tame and friendly and stood quietly and trustingly on my finger while I wondered what to do with him. In the lift back up to the 5th floor he kept doing little wriggly movements with his shoulders so I decided to call him Atlas Shrugged. Atlas sat placidly on my forearm while I rang the vet we take the cats to for instructions ('I rang for instructions', I mean, not 'we take the cats to the vet so they can be instructed', although that's probably not a bad plan). They suggested taking him to the local pet shop. At this stage I was still thinking it might be possible to reunite him with his owner. I considered ringing Today Tonight but thought better of it. As a last resort I called the wildlife sanctuary that's attached to this campus and they didn't want him either, although they did seem to say that they'd had other calls about little budgie that day. (Which means some mean person noticed him and tried to do something but in the end just left him to his fate.)

So I put him into an empty copier paper box and drove him to the pet shop. The pet shop owner said he was a male and put him into a private budgie suite. Last I saw he was having a drink of water and eating some budgie seeds.

So if you know of anyone who's lost their budgie in the Bundoora / Macleod area, direct them here.

10 comments:

Michael C said...

Is this an allegory for first-year undergrads?

lucy tartan said...

It's probably a more suitable one for what I have been wishing somebody would do for me, recently.

Michael C said...

A private budgie suite does sound cosy.
Come to think of it hiding in the corner is not common among first year students. They are more plover-like than the poor Atlas.

TimT said...

Alternative post title: budgie smuigglers!

Liam said...

Last I saw he was having a drink of water and eating some budgie seeds.At the Fountainhead, right?

genevieve said...

Yes, I want a budgie suite and a good lie down too.
Nice save, LT, and beautifully recounted as always.

Ben.H said...

Yikes! La Trobe flashbacks!

lucy tartan said...

Yes, the horror etc.

Helen said...

He was studying moral philosophy and you made him miss his tutorial.

Link said...

That's very sweet. I'm glad there is you. Poor widdle budgie.