Posts Tagged ‘Zulu’

And lets none of us shed a tear.

A disclaimer: I am generally anti-death penalty- I understand the whole “I don’t want my tax dollars to pay for that scum to live out his life in prison” argument, but (guilt or innocence aside) since the automatic appeals process costs 21 times just giving him 3-hots-and-a-cot, I typically fall on the ‘let ‘em rot in prison’ side of the fence.

But this guy? He’s a peach. Let’s see what he has to say for himself, eh?

Earlier in his conversation with the detectives, he attempted to explain why he had been enraged.

“She wasn’t calling me back, you know, and I know that sounds silly, but that’s the way it is,” he said. “I wanted her to talk with me. She wouldn’t talk with me.”

Magee chased his wife’s car in Tall Timbers, ramming it until she crashed into a tree, according to testimony from various residents who witnessed it.

Magee then walked up to her car. “Oh Jamie, no, no, no!” she screamed, according to Delbert Bryars, a neighbor.

Magee said he and his wife “were fighting over the gun and it went off.”

He shot his wife, point-blank, in the left temple with a 12-gauge shotgun, according to testimony and authorities. The shot blew the back of her head off, St. Tammany Chief Deputy Coroner Michael DeFatta testified Saturday.

“And then I looked at Zach. It was already bad, man, it was already bad,” Magee said. He shot his son twice, once in the back and once in the head, as the boy tried to run away, according to witnesses and DeFatta’s re-creation of the events.

Magee then fired his shotgun into the car where his two daughters were hiding. The shot hit Ashleigh, 8, in the shoulder. Aleisha, 7, likely was spared injury because she was playing dead in the back seat.

Explaining that final shot, Magee said: “I seen what happened to Zach and I just finished.”

Uh, question: if you’re “fighting over” a shotgun,hnow do you get shot point blank in the temple?

Then the coward ran. The cops chased him down in Florida several days later. That means you’ve got several states of good ol’ boys to pass through. Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana. Quite frankly, I thought the cops might lose a couple of pieces of ‘im before they got him back here…like, oh, maybe his head. But no. He made it here and through prison for the last two years and all the way to the trial.

Apparently he cried all day long while they deliberated over the death penalty. For himself, of course, and what a horrible life he’s had, and fear for his own skin. His parents argued that putting him to death would leave a hole in his two surviving daughters lives- that one day, they’d want answers and he wouldn’t be around to give them.

Personally, I don’t know if any amount of counseling would ever give me the strength to talk to the man who killed my mother and brother.

She was also my poor Zulu’s original owner, so I feel tangentially attached to this case. The papers hadn’t shown photos of any of these people, and seeing them was a bit of a shock, particularly Mr. Creepy there. And she and her son look sweet and kind.

When I wandered into Birds Unlimited that day, I found out that Adrienne’s mother had custody of the two surviving kids. She’d had a nervous breakdown over it, and the little girl was still in the hospital 3 months later. The mother and son were still in the morgue because the family didn’t have the money to bury them, and no one knew how they were going to pay the hospital bills. They were deep in debt and much deeper in shock, selling off everything they could, including Adrienne’s beloved birds, one of which was Zulu.

Please don’t get me wrong- I am in no way equating what Zulu went through with what the rest of the family dealt with. But I can still hear his little birdy voice booming in a deep baritone “WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!” and “BITCH!” and “I said shut UP!” It was a little slice of what went on in that house, and it sent chills up my spine. The terror in that house- human and animal alike- must have been beyond imagining.

It makes me appreciate Zulu’s spirit all the more- how he tried so hard to overcome his fears and trust again. Dr. Rich said that his crazy stress levels were no doubt largely to blame for his early death, and I’ll miss him always.

As for Jamie? I can’t imagine there are going to be many who miss him.

Rex and Zulu, Audubon Zoo’s white tigers, have about the cushiest jobs in the place, whether they’re relaxing in the grotto on a hot day:

Or just striking a pose while semi-hiding in the bamboo and bananas.

It’s clear they’re well named- Rex and Zulu rule over Mardi Gras Day, and these two clearly rule the roost.

I don’t want to go into too much detail, but it’s been a tough week. Many little things went wrong along with one massive and unforeseen thing.

A terrible accident has taken Zulu way way before his time. I have been more devastated than I could have ever imagined possible by the loss of a bird.

With the intelligence of a 5 year old, an ever increasing vocabulary and constant curiosity, Zulu seemed more like a person than a pet. Anthropomorphizing? Maybe, but it doesn’t make it any less true.

Ironically, Alison took two funny little videos of him the night before the accident. I haven’t been able to bring myself to look at them, but when I do, I’ll post them.

We buried him the garden, between the big angel’s trumpet and plumbago, near the bird feeders.

So that’s it. I just wanted to explain why, in this busy Jazzfest week, I fell off the turnip truck. I’m officially climbing back on now and getting back on track.

Sunday was quite the busy day. There were Mardi Gras Indians, romps around the city, dinner with friends, shopping for Alison.

Each of which pales beside something that took about 10 seconds to actually happen. Lunch was being delivered from a local sandwich place, so naturally the dogs went bananas when the bell rang.

This is S.O.P. If somebody ever just breaks into my house, the dogs will figure they must belong there but if the thief rings the doorbell first there’ll be hell to pay.

So dogs are freaking out. Delivery dude is leaning on the bell. I’m knocking everybody back so I can get to the kid to make it stop when…it happens.

In slo-mo : I push the dogs back and unlock the door, unleashing a final barrage of hopping and yapping. One of them loses their balance and topples backward into the bird cage.

Zulu is catapulted out of the cage, up into the air…and out the open door. He FLEW across the street, smacking into the house there, a distance of maybe 40 feet.

Understand that he doesn’t fly- his wings have been clipped since he was a chick. Without this doggie propelled shotgun blast out of his cage it wouldn’t have, nay, couldn’t have happened. I don’t think anyone was more surprised than he was.

Luckily there were no cars coming, because I bolted out after him, coaxing him out from between their fence and the house. “Peep.” he said quietly. “uh…peep.” This is not his usual tone. He was freaked. That made two of us.

He seems to be just fine, nothing hurt except his sense of world order. He stayed in the cage for a full 24 hours, refusing to budge.

And then he found a target. He decided he HATES this perfectly innocent Easter frog. He had been scared of it before, but I guess he’s decided he’s got to regain his manhood, so the frog is feeling his mighty wrath.

All the while, of course, the poor froggy continues to look chipper and thrilled to be there. Whatever, Kermit. You’re a therapeutic tool, and your life has been given up for the betterment of birdkind.

At great risk of loss of limb we began training Zulu this week. In the same packet that held his beloved caterpillars (only 3 left!) was my secret weapon- a clicker and training book!

Very dutifully I read it cover-to-not-very-distant-cover and felt fairly confident at trying this.

It came with a handy-dandy lucite stick to start with, and it was clear from the outset that he was a pro. Somebody, somewhere, has started this program with him. The first step is to get him to gently nip the end of the rod, click the clicker and give him a treat.

Well, clearly, he belongs in this household. He’s a praise whore who already knew all about grabbing the stick. But the food can disappear for all he cares, just sweet talk him (“Who’s a good boy? A very very smart boy?? Well, YOU are, of course!”) and he’s all yours.

All of this comes, however, at a point where his clipped feather wings are growing in, sparking great debate within the household. There are resources that say birds are happier, calmer, being in their natural state and able to fly.

Then, naturally, there are those who say the first group are crazy, and it’s far far better to keep them calm and clip their wings.

So we’re at an impasse on that one, and at the same time ready to move on to our hands being much closer on an ongoing basis. I have bandages and peroxide at the ready.

I know I cannot show fear.

I am firm and resolute.

Perhaps a small glass of wine before we begin…

So our vet suggested this site to keep the lad occupied. I wasn’t sure at first, but put in an order that just had to include the toy they swore every Grey loved.

Sure enough, here he goes, one second after it was put in the cage:

Somebody better tell him to be careful extending his neck with Thanksgiving around the corner.

And THEN he found the caterpillars. Read the rest of this entry »

Zulu has all kinds of foraging toys to keep him occupied, and usually they take him a day or two to figure out, but then there’s this treasure chest.

Damn that treasure chest. Two ‘keys’ have to be turned and then pulled out keep it ‘locked.’ It’s a clear yellow lucite, so he can see the nuts and things in there, taunting him. Once the bird’s pulled the keys the bottom drops down, allowing access to the goodies locked up inside.

Well, sorta. As it turns out, it’s made for a bird with a smaller head than Zulu…he can’t fit his beak in there to get at the treat. He tried valiantly for quite some time, stubbornly not allowing me to get my hands in the cage to try and help. HE was going to do it.

But if the beak don’t fit, you must submit. With a mighty PEEP! He came barreling out of the cage, and over to the outer door of his food (making sure I was watching, of course):

Ripped open the door, and flung the entire dish out, onto poor Kassie, asleep by the cage. Not that she cared much, she started eating it up straightaway.

Mission accomplished, he swung the door shut again as if it’d never happened and feeling much better about the whole episode.

“What is WRONG with you??”

…and while it’s true that he’s not likely to clean up after it, neither does my daughter, so six of one, half a dozen of the other, right?

Anyway, I’ve learned that Zulu being bored is a bad thing. The more he has to occupy him the better. He’s happier, and less nippy so I get to keep more of my blood on the inside, which I’ve come to appreciate is a good thing.

Read the rest of this entry »

Blech.

First up, bad allergy day. Drugs, groggy, grumpy. Ick.

Second, Robert Jordan died. You likely have no idea who he is. He wrote a Fantasy series called the Wheel of Time- 11 books out of 12 were finished, only one to go.

And he died. Of all the nerve.

8236 pages invested. 6.7 MILLION words. God knows how many hours.

I’m cranky. And yes, selfish. Absolutely.*

Perhaps Zulu’s caught my mood, and he ran at the camera this morning. The pic is a good representation of us both; the fluffing and head down charging thing is his “back off, I’m not in the mood” pose.

Anyway, maybe I’ll edit photos and suchlike instead today and let my ever-industrious assistant Nancy do the day’s asskicking. Works for me!

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*Well, not entirely selfish- it was a long, hard struggle for the man, and I?m sure his family?s going through hell. Jordan actually died of a horribly painful, rare blood disease called cardiac amyloidosis- prognosis for someone diagnosed with it is typically 4 years, tho he only got 18 months. Donations to the Mayo Clinic in his name have been going on for some time. He wasn?t the best writer out there, but he could still grab and hold on to you, and it’s hard to not appreciate someone like that.