My budgie, Peppy2, has gone to that great aviary in the sky. My wife and I were on the way out to do grocery shopping and neither one of us noticed that he was hiding in the hood of my winter coat. We should have checked before leaving the suite as he was always on me somewhere. His favorite spot was on my chest while I am taking a nap. He goes to sleep there when I nap. Anyway as we headed out into the parking lot he gave a couple of tweets and then disappeared over the roof of the building. Unfortunately the temperature was minus 16 degrees celcius and abudgie can't last more than twenty minutes in that kind of weather. If we had a visitor he would sit up on the curtain rod and grumble. When my grandchildren came and sat by me he would go and hide behind the plants and stay there until the children had left. He was extremely jealous of anyone getting near me or my wife. He loved to sit on my wife's hand while she peeled potatoes and would nip her if she didn't let him have a bite or two of the potato. We couldn't turn on the tap because he immediately wanted to play in the water and if you said no he would go sit on the top of the cabinet and sulk. When i went out to feed the sqirrel he would sit by the window and whistle because that was the way I called the squirrel. If he saw the squirrel whille I was watching Tv or doing something else he would fly around my head and then head to the window and whistl. If I paid no attention he would keep repeating it until I went to the window. He also would groom mine and my wife's hair. I know I am being maudlin and sentimental but I miss him. My grandaughter ,who is due to have a baby, went and searched the neighborhood for an hour nand then posted signs wherever she could all to no avail. Two days later my third oldest daughter went searching in spite of the fact that I insisted that he was done for. This happened about twoo weeks ago and my wife still gets up in the morning to change his water bowl until she remembers he is no longer here. He would have been about six years old now. My great grandson wanted to hold a wake and invite all our friends and relatives. When his mother told him no he said,"You do it for people when they die, wasn't he a part of the family?" With that kind of logic it was hard to say ,"No." I told him to go outside and quietly say,"bye, bye Peppy 2 and that wherever Peppy2 was he would hear him." My great grandson, who is no dummy, said,"Yeah, right grandpa," shook his head and walked into the kitchen for a root beer. My wife laughed so hard that tears were rolling down her face. Thatt's pretty much the news around here. I am thinking of secretly buying another budgie if I can be sure my wife won't throw something at me. She said that, There will be no more pets, period." Should should I dare?