Posts Tagged ‘Peacock. peahen’

It’s automated

Wednesday, October 12th, 2011

By Tiber

We are horrible people.

Lots of us were home today when Dad had his business meeting.  And did anybody remember to ask if the visitor had a blue car? Of course not.

We realized it when the inevitable piercing metallic shrieks began.

Yes, because of my soft-hearted mother and my sister, Iris Nell, we still have the two peacocks and yes, the male still will not mate with the, uh…full of  fun and personality-  oh, who am I kidding, ugly-ass peahen.

So, on at least three occasions, he has tried to tap blue cars.

It can’t be comfortable for him but, clearly, he’s too focused on his mission to care.

By the time I got out there, Cook was trying to remove the bird with a broom. Brunty, the butler, had brought the first thing he could find and he was throwing after-dinner mints at it.  My parents haven’t used the mints lately and they’d gotten hard, so they weren’t dislodging the bird so much as further denting the car.

I’d brought out a new package of socks so you can see how astute we all are in a sudden emergency.

Nothing worked anyway until the peacock was done. Dad’s business meeting was pretty much done too.

The last time this happened, my sister, Vanessa, told Iris Nell to just make the peahen some sexy lingerie and try to put a stop to this. Now, I think it’s too late even for that. After awhile, a man simply develops a new type.

Halloween’s coming up and I think the best thing we can do is to put Iris Nell to work on the costume front…and dress up the peahen as a sleek, new, 2012, blue Lamborghini.

Spring is in the air and the peacock’s on the car

Monday, March 28th, 2011

By Tiber

We are idiots.

Mom had a visitor this weekend and nobody told the woman not to park her blue car out in front since the peacocks were loose. And two seconds later, we heard that horrible, metallic, grinding noise as the male peacock got a crush (let’s say) and proceeded to almost crush the visitor’s car with love.

As you know, the peacock is not alone. We have a peahen but, well, she may not be quite as attractive as-oh, who am I kidding? The peacock took one look at her and ever since then, he’d rather tap blue cars.

Remember the last time he tried to have sex with a blue car and Kru’s date was still inside?

“Oh, my God! She’s going to be the chewy nougat center!!!”

Iris Nell has never been able to find another good home for the peacocks so she insists that we keep them. But since Dad had to pay for the damage to that car and Iris Nell makes animal clothing, Dad told her she’d better make the peacocks some tiny Salvation Army outfits.

“Because if this happens again, the three of you are going to stand on a street corner with a bucket and collect some money to pay for everything!”

Well, now it’s happened again. Instead of the Salvation Army outfits, though, my older sister, Vanessa, rolled her eyes and told Iris Nell,

“Just make the peahen some sexy lingerie and get it over with!”

This probably shouldn’t be just Victoria’s secret. I’m thinking that if Iris Nell really does start making hot underwear for our bird, maybe we should keep this everybody’s secret. 

Don’t Be Blue

Friday, July 2nd, 2010

By Tiber

Now I feel sorry for my brother, Kru. Through his cat sand delivery business, he met a girl he liked named Pippy and he invited her over here for dinner.

Kru’s nothing if not brave. I mean…he invited Pippy over here for dinner.

Amazingly enough, everything with us went well. My sister, Iris Nell, didn’t grill her on whether or not she swats flies who get into the house or escorts them out “properly,” wearing pastel-colored cotton gloves.

Duncan’s triplets, who must have a fever or something, never once made their eyes glow red or levitated over the table.

And even Brunty, the butler, didn’t drop a soup tureen on her head.

So Kru was on his way to a second date…until we forgot about the peacock.

As I’ve written before, Mom brought home a pair of peacocks who needed a home, which was a great gesture but a bad reality. The peahen is, to put it nicely, homely, so the frustrated male tried to have a relationship instead with a blue Porsche that belonged to one of my father’s business contacts. Twice.

Ever since then, Dad’s been after Iris Nell to find the peacock a new home but, unsurprisingly, she hasn’t been successful. We should have remembered about the blue car, though. Every blue car. A blue car like the one that Pippy had driven here.

As she started to leave, we all heard that unmistakable, shrieking and peeling back of a 2 ton sardine-can lid noise and we realized that the peacock was having a “special moment” with Pippy’s car. The difference this time, though, was that Pippy was in it.

“Oh, my God!” yelled Erin. “She’s the chewy nougat center!”

Everybody raced outside to try to yank the bird off the roof of the car, all the while with Iris Nell screaming not to hurt him.

Pippy must have felt not only assaulted by another lovelorn species but that it was all happening in the middle of a soccer riot.

Dad’s obviously going to have to pay for the damage to Pippy’s car so, once again, the money will be flowing in the wrong direction.

Since Iris Nell is already working on her pet clothing business, Dad said she’d damn well better make the peacock a little Salvation Army uniform to wear and then go and sit with him on a street corner with a tin cup.  And in front of that, she should have a big sign that reads, “Please! Give Generously to the ‘Save A Peacock Foundation.’”

I Love Your Car, Man

Monday, April 26th, 2010

By Tiber

As I reported back in December, here Dad is, trying to save money and Mom suddenly brought home two peacocks. Well, they’re a peacock and a peahen.

Dad went crazy but Mom explained that their other owner couldn’t afford to keep them either but they certainly couldn’t be released into the wild because the other birds would pick on them for being so much more attractive.

“Attractive?!?,” Duncan blurted out. “The male, maybe, but that is one head-jerkingly ugly-ass peahen.”

Of course, this comment (and truism) meant that Mom and my sister, Iris Nell, would keep and protect the peahen from then on, no matter what.

And “no matter what” has just arrived.

I will never be able to stamp out the noise from my brain. It started with a shrieking up-and-down-the-scale animal cry which was then joined by a metallic groaning and scratching and heaving.

We all raced outside when we heard it. And there he was. The male peacock. Evidently Duncan had been right. The peahen was not hot enough. And the peacock had instead found his dream mate in the form of a blue Porsche that was parked in front of the house. He wasn’t the first male to fall in love with that car…only in his case, he wanted the car to know it. Twice.

Why couldn’t it have been a friend’s car? Our friends are used to us. But no, it belonged to a new potential financial partner of Dad’s. I think we can now change the word “potential” to “will never be at any time, any place or any circumstance ever.”

They say that love is a game and in the game between the peacock and the Porsche, the car lost.

So Dad says the male peacock has got to go. He’s probably right, unless we want to hire someone to stand outside all the time and wave away everybody driving a blue car.

The female can stay though, and already, Iris Nell is worrying that she’ll be too lonely all by herself. It’s clear that instead of hunting for work, the rest of us are going to have to get out there and find a friend for the peahen. And what will be most time-consuming about this is that the next peacock will need one of two things. 1) to be really unattractive himself or 2) glasses.

Our peahen has a great personality

Monday, December 7th, 2009

000_peacok and peahen

By Tiber

I knew it was the male peacock who had the colorful tail but that’s pretty much all I knew about peacocks. Now, I guess, we’re going to learn a lot more.

My mother just heard about two peacocks whose owner was now too broke to keep them. She felt sorry for them and had them brought here. (This is where my sister Iris Nell gets this sort of thing.)

My father yelled that in this economic climate, we can’t afford them either.  Mom insisted, though, that they certainly couldn’t be released into the wild, not because they couldn’t survive but because they clearly would be picked on and mocked by the other birds, for being so much more sophisticated and attractive. (These sudden verbal side trips are why my father loses arguments around here.)

“Not that attractive,” my brother, Duncan, chimed in. “At least, not the female.” He proclaimed that the female was one head-jerkingly ugly-ass peacock, or peahen, to be specific.

Iris Nell, generally kind, unless animal insults are involved, grabbed a mirror and started chasing Duncan all over the room, thrusting the mirror up to his face and yelling, “And do you call this handsome? Do you? Do you?!?”

I was trying to stay neutral. I sort of thought that was one ugly-ass peahen too but really, what do people ever know about another species’ good or bad looks? No man I’ve ever known has ever once eyed any girl rhinoceros and thought, “I have got to get me some of that.”

And yet rhinos continue.