Really appreciate the concern and the sentiment. Really do. Thanks everyone.
It was horrible and just an utterly bizarre thing to happen too. It just all seemed so unreal you couldn't believe it could possibly be true, but it was
My daughter was very upset, but so much more so my missus. She has been distraught ever since and now hasn't slept for over 36 hours.
And on a side note, I do believe every day should be a do gooder day shouldn't it?
Wouldn't it just make the world a bit of a nicer place to be?
Anyway, I managed to recover the bird and he was pretty much still intact, so that made me personally feel so much better. It was like the rat took him away from us, but now we had him back and he was ours again.
Being able to bury him in the garden and then kill the rat has given me at least a little sense of closure.
I do think it makes it so much worse when it is a pet that talks to you. Makes it so much more personal and makes the animal seem so much more alive, it you get my meaning. They also live such a long time too. We just believed we were going to have the next 25-30 years with him.
Only had him a year, but taught him loads of stuff. He would say 'cheeky monkey' and 'cheeky chicken' and 'crazy in the coconut' and 'okey dokey' and 'holy schnitzel' and 'hello poopy' and so much more.
He would play peek a boo with you and hide and seek and he would wrestle with you and he would imitate the vacuum cleaner and do the actions too, hoovering the floor and you only had to say the name of someone in the house and he would fly straight to them. He knew all our names too. He was lovely.
Best thing he would do would be to fly upstairs into my daughter's bedroom, land on the the top of her bunk bed and stare out of the window into the garden and say 'where's the birdies?' Don't think he got irony.
Going to miss him so much, cos we got so attached to him and him to us. Guess that's why my wife now doesn't want another parrot. He is irreplaceable in her eyes.
Once again thanks for all the really kind words. It really made me smile and warmed the cockles of my heart.
Even better still, it even made my missus smile too.