Minds of their Own - Animals are smarter than you think.

[truedelphi]

15. Growing up, my mom and I adopted a gorgeous

Blue bodied, yellow headed parakeet named Ricky. Whenever my baby sister was too fussy, and wanted to be left alone, we would play with the bird.

Soon, Ricky knew over three hundred words. And the amazing thing is, he used them in context. He never said, "Good morning" in the evening. And usually, when my mom let him out of the cage so he could wake me up for school, he'd fly to my forehead and pick at my eyelashes, while I slept. As I woke up he'd say, "Get up." Or else, "Get out of bed."

And as it got dark, he'd land on our heads, and when you had him hop on your finger, he'd say, "Dirty bird, go to bed."

We both found him amazing, and he lived to be thirteen years old.

I've had the experience of knowing a cat that snuck out of its real home to be with the elderly man that he had adopted. He would come and get this older man out to the kitchen, if the tea kettle was getting dangerously hot. The elderly man was hard of hearing, and he'd forget about how it was steaming away.