Phoebe was very tolerant of his dog brother today. For some reason, Percy was visibly on edge and needed to be near me at all times, including while I was with Phoebe in his play place (the bathroom). Although Phoebe is normally fine around Percy, it’s a different scenario when Phoebe is playing and running around on the ground. He can potentially nip his brother’s feet, which I assume he does to be playful rather than aggressive.

Although I did have to create some space between them, Phoebe was largely chill with his brother sitting on the floor while he was having playtime. I think he views Percy as a roommate who has weird habits but is otherwise harmless.

As always, I took Phoebe to Rosebud Cafe. Because the tables where we normally sit were in direct sun, I took him to the shadowy side of the cafe to play with his cardboard sleeve toy. He said hello to all of the people walking by or entering the store. None of them said hello back — although, to be fair, what he says doesn’t exactly sound like “hello” to the untrained ear.

Phoebe also fixated on a woman who was on the other side of the window having a meeting on her laptop. She eventually noticed him staring and was seemingly amused.

We went back inside and Phoebe climbed onto the arm of his friend, Stephanie. We tried to get him to dance to the indoor music, but at most he did some small head bobs.

I want to quickly address another question people usually ask me about Phoebe: How long will he live?

It’s difficult to know because the conditions of captivity for birds vary a lot. The best estimate I’ve seen for Phoebe’s species is about 40 years. So assuming his age of 27 is accurate and he dies of natural causes, he hopefully has another decade left to live.

I’ve seen online message boards where people swear they have cockatoos who are in their 60s or 70s. Don’t get me wrong, I’d like for Phoebe to live for a long time. But I’m not sure I want him to outlive me!