“He doesn’t love me, that’s for sure. You can project human qualities onto these things until they bite your ass cheek. He bit my ass cheek. Middle of the night, wife asleep in the bed, I bend over to pick something up, and he bites me right on the ass. He’s very dangerous if he doesn’t get his way. If you aren’t accommodating his wishes, he can screech you right into the ground. He won’t go in his cage. Our entire apartment is filled with driftwood from the Hudson. He likes to sit on the driftwood when he watches TV. He’ll take food off our plates. If anyone is talking, he has to be there. He wants to be part of everything. And the worst part is they won’t die. They live to be 80 or 100. You know the saying: ‘This too shall pass’? Not the umbrella cockatoo. This too, shall not pass. There’s no hope. That’s the horror of it. I told this to a nine-year old girl in the park. This girl was a genius. She says: ‘You’ll never have to say goodbye. You have an infinite pet.’ It was the darkest thing I’ve ever heard.”