There is no doubt about it.
When you are small, very cute, covered in feathers and by nature a flocking species, every other being is going to falling all over themselves to be your Valentine when the annual day ‘o love arrives.
Waffles and millet and neck feather scratches and crispy crunchy nesting materials will be falling from the skies.
The fans will be jockeying for position in your V-day receiving line.
But more than bling and baubles, more than even personalized five-feather cuisine, you are looking for the treasure you value above all else.
Customer service.
After all, the best way to know who loves you most is by noticing who pays the most attention to you.
No customer service = no love.
VIP customer service = mucho mucho love.
Happily, this is also what makes you so adaptable to life as the “alpha” flock member in an interspecies flock.
Sure, your featherless flock mates aren’t nearly so cute as you are (and the shelled flock mates are downright, well, “appearance-challenged” is probably the polite way to say it).
But that aside, being the flock “alpha” still feels just as good when you are the walking down that plush red carpet with all those adoring ladybirds clamoring for beak-o-graphs.
Sometimes fans or aspiring large featherless assistants want to know more details about providing the best customer service (and thank goodness for it, because everyone knows they need lots of help!).
When you think like a flocking species, where being alone is akin to being lunch, the mystery nearly decodes itself.
The best customer service is when you do everything together.
You share every meal and every snack. You shower together and sing together and snooze together (although ideally here you want to train your large featherless assistant to not-snooze so she can stand guard and watch for predators while you take your beauty rest).
Oh, and optimal customer service always recognizes the pecking order.
Small feathered beings get served first. Then larger feathered beings. Then any other beings with feathers.
Then the non-feathered beings can take their turn (and no need to get particularly picky about pecking order from this point on down).
By maintaining this high level of daily (hourly, minutely, secondly) customer service on Valentine’s Day and every day, you can win the love of a cockatiel and – most importantly – keep it, too!
Happy Day ‘O Love to you and your flock from Pearl, Malti, Bruce, Flash Gordon (aka the wild and woolly furred being), the Tall Tree, the Small Tree & me
