The problem started in December. There were a lot of strange noises in the kitchen and they seemed to be coming from the refrigerator. It thudded and thonked but whenever I rushed over to see what was happening it mysteriously stopped. The only consistent factor that I noticed was that the noise only happened when the ringneck parrots wandered into the kitchen–but the ringnecks were always sitting there looking innocent by the time I arrived.
This made me nervous–I wondered if the birds were doing something but they were always so quiet once I arrived in the kitchen to shoo them away. It appeared to be the fault of the refrigerator, which was acting as if it had a mind of its own, but a repairman couldn’t find anything wrong with it. I began to think I had a poltergeist.
This went on for a couple more weeks and today, as usual, I heard the noise. This time I was barefoot and able to sneak up on the noise. I craned my neck so I could see into the kitchen and realized the noise was not coming from the fridge. I moved around the corner in time to catch the femal ringneck parrot, Azazel, attempting to chew a hole in the kitchen cabinet. She had been making the racket all along and knew to stop when she heard me approach.
So the ringnecks were banished to their room. There doesn’t seem to be any real damage to the cabinet, and I expect the refrigerator will forgive me for telling it where to go (in Latin, no less) during the poltergeist experience.