Story Bird:

Bilbo, well clipped, was on a little playstand at the end of my shot-gun style kitchen.  I had taken a break from packing to move to do something that relaxes me - I was baking.  I had wonderful croissants ready to go into the oven at about 8 pm on a Sunday night, and just as I leaned over to put the cookie sheet in the oven, Bilbo decided to try and get to me.

He hit my should just as I leaned and slid off - right into the hot oven.  I screamed and threw the cookie sheet, reaching into the oven to get him.  He'd hit at the bottom corner, and thank goodness the heating element wasn't on.  I called my vet (Jerry LaBonde in Denver), who is wonderful enough to have a pager that he answers even on Sunday.  He directed me to an emergency vet hospital with a bird-knowledgeable vet on staff.

Bilbo had burned his face and his eye.  He was kept overnight in intensive care, and Dr.LaBonde stopped in to get him in the morning.  The worst damage was to his cornea, and I was sent home with an antibiotic salve for his eye that I needed to apply three times a day.

I was a wreck.  I cried at the hospital, I cried in the car.  Bilbo came out of this just fine - but he gave me a good bite the next day for putting him through all of this.  Lesson?  Birds are in their cages when Mom is cooking.  Period.  You just never know what they'll do.  What could have happened if I've been boiling water, or frying something on the stove?  I could have lost a precious member of my family.