He’s my African Gray parrot and he loves to imitate me. He loves to sing and whistle even more. I try whistling the tune to the Andy Griffith theme and he cocks his head and listens so intently trying to catch the rhythm and notes. And then a totally puzzled look comes over the intensity of his gaze and I realize how hard it is for him to try and imitate me since I can’t carry a note or a tune, even with help from music, backup singers and a wheelbarrow. Then he tries to imitate what he thought he heard and the notes wobble all over the scale. He knows this is not right. He knows these notes were randomly chosen by my larynx and hold no real meaning. He knows when he imitates me he sounds like an out of tune fool. Poor Abdul. He deserves someone whose singing is not an abomination and whose whistling doesn’t sound like the air being let out of an almost deflated balloon.