human-bird friendships

Maggie never forgets to impress and delight all his many friends and acquaintances, human or bird. It's his 'thing', the complete network builder. Yesterday, for example, I left for work in the car, and a few hundred yards up the street, the neighbour's dog (not a bad chap, but he chases cars) - you guessed it, chased the car. As it happened, I then remembered something I had to take with me, and stopped the car to check the boot (that's the trunk, for our American friends) to see if I had remembered it.

Last Friday I was taking a water can up to the front gate to change the water in the bowl up there. Maggie was behind me pottering around. Suddenly I saw him running past me to beat me to the water bowl, getting there while I was still about six feet away, and then he stood facing me and drinking water. I had a nice chat with him, but the meaning of this action came home to me forcefully while I was walking back from the gate. He was trying to tell me that there was already water in the bowl and I didn't have to lug the big water can all that way.