You said you were getting a budgie right... the ones stores label as parakeets?
well I will give you a few pointers before your big day...
Choose a store or breeder that has a good environment for their budgies. This includes a clean cage and play area, plenty of toys, fresh water, fresh foods, and well trained employees. Buying any bird from a place that has bad conditions, unhealthy birds, and untrained employees only rewards those business and reaffirms them to continue their bad practices. It is important to avoid "pity purchases" from such places
Make sure that your budgie purchases come with a written guarantee of health where you have the option of returning the budgie if any health problem is discovered by your veterinarian.
Choose a bird with a clean vent area. A dirty vent can be an indication of bad hygiene, digestive problems, or some other medical problem.
Look for clean, clear nostrils. Avoid buying a bird with caked on mucous on its beak or nostrils. This is a clear indication of a respiratory problem.
Count the toes. A normal, healthy budgies should not be missing any toes. Also watch to see the bird perching, grasping, climbing, and basically making good use of its toes. If the toes show any abnormal scaliness this could also could be an indication of the existance of mites which is something to avoid.
Listen to the bird breathe. If you can hear 'clicking' sounds this may be a sign of air sac mites or other respiratory problems. A wheezing budgie is not a healthy budgie
Feathers and Wings: A healthy budgie should have complete wings. The wings may be clipped, but make sure that all the feathers are there. The feathers shoud be shiny and full.
An alert and playful budgie is generally a better bet than the small, quiet budgie that sits alone in the corner. Alertness and activity is usually one sign of happy, healthy budgie.
Look for a bird that is a good weight. Overweight budgies often show an obvious indented 'line' down the breast where the keel bone is. The fattier tissues are pushing beyond the keel. In an underweight budgie, the keel bone sticks out from the rest of the body tissue and is often a sign of a digestive problem or other health issues.
Check the beak. The beak should meet cleanly, be relatively smooth, and not overgrown. An overgrown beak is often a sign of mites, or other more serious problems.
Look for a budgie with good socialization skills. A socially happy budgie will be playful with other budgies and even humans if someone has taken the time to tame them.
now for some fun facts...
The term budgie was derived from the word budgerigar, which is based on a similar sounding Aborigine phrase that means, "good eating" and refers specifically to the species Melopsittacus Undulatus
The average lifespan of a budgie is generally 2-7 years. There are budgies that have lived to 13 and ever older, and there are budgies that die before their first birthday
In general, the color of a budgie's cere is the simplest indicator of sex in adult budgies: males are blue, and females are white, light beige, reddish, or brown. While it is fairly accurate, the color of the cere cannot always be used to sex a budgie. With some color varieties, like albinos, lutinos, fallows, and some recessive pieds like harlequins, both males and females have beige or pink colored ceres. Other visual sexing methods include females having an almost invisible, whitish rings around their nostrils, and males having more rounded, bulbous ceres, both of which are often hard to recognize to the untrained eye. And many people also say that females bite harder than males and that males have rounder heads while females heads are more flat on the top.
I pulled most of my info from
http://www.budgies.org/
take a look and learn some more
