Tuesday, November 25, 2014

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly... of Pets



I was actually busy writing a post with almost the same heading, about clients. And I could rant for a while about that. But even as the words were on the screen, I heard loud squeaking, and had no choice but to down tools and run. Sure enough, I caught our mentally deranged dog, Ninja, with a kitten in her mouth.

Stop! Breathe, everyone. The 10-day old kitten is alive and well, though severely spat upon. The dog is suitably chastised and sitting in the garden under a bush with a look of utter weltschmerz upon her face. She knows she has done a Bad Bad Thing, but I'm pretty sure she has no idea exactly what that was.

We're soft on this dog, and we know it. We have to be, because she is neurotically challenged. She was born to an extremely surprised 13-year old labrador, on Christmas Eve three years ago. Suckers that we are, we fell in love with her without even seeing her, and helped with money for the highly expensive puppy formula to keep her alive. We should have known she'd be a total weirdo. What am I saying? She had us at 'ridiculous birth story'. It was a done deal...

The Blundertribe has an affinity for weird animals. And weird people. We're just like that. We pick the runt. Or the one with funky backwards paws. Yup.

So, yes, Ninja wants to eat kittens. This is bad. But she also waits every morning for each of us to appear from our bedrooms, and has to greet each one personally, and talk to them, and nuzzle. Big cuddles. She actually gets up on her hind legs and HUGS Sean, which is tear-jerkingly sweet. After that, she won't let you anywhere near her for the rest of the day, and regards most overtures of affection as proof that someone wants to kill her. Did I say neurotic? That doesn't really cover it.

I reckon she is our family lesson in how to accept someone really, really interesting, who is also really, really strange. Hmmm... Yup, she fits right in around here.

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