So today I'm practicing the time-honored cowardly technique of dealing with stress: Avoidance. PS: did you know my calendar at home is STILL on the January picture so I remember to finish that little scene and go on to February's picture? Yeah. Avoidance.
As such, I'm reviewing the top three non-traditional pets of my past. These are in addition to the myriad of kittens, horses, calves, chickens, and Canadian geese we housed on the farm where I grew up.
1) Petey the Precocious Pygmy Goat.
If you've never seen a pygmy goat (or a goat in general, I suppose) it may be hard to envision the cuteness, so the internets provided a fabulous representation. Petey lived most of his short life on a lunge line in our front yard during the day, bleating and frolicking between deck of our house, the grass, and his little pen with a shelter which he rarely slept IN but often stood on.
Did you know that goats, even kid goats the size of a gangly-legged puppy, have the jumping and climbing power to get on top of cars?
Did you know that hoof prints the size of a quarter all over the car is (probably damaging) cute as hell? Unless of course you consider goats (and the associated tiny prints) to be signs of the devil...in which case I suspect you found my blog by a horrible horrible mistake and I apologize for the nightmares).
Petey, unfortunately, didn't last terribly long. He got sick and died pretty suddenly. He was followed by Precious (who was a MASTER at jumping out of her "pen" (a laundry basket) in the house as a baby and had a fabulous time frolicking in our yard when spring hit.
No, I was not responsible for naming either goat.
Petey, unfortunately, didn't last terribly long. He got sick and died pretty suddenly. He was followed by Precious (who was a MASTER at jumping out of her "pen" (a laundry basket) in the house as a baby and had a fabulous time frolicking in our yard when spring hit.
No, I was not responsible for naming either goat.
2) Guinea Hens
Speaking of Satan, I fully support the idea that the horrendous noise Guinea Hens make could wake the dead and annoy the fuck out of demons. They certainly annoy the fuck out of me. But they eat woodticks so they're handy to have roaming the yard. Also, their diet is the #1 reason I REFUSE to eat them even though people swear they're tasty. But if you are what you eat and they eat ticks I'd just be eating tick-by-association and THAT'S GODDAMNED GROSS.
3) The UnStud Pony
I don't count him as one of the horses. Mostly because he hated me. Sigh. When I was in high school we adopted a local little by stud Shetland cross pony by accident. Yes. By accident. He'd gotten away from his house and the owners said "hey, you already have horses, why don't you just keep him?"
Because a small, fat pony was EXACTLY what a house full of tall Scandahoovians (who could probably step over him) needed. But he was cute as hell and nobody wanted him to be sent away, so there you go. We took him.
Anyway, if you know horses at all you probably know that studs can be a little...hmm...unmanageable. Even when they're short. In order for us to get him adopted by a nice family, our boy had to get the snip-snipperoo. I imagine the same people who won't get their dogs neutered are currently crossing their legs, but that's the way of life on a farm, people.
So the process for these ball removing shenanigans is for the vet to come do the actual procedure (which takes all of 15 minutes, if I remember correctly) in his vet-like manner, and for the next two weeks or so SOMEONE has to make that poor nutless pony walk for at least 15 minutes twice a day. As I'm sure you can imagine, there's some soreness involved in the healing process, so walking isn't really the best loved exercise for a stiff-legged sore-crotch pony.
That pony hated the fucking sight of me after two days. I coaxed him with treats, I was immensely gentle and walked really slow. I brushed and attended to him. He loathed me: I was the bitch who made him hurt for two weeks while he healed. Sigh. I've had horses since I was born. I remember all their names. I remember all their quirks. I remember all their favorite treats.
I CANNOT REMEMBER THIS PONY'S NAME. I remember how cute he was. I remember him staring at me with one baleful eye from under a thick forelock. I remember him stiffly shuffling away when I tried to catch him in the pen every morning. To this day I can't remember his name. As a pet he was pretty much an epic fail. But he WAS ridiculously cute.
What was (or is) your oddest pet?
Because a small, fat pony was EXACTLY what a house full of tall Scandahoovians (who could probably step over him) needed. But he was cute as hell and nobody wanted him to be sent away, so there you go. We took him.
Anyway, if you know horses at all you probably know that studs can be a little...hmm...unmanageable. Even when they're short. In order for us to get him adopted by a nice family, our boy had to get the snip-snipperoo. I imagine the same people who won't get their dogs neutered are currently crossing their legs, but that's the way of life on a farm, people.
So the process for these ball removing shenanigans is for the vet to come do the actual procedure (which takes all of 15 minutes, if I remember correctly) in his vet-like manner, and for the next two weeks or so SOMEONE has to make that poor nutless pony walk for at least 15 minutes twice a day. As I'm sure you can imagine, there's some soreness involved in the healing process, so walking isn't really the best loved exercise for a stiff-legged sore-crotch pony.
That pony hated the fucking sight of me after two days. I coaxed him with treats, I was immensely gentle and walked really slow. I brushed and attended to him. He loathed me: I was the bitch who made him hurt for two weeks while he healed. Sigh. I've had horses since I was born. I remember all their names. I remember all their quirks. I remember all their favorite treats.
I CANNOT REMEMBER THIS PONY'S NAME. I remember how cute he was. I remember him staring at me with one baleful eye from under a thick forelock. I remember him stiffly shuffling away when I tried to catch him in the pen every morning. To this day I can't remember his name. As a pet he was pretty much an epic fail. But he WAS ridiculously cute.
What was (or is) your oddest pet?
When I was 3, we had a horse named sugar, who kicked me in the chest and sent me flying, I got up just laughing with no adverse affects.
ReplyDeleteI lived in the same city you do now with 2 roomates. One of the roomates had a pet tarantula and the other one had snakes and a pet scorpion. Somehow I inherited the tarantula and I moved in with a mutual friend of your hubby's and mine, and him and his girlfriend at the time adopted him and named him Spidey.(sorry, my grammar is horrible today)
Oh and ask Heather Jarvis about owning Guinea Hens...I think she said they were not eating wood ticks like they should have been....
Not your hubby's girlfriend, but our mutual friend's girlfriend.
DeleteI followed. :) Also, rumor has it (if straight from Husband's mouth counts as rumor) that Husband had both a tarantula AND a large snake as pets. These were prior to me (being in his life, not being a pet...you know what I mean. I have bad grammar today too!)...and may have been a dealbreaker while we dated if he'd still had them. *shudder*
DeleteMy grandma still has guinea hens on her farm...they apparently do help with ticks, but they're still fingernails-on-a-chalkboard irritating.
Well, the tarantula might be the one I left with the friend and girlfriend, that your hubby lived with after I moved out. I have no idea about the snake. The person I lived with who had a snake, gladly kept the snakes and scorpion.
ReplyDeletearen't all pony studs called the same name? A$$!
ReplyDeleteI had a pet waterbug that I kept in a red wagon on my front porch. I fed it coke and it stuck to the coke and died. Very traumatic.
ReplyDelete