Pets & the humans who love them

I'd like to introduce you to Her Royal Greyness the Woodipotimus


She's my first pet and probably will be my only pet in life. She's a 12yr old Russian Blue who came to live with us a couple of months after my Ma died in 1999. The story of how she came to us is too long to type out but suffice to say she picked me out when we went to visit the owner of her Mum who told us that Pudding (her first given name) was old enough to come home with us. Upon taking her to the vet I found out that Woolly wasn't old enough to be separated from her mum and had come to us at roughly a month old.

The Puppster has many names and answers to them all. She also has songs written about her, as did Bunzalus Bunzelius - the first cat to come into my life, she was 5yrs old, a few months before little kitten Wooders did. The deal was in event of divorce that Bunz belonged to my ex and Woodley belonged to me. Bunito Neetfeeto now lives with my exes ex. I miss her even though she's not lived with me for 3yrs or so.

Typical of the breed Spudders barely has a voice and didn't learn to meow/squeak until she was almost 5yrs old. She doesn't 'talk' often so when she does I'm convinced she's shouting at me.

I am very happy staff to the Woodipots, she allows me to rent a small square of the bed from her at a peppercorn rent.

Our bone of contention is her diet. I refuse to give her canned cat meat anymore and haven't done for several years. She's a dreadful glutton and cat meat makes her even lazier, fat and an irritating beggar. She has decent quality cat biscuits designed to be a main diet rather than a complement to cat meat.

The Wuppert and I are a package. She travels with me when I go away from home for more than a few days. She's been lots of places on trains, coaches and cars. She's not a particular happy visitor but grins and bears it.

She is very much my fur-baby.

[cane]

[QUOTE=Incubus;376207][COLOR="DarkGreen"]I'd like to introduce you to Her Royal Greyness the Woodipotimus


Weird... that looks exactly like my mother-in-laws cat, which also is 12 years -a scratching Queen of the house, with her own persian rug in the middel of the sitting room, which no one must step upon or else...Also she demands to be petted when she is eating or she won't eat. A handful some might say...

[cane]

I have a dog, a sheba, a red one, his name is Mio after a, in Sweden, well known childrens book (by Astrid Lindgren).

He is really stubborn but a very loyal friend who never leaves my side.

Did anyone see the movie with Richard Gere and a dog? It was an Akita, which is sort of like the Sheba (my dog) only bigger. The dog wouldn't fetch for him, at all. And they don't usually do that sort of things, they just don't seem to see the point. My dog will do it for a treat (that he wants to see before he runs off to fetch the ball) but not otherwise, you can almost see him thinking "If you throw away things you can damned well fetch them yourself, what's in it for me..?

[T4Texas]

My Roomie and I have 3 cats and a dog. All were rescues. Spats and Sissy are brother and sister black and white tabbies. Spats is very laid back, Sissy is a screamer and I believe slightly schizophrenic. Jake, our last addition was being abused by some boys when he was picked up off the street. Hes a gray stripe and very loving. Then there's the dog....Jazz...who is a german shorthaired pointer with one eye. But regardless of that one eye she can still point and proceed to kill anything that comes in the yard, particularly the doves. She's very high strung but when she does settle for a few minutes can be very sweet. I believe when you take an animal on, you do it for the life of that animal, even if its not the ideal situation. We wouldnt consider gettiing rid of any of these just because they had behaviour problems or didnt work out the way we wanted them to. Jazz has been a bit of a trial to us, but she is settling down a bit as she gets older so we're hoping for the best.

[Jess]

I love how our dogs demonstrate the power of how we view ourselves. Our mini's think they are mammoths and will boldly go where no dog has gone before! Our Giants ( especially Sookie) think they are tiny lil things.

Here she is in all of her petite-ness sleeping in one of the lil guys beds!



while, of course, the lil guys are laid out on the couch...lol

[JoSchmooze]

The trio starts out with Freckles...not mine originally, but left by an ex when she left. The excuse was "Jasmine (her name then) does not travel well and I am an entertainer with gigs all over". Needless to say, the ex parked her RV on the other side of town (not traveling!) and Freckles, an 8 yr old Australian sheperd/Blue tick heeler mix loves to jump in the backseat of my car any time and for any length of time it takes us to reach our destination. She is an expert "fly catcher" and roves both the house and the yard, making sure that her family is protected and all "herded" exactly where she wants them. She follows me from room to room and when I settle down she is always between me and any door - watching both, making sure than I am safe. She is either very protective or has abandonment issues.

Then there are "the girls". Born of the same mama cat in the same litter - the only ones in the litter. Fatso and Psycho. Fatso is the short haired russian blue "self prclaimed "Queen of the house" and Psycho is the long haired puking wonder. Fatso believes that she has to sleep with the remote. Any time she is on the bed, her front paws are wrapped around that remote, as if it is baby or lover. Fatso relaxes on her back with all four paws waving in the air..."look at me, I can balance on my back" she tells me. But from the back, she looks like a rump roast on legs, sauntering down the hallway. Psycho lives underneath the bed, unless she has jumped up on the arm of my recliner to knead my leg before she can settle down and sleep on said leg with her head hanging off the edge of the seat. She is the one who, out of nowhere, jumps up to swat at absolutely nothing in the middle of the hallway. She has taken to resting on either the dining room table or my desk, during the day depending upon if I am working or moving about the house. When friends visit, it is rare that Psycho shows herself, she is my "scardey cat". She is also the one who can be puke-free for days on end, but as soon as I get the suitcase out, will wander the house, leaving little trinkets of her distress. Both of them will run like their lives depend upon it when any container of tuna is opened...I have never seen anything like it in my life. The girls are six yrs old.

I belive that pets are yours for as long as they live. I did not choose Freckles but she is mine and will be for her entire life. I chose the girls after my beloved Springer, Budd, was put down after being with me for all 15 years of his life. I did not know when I would be ready for another dog. I hate cleaning up after all of them, but they are mine and I am theirs. That's all there is to it. I would no sooner give any of them away than cut off my right arm.

[NJFemmie]

About 17 or so years ago, I brought home twin kittens - Charlie and Shaolyn. Charlie was an all black male, and his sister was all grey. Well, she was actually a silver kitten, but eventually grew darker as she aged. I lost Charlie about three years ago, and buried his sister two years later. Shaolyn (affectionately referred to as "Shooshie") originally belonged to one of my exes, but it was mutually decided that if we broke up, she was to stay with her brother (and me naturally, lol.) They were my bestest friends besides being my fuzzy children. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of them - or sing the songs I've made up for them over the years.

Shortly after Shooshie's death, we adopted Maxwell from an animal shelter. He's a striped grey tabby with lots of attitude and a load of spunk. We were a bit nervous about introducing him to Ember, who is an older classic marked orange tabby. Things didn't go so well at first - but they do co-exist peacefully provided Max doesn't instigate - which he does quite often, lol. At this point, I think Max is keeping Ember on his toes and keeping him sharp. Well, that's what we hope.

Max is a sharp little guy. He's a pro bug catcher and could play until he collapses from exhaustion. He's also a talker who especially likes to talk back when reprimanded. His trademark is meowing while yawning. I guess he figures he'd kill two birds with one stone. He learns quickly and is quite ingenious - except when it comes to doors - he hasn't quite figured out the push/pull thing.

Ember doesn't meow like "normal" cats. He tries to enunciate. He's been known to have said "I don't know", "kumbaya" and can now say "water". He says "momol" for mommy, and when he's especially aggravated, he'll mumble on and on ... I guess it's a blessing that we don't actually know what he's saying - we may not want to know. I have never heard him meow once, but he can hiss quite well though. Heh.

I have a weakness for black cats and Mare has a weakness for orange. I still want another kitten, but I have a feeling Mare will win this one.

I cannot imagine a life without cats. I used to be severely allergic as a child, but can't tell you how grateful I am to be able to tolerate them now. I'm still allergic, but I deal with it. Having the fluffy love is worth every sneeze, hive or itch.