The Barnyard Bully

Things have taken a nasty little turn here in our otherwise idyllic lives. Seems I have a chicken with a murderous streak in her. Ruby Pauline has always been high strung and nervous, much more so than any of the other birds in the flock, and while she can be somewhat aggressive (it's a characteristic of her breed), I never expected it to turn as ugly as it has this week. It also doesn't help that she's a freak of nature: she's easily twice the size and nearly four times the weight of what nature says she "should" be, and by far the biggest bird we have. To say she's gargantuan wouldn't be an exaggeration.

So it goes without saying, that on a routine trip out to the barn, I was devastated to find my favorite little hen (and I mean the "little" description in the literal sense: she's only a sixth of Ruby's size) ripped to shreds and half alive in a corner. Feathers ripped out, comb torn, one eye damaged, bloody and tightly shut, and half her head scalped and blackish purple with bruising. I brought her into the house and cleaned her up and then Griffin and I set up a cage indoors and brought in her best friend from the barn to keep her company while she mended.

On closer inspection, it was discovered that Ruby's head and beak were generously covered with dried blood. Now, while this would appear to be all the evidence one would need to convict, it really isn't. Flock mentality is such that when one bird does something, those of a like mind will join in (kind of like an English soccer riot, if you will). So while it is most likely that Ruby was the perpetrator given the bloody face and predisposition to being bitchy, it wasn't definite. Until a couple of hours later that same day when I caught her on top of another smaller bird attempting to rip the back of that bird's skull off.

So now what do I do? Griffin was all for giving Ruby a dose of her own medicine, but that wouldn't be very humane, now, would it? I thought about removing her from the flock for a couple of weeks and then reintroducing her as if she were a "new" bird, thereby knocking her to the bottom of the peck order. But given her penchant for bullying and inflicting pain on those smaller than her, it would only be a matter of time before she stomped, pecked and dragged her way back to the top of the heap and that wouldn't solve anything. I could try to find her a new home, but there's two things wrong with this option. First, even though I'm not very fond of Ruby and I certainly don't like the way she does business, she does have sentimental value, however misplaced it might be. You see, as a tiny chick she was a gift from a very dear friend who passed shortly after he gave her to me and as such she triggers very, very fond memories for me. And second, what kind of person would I be if I gave someone else a hen that I know will eventually start beating the shit of their beloved birds? I don't think I'm that much of an asshole.

So today it was pointed out to me that I still have two more options. I could debeak Ruby. This is what the major chicken people do, like Perdue, where you cut off the point on the top half of a chicken's beak to prevent them from doing any damage when they peck. The chicken industry does this so they can squeeze as many birds as they possibly can into a very small area and when the birds inevitably become stressed from living in such conditions, they can't really hurt one another when they start to attack each other because their beaks have been disfigured. I don't eat big business chicken for this very reason, so I certainly wouldn't engage in this practice with one of my own birds. My other option, and while it's not permanent is still somewhat mean, is to put what are known as "peepers" on her. This is a little blindfold that looks a lot like the sleep masks women always wore in 1950's and 1960's movies (but without the ruffles and lace). It works like the blinders trainers put on racehorses, limiting vision and therefore any aggressive tendencies the animal might be unable to control. I'm not sure I like the idea of having a hen wandering around with an eye mask on, but what else can I do? A hen in drunken goggles who can't hurt anyone anymore is better than any of the other alternatives, all of which perpetuate violence in some way, be it Ruby committing the act, or me committing it on her.

Still, I have a little time to ruminate on all of this as my favorite little hen (why is it always the favorites who die or become injured? Why do the birds we merely tolerate live on and on and on without incident?) will be recovering for some time and is not going to be reintroduced to the flock anytime soon. Gentle force-feeding is on the menu today and everyday until she can eat on her own once again. And why is it that I somehow always end up with chickens in my house every few months? It isn't as though I enjoy having them in here because, contrary to what my family thinks (and would bet money on), I don't. It just looks like I do. In a perfect world, all my birds would be best pals, would live to ripe old age with nary an injury or illness and my house would stay clean and poultry-free. And none of my birds would have to suffer the indignity of wearing goo-goo-goggles to keep them on the straight and narrow.

An ALMOST Happy Birthday!

I've always been one of those people who can't walk into a pet shop (okay, so those went the way of the dinosaurs for the most part, and even though those faceless corporate pet supermarkets are a poor substitute, it's pretty much all we have nowadays) and think, "I want one of those, and those, and those." I do it every time I go. But it was my grandmother who had the "cool-animal-gotta-have-it-affliction" worse than I have ever had.

I remember when I was really little back in the 60's, back when pet shops had some of the most amazing offerings you could imagine. You know, all those fun animals that are now endangered, or protected or just plain dangerous, that you used to be able to take home with you without needing to know a damn thing about how to care for it, or how to protect yourself and your loved ones? Every breed of monkey known to man and a few chimpanzees as well, baby alligators and crocodiles, even a few really exotic animals, like wallabees and koalas, and even the coati mundi my grandmother bought for me on one of my earlier birthdays. Lest you mistakenly think that I had to be the coolest kid in my neighborhood, let me assure you, I never even got to touch the furry little thing. Nope, not even for a minute. In fact, I never even got the thing out of its cage, let alone out of the shop.

My mother, grandmother and I had been out shopping when we stopped in a pet shop in, I believe, Braintree. My mother is of the belief that we had just previously eaten lunch and my grandmother, who was by no means a heavyweight when it came to drinking, probably had had a couple and thus had gotten the idea to buy me the most unusual gift going. I remember my grandmother and I walking around the shop looking at the tiny spider monkeys while my mother went off alone to admire god only knows what, since she really has never been much of an animal person save for cats. It was then that my grandma and I saw the baby coati mundi and as I was immediately taken with its adorable stripey tail and pointy snout, she whipped out her checkbook and promptly bought the thing for me. I must have then run and found my mother and lead her to the cage where my gift was being removed for transport home.

I don't remember the actual act of finding my mother, but I very clearly remember her scream upon standing before the cage that contained the coati and being told that it belonged to me. She said, "There is no way that thing is coming home with us. I will not have anything that nasty climbing up my cabinets and all over my furniture. Who knows what diseases this thing carries (although given the plethora of weird animals in pet stores at that time, I don't think potential disease was ever really an issue until much later). You absolutely can not have this." And then she turned to my grandmother and said, "Miriam, get your money back right now." My grandmother and I were both very disappointed, but my mother's word was final (and really kinda scary).

I was very sad to not have been able to have it live with us, especially since learning that among other things, the coati mundi is an extremely vocal animal with a lot of "snorts, grunts, screams, whines and chatters." Frankly, owning a coati mundi would have rocked, regardless of what my mother thought. And one final thought: I have absolutely no memory of what my grandmother ended up getting me for that birthday. It certainly wasn't as cool as her first gift to me that year.

Has This Duck Been Eating Spanish Fly?

Phinaeus Taft is a very strange little duck. Like a great many of our ducklings, he was born too early in the season to be outside because of the cold, and as such, he was hatched in the warmth of our kitchen by a chicken hen (as a general rule, duck hens make not only lousy mothers, but frequently dangerous ones as well, as anyone who raises ducks can attest to). I always try to use the same little Silkie hen as she's not only reliable (a chicken who decides as she's grown bored with doing nothing but sitting for a month, she's entitled to pop permanently off the nest just a day before the scheduled hatch is a bad thing), but is a doting and gentle mother to the babies, be they chicken or duck. And it's also normal for the young ducklings to have a bit of an identity crisis when they first go out to live with the ducks. It usually takes a few months before they no longer want to be with their "mother" and the other chickens, but eventually they all give up on being permanently with mommy and even actually enjoy being active members of the duck flock. Having a young duck who is overly friendly with me isn't unusual as they've spent so much time with me during those first few weeks in the room in which I spend such a great portion of my day. It really is inevitable. However, there's friendly and then there's too friendly. And I would say that, without question, Phinaeus is way too friendly.

As we're approaching his first birthday, he not only should have long ago given up his fixation with the chicken hens (he hasn't. He spends hours and hours a day watching them and pacing up and down the divider wall between the ducks and the chickens and then immediately joins the chickens when they're allowed to mingle with the ducks), but also should have gotten less close to me as he's spent more time out in the barn. And with mating season here, he should certainly be pairing off with a duck, instead of trying to get with me. Seems young Phinaeus thinks I'm his hen. Seriously. He struts right over to me when he sees me, jockeying for my exclusive attention and will even physically push the other drakes away from me, biting them as he sees fit. He "talks" to me nonstop, to the point where he actually becomes hoarse and then loses his voice entirely. He routinely chases and attacks my son, whom Phinaeus apparently thinks is a potential rival for my affections (yup, this just gets creepier and creepier), and when he thinks he finally has me to himself, he does his ritual mating dance around me in a circle. As this has been going on since last fall, I had asked a respected breeder at that time what she made of this behavior and she told me, aside from never having ever heard of such a thing, "He'll either outgrow it by spring, or this situation will get really interesting." Chalk one up for the latter.

Every day I'm hoping the little duck hen who is smitten to pieces with him and follows him everywhere, even mingling with the chickens herself to be close to him, will finally catch Phinaeus' eye (female ducks are the ones who choose to pair off with a mate, not the boys choosing the girls) and that he'll finally see what a little charmer Babette Fleur is. So far, no luck. I frankly haven't a clue what do to. I continue to be as gentle and kind an owner to Phinaeus as I am to all the other birds and animals here, but I also try not to encourage the creepy mating madness, nor the hostility towards Griffin. Short of that, I'm stumped. I can however, safely say that while he is short, dark and handsome, Phinaeus is most definitely not only not my type, he isn't exactly my species either. Love can be such a cruel thing.

Boris and Tallulah

These are the first two chickens I bought years ago when I started in poultry. That's Boris Q on the left and Tallulah Jane on the right. They weren't exactly what I was looking for when I went out to buy my first pair, but when I saw them, my mind was made up. The conditions they were being kept in were deplorable: overcrowding to the point where none of the chickens could even turn their heads, the males were feather-picked to baldness due to stress-related aggression, they were bone thin, starving and dehydrated, and little Boris had a broken leg, most likely from his previous owner having stepped on him while trying to make his way through the inhumane clog of chickens in the pen where they were being kept. I chose Boris because he was the only cockerel who didn't try to attack me when I picked him up, and Tallulah because I had never seen a chicken who at four months old was still nearly chick sized. The two became instantly inseparable and remained so for the rest of their lives together.

It became apparent fairly quickly that Boris was more than just physically sub par from his previous mistreatment. He never crowed. He had seizures. He had trouble remembering how to get in and out of the barn, he wouldn't eat unless you put him directly in front of the food, and he didn't scratch and graze the way a normal chicken or rooster will when out and about in the yard. And always, Tallulah was right there, just like a mother hen with her little chick, pointing out tiny morsels in the grass to him, guiding him out of the forsythia hedge when he wandered in and panicked, unable to find his way back out again. The two of them would stand for hours, doing nothing at all.

People told me to kill Boris, that providing daily care for such a bird was a waste of time. He couldn't be bred (I never saw him hump anything out there anyways, not once), he cost money that was never recouped in any way, he was useless. And while this may have all been true, he had had such a horrific start to his life, there was no way I wasn't going to give him a happy home for as long as he lived. Pets are not expendable because they aren't perfect. Besides his rather lengthy list of flaws, he really was a truly beautiful bird to behold. Two pounds of soft, lush and beautifully colored feathers. And the gentlest rooster to ever walk this earth. But Boris aside, a great many times I also wondered if Tallulah might be as slow as him in some ways. She didn't dash about like my other hens. If you wanted to pick her up, like Boris, all you needed to do was simply walk over to her and lift her. She never joined the other hens in the flock, but simply stood there looking vaguely about, usually next to Boris, never more than a few feet away from him. She laid only a handful of eggs in her lifetime. She was very quiet; no cackling, no shrill calls ever came from her mouth save for one time. Her life was slow and dull.

When Boris became ill and we thought he was going to die, the two had to be separated while he underwent treatment. From out in the barn came the most desperate and mournful crying throughout the night. The next day, despite doctors orders, I moved Tallulah into the recovery cage with Boris and she immediately quieted back down. Surprisingly, Boris would live another three years and when his time came, Tallulah was with him, standing right beside him as he breathed his last, ever the quiet and stoic hen.

And then the most amazing thing happened. A few days after his death, when Tallulah knew she no longer needed to stay near poor, little special-needs Boris, she came alive. She was finally free to be the hen she might have been without her burden. She ran about, she scratched, she clucked, she got into little fights with the other hens. She was a chicken at long last. Clearly she had felt it was her duty to keep him safe, and it was her chicken kind of love for him that kept her loyal in spite of what was clearly a very depressing way of life for her. Her sudden transformation was startling yet exhilarating to behold. And little Tallulah Jane got be and act like a real hen for almost a year and a half before she too passed in old age.

She was a very special bird, and when people have said to me upon observing a bird at a swap meet or a show, "They're just birds. They have no feelings or brains," I sometimes tell them I beg to differ and relate my story. Sometimes I just walk away, but always I'm reminded of my two unusual chickens: the one who needed such desperate help and the one who was always there to give it to him unconditionally throughout her exceptional life.

But Can't A Girl Look?

As I've mentioned before, having an old dog really sucks. Almost everyone in my family keeps telling me to have her put down because she's become little more than a four-legged hairy lump who shits all over the house indiscriminately, but I can't do that. I simply can't, with any semblance of a conscience, kill an animal simply because it's become an inconvenience to me, or because that animal is no longer "fun". She isn't in any pain, she isn't unhappy, she simply exists in a way that no longer has much to do with me or anyone else in this family, save for her brief happiness at greeting me when I come home from outside the house. And so she lives on.

But it still really does suck. And considering that I've had a very good long time since my dog began her decline to ponder how much I wish I had a "fun" dog, the waiting for her final demise makes it even harder. I often feel very guilty about my daydreaming of the puppy I will own once poor old Cordelia has shuffled off this mortal coil, yet I can't quite seem to stop my wishful thinking. I find myself regularly shopping through the lists of available puppies at shelters in my area and become wildly ecstatic when I see that one of the dogs "of my dreams" is available right now. Chihuahuas, Min Pins, toy Jack Russells, Pugs. Inevitably, I become very depressed when reality sinks in again and I glance down at my sweet old girl lying at my feet. I know there is no way I could ever bring home a new little bundle while she's still here with me. After all, that would be the ultimate betrayal, wouldn't it?

I've been doing this for months, and I can't seem to stop myself. Every weekend I manage to find a dog I could adore were I to go and bring it home, but last weekend was the worst. I saw a nine month old Min Pin up for adoption at the Mass Humane Society and I thought, "How perfect! A tiny purebred dog, still a baby yet housebroken, and in need of a family. And the $200 donation fee would go to the Humane Society and help other homeless dogs and cats" (it turns out after the fact, rather horribly, that this little dog was stolen from the pound late Sunday afternoon when thieves cut through the fence and made off with him, so I hope, hope, hope he's with a loving family and not being abused by monsters somewhere). I was so happy for all of ten minutes, until I realized once again, that there was no way I could do this to my beloved Cordelia. In fact, I became so depressed, I cried. I know that sounds silly, but having a canine companion is very important to me. A vital part of my being, if you will, and having a dog who can neither see nor hear me very well, who can no longer go everywhere I go and who interacts with me very little in her fog of dementia, simply doesn't fill the need I have for the doggie friend that inhabits my world. At this point, save for those blissful moments of homecoming, I am little more than a home health aide to my old friend, meeting her needs until such time as they can't be met any longer.

My husband has now forbidden me to look at the little dogs. He says he can't understand why I put myself through the pain of seeing all the available little puppies out there when I know I won't get one until Cordelia is gone. I tell him that it starts out making me very happy to see all those lovely little dogs waiting to be chosen for their forever homes, and being able to imagine myself owning one or two of them, and it's only after the fact that it makes me sad. He says that because the sadness inevitably always follows the initial happiness, I should know better than to look at all, and that it's just stupid to put myself through this over and over again. I know he's right but I just can't stop. As the years roll by with Cordelia living on and on, yet becoming less and less of a viable pet, I grow more anxious for the day when I'll be able to shop for a new friend for real, not just in my mind. I'm more than ready, yet desperately trying to keep strong my patience and my love for my long-time companion. She's been a magnificent dog, and I cherish the 16 years we've spent together, but one of us has grown very lonely these days and it's been a long time coming.

Noodles and Melvin

Our first spring in our new house was spent clearing the land behind our outbuildings and making a nice field for gardens, grass and the beautiful birch trees growing beside the wetlands we have back there. The clearing of the land necessitated felling several very tall and very ugly evergreen trees that at forty feet tall and without any foliage for the first two-thirds of their trunks looked as though they belonged in the pages of a Dr. Seuss book and definitely not in our yard. My husband had carefully checked all the debris and nests in the trees and found them all to be empty before felling the branches they rested on. Except one. A large mangy nest he had picked through and then proceeded to cut its branch proved upon hitting the ground to not have been entirely empty. When it hit earth, its four tiny inhabitants were thrown in as many directions: tiny baby squirrels huddled on their bellies in shock and fear. My husband kept saying that he had checked so carefully, and that he felt just terrible and would feed the babies and care for them himself as he was responsible for this turn of events. Uh-huh.

It was apparent from looking at them that they had been abandoned by their mother, who most likely had been killed by a passing motorist, as our road is dotted year round with the flattened, dehydrated bodies of squirrels who neglected to look both ways before crossing. The babies' tiny bodies were so thin, and they were all so weak, it was obvious they hadn't eaten for some time. I filled a small box with bedding from the chicken barn and buried the babies in it for warmth, and then I called a family friend who has been a wildlife rescuer and would know what to do next. She wasn't home but her husband was and while I was at the time thankful for his advice, the words of 'wisdom' he provided would ultimately prove fatal for two of the four little ones.

At his word, I went to the grocery store and purchased a couple of cans of evaporated milk and a set of eyedroppers and began to try to feed the tiny squirrels. None would eat. I tried countless times through the afternoon and that night to get them to feed, with no luck. Even forcing their tiny mouths open and squirting little bits of milk into their throats couldn't save them. After near constant attempts to get the babies to eat throughout the following day, and after two of them passed away late that next afternoon, I once again called our friend in a frantic attempt to save the remaining two who were barely clinging to life. "Not evaporated milk!" she yelled. "You must get puppy or kitten replacement milk. And not an eye dropper. You need the smallest baby bottle you can find, preferably one for very small animals, like a gerbil bottle." And off I went again, this time to our nearest Petco, hoping that this would be the miracle to save those two little squirrels. And it was. But it wasn't easy. I spent more hours trying to get the little ones to feed, and to his credit, my husband gave it a shot as well. When we were finally about to give up and let nature take its course, as she most likely would have anyways in that abandoned tree without our ever knowing it, the babies began to drink. And drink they did.

And then Monday morning rolled around and off my husband went to his office, leaving me in charge of hourly feedings. At first, I'll admit, it was fun to feed the babies. Holding little gray squirrels who themselves held the little bottle with their impossibly tiny front feet, their big black liquid eyes watching me while they sucked, their long fuzzy tails curled around my hand. All was bliss for the first few weeks, tiring as it was to be feeding two newborns around the clock, while my husband worked, or slept, or watched TV to unwind, never giving the squirrels much more than a cursory thought. But then the little squirrels, fortified with puppy milk, began to test their mettle. They spit at me, they bit with very sharp little teeth, they grabbed the tiny bottle from my hand. I spent a great deal of time washing my bloody hands and wiping warm, sticky puppy milk from the babies who would wind up covered from head to toe in it at every feeding, as well as cleaning squirrel urine off my hands and forearms. And it seemed that feeding time not only made the little ones pee, but also turned them on as well. I grew tried of feeding two little boy squirrels who would, without fail, get a tiny boner while I held them to feed them. Fun stuff. And where was the man who swore he'd take responsibility for this mess? Not feeding these animals, that's for sure.

Finally, after a few months, the little boys grew big enough to be weaned from the milk and then eventually set free in the yard, though they still required me to provide them with supplemental food. My son named them Noodles and Melvin and while Noodles moved on to a new territory fairly quickly, Melvin stayed with us for quite some time, living in the old, empty chicken house on our land. Even when he became too big to fit through the small hole in the siding that allowed him access to the inside of the building, and even after tearing off three-quarters of his tail when he tried in vain to squeeze his fat ass (and it was fat, trust me, these guys were well looked after) through that too-small hole, he refused to go. But finally, as with everything in this life, all good things must come to an end, and Melvin's reign did just that. Whether he was killed somewhere while off on a daily jaunt, or whether a bigger, more aggressive squirrel stole his territory from him and drove him off, the following spring he was gone. I know not what became of him, save for the fact that he most definitely wasn't one of the gray pancakes in the streets around our home. His unique bob-tail would have given his corpse away.

And my husband, who after those first few moments of feeling badly for what he had wrought, and never gave it much more thought, managed to do the same thing once again this summer while removing an old foundation on one of our outbuildings. Same story, different rodents. This time though, I was not at all successful in saving a family of tiny pink baby field mice found scattered with their once cozy little nest among the rubble. They were just too tiny and wouldn't eat. I think maybe the next time my husband does demolition on our property, I should be there to check out the situation before he commences destruction. At least I can be ready with a box and some food.

Black is Beautiful

At dusk the crows came, just as they do almost every autumn evening, flying low over my land in massive numbers. They'd stay only briefly and then fly off to their nightly roost, wherever that might have been. I said I wished that just once they'd stay here for the night and not move on. And that night, they did just that. They must have heard me. Or perhaps the very loud train whistle up the road startled them from their original aerie near the tracks and brought them here to stay for the night, darkness being too close for them to keep moving.

I stood in the rain and watched hundreds of crows settle onto the tips of the tall trees around my property. As darkness descended, still more crows arrived to join the first group. Birds alighted on branches, remaining so very still it was hard to see them against the dark gray sky. But then their bedtime dance began. Birds flitted from branch to branch, restlessly searching for the best spot. More birds arrived, hovering, wings beating, looking for open space. Some birds moved within the same tree, many birds moved from one tree to another.

Gradually, the cacophony of caws died down to just a few random calls. And eventually, the new arrivals dwindled and became more sporadic as well. Soon it grew too dark to clearly make out the countless little dark bodies up in the trees. When they became mere silent silhouettes in the night sky, I went inside. Periodically throughout the early night, I checked on the crows and thanked them for staying just a bit longer than usual.

At 6:30 the next morning, with the sun just peeking out from its night cover, I woke up with a bad cough. It is then that I heard them: hundreds upon hundreds of crows waking and moving on to start their busy day in an ocean of noise. Quickly, I rose and went downstairs. As I let out the dog, I stood in the backyard and watched them leave my trees. Small groups left in staggered departures, flying off in all directions. The birds that were still in the trees called to the neighborhood to wake up and greet the day. I was pleased to have seen them leave for the day. It felt complete after having watched them arrive. That night they would return once more to roost in my trees for a second night.

They have not done it since in the two years since they so beautifully and noisily graced my land. Once again I must be content to watch them fly over hurried and low every night as evening settles, calling to the dark night that beats at their backs.

The Seven Deadly Sins as They Apply to Dogs: Gluttony 101

The other day at Thanksgiving dinner with my family, with my dog sitting beneath the table hoping that a scrap or two would fall her way (nothing did- that's bad form at the dinner table), I got to thinking about a little dog I knew when I was very young. Okay, a little dog that should have been little, but was in fact, not.

I grew up on a lake and a short walk along the shore from us lived friends of the family who not only had dogs themselves but also had many friends who had dogs as well. We quite often found ourselves there for breakfasts, and dinners, and sometimes on hot summer nights we stayed there well past my bedtime while the adults played card games at the large dining room table, me sitting at the table with my mother or my brother watching them play until I couldn't keep my eyes open another moment. One of the friends of these friends, a person whose name is long forgotten from my memory, was an older woman. A very fat older woman with a very fat little dog.

So many meals were spent with those people and that woman (who always seemed to drop in at meal time, curiously enough). And as we passed around the bird, and the vegetables and the homemade cranberry sauce at my house this year, a very, very vivid memory of that lady's dog strapped into a baby's high chair, wearing a bib and being spoon fed at the table jumped from my brain. Whatever was being served to those of us two-legged folk back then on the pond, her black and white chihuahua was also served, cut tiny and mashed just as if it were being fed to a toddler. And don't forget dessert: pie, ice cream, pudding or cake. While the adults played poker, that dog was also seated at the table and fed whatever snacks were available: popcorn, crackers, potato chips, all made safe to eat in little, bite-sized pieces. And always served with that little spoon. After all, only a boorish neanderthal would dare to make a dog eat from a bowl on the floor without so much as a single utensil at their disposal. That would be simply monstrous, not at all unlike stuffing your morbidly obese little animal in a chair made for a human and cramming it full of piles of yet more food.

I also recalled that I never once saw that dog actually walk anywhere on its own. I remember it always being carried, like a baby, against that woman's chest or thrown over her shoulder as if it were in need of a burping (given its diet, it most likely was). This probably accounts for the fact that that dog was easily five times the weight of a normal chihuahua. After all, being constantly stuffed to the gills with food and never getting even a step of exercise would make for one very fat dog. And trust me, it was one very fat dog.

For the life of me I can't remember the dog's name any more than I can remember its idiotic owner's name. I know it had a name like "cutie-baby" or "muffin-pie", something nauseatingly sweet and ridiculously baby-ish (after all what else could a dog such as this be named?). And I know it was a boy as it always wore a baby blue bib, but the finer details escape me (probably for the better).

I hadn't thought of that explosively fat little dog in decades and for whatever reason it popped into my head this holiday it's in there now to stay. So wherever you are in doggie heaven, Fat Little Dog, I hope you're happy. Thinking about you has made me happy because my family and I took a wonderful and very odd little trip down memory lane this past Thanksgiving because of you. I hope in doggie heaven you got to leave your bib behind and finally run free.

My Cat Has ADHCD

Maia Louise is a very unusual little cat who packs quite a wallop in a very small package. She's always up to something. Now don't get me wrong, I like having a cat with a personality disorder or two, I wouldn't want nor expect anything less from my cat. That's why I chose her and not any of her litter mates. It was obvious from day one that this little ball of fur would be a force to be reckoned with and we haven't been disappointed. Take for example her penchant for slipping into various places that a cat should never be, without your seeing her slipping into said place. One of her favorite things to do is to hop into the refrigerator after you've turned your back to it, just before the door snicks shut. After misplacing the cat more times than I can count only to find her tucked into a shelf in the fridge having a good look around and the occasional nosh, we've all learned to always make a quick scan in there before closing the door.

One of the first times that Maia Louise went missing was on one very hectic school morning when she was still a new family member by just a few weeks, a busy morning that left little room for error. As an indoor cat, there are only so many places that she can sneak off to and not eventually be found, but on this particular day she was giving us fits. I was afraid she had squeezed out the kitchen door when the dog was let out, and I wasn't about to head off for the day without knowing she was inside and safe. We looked everywhere, or at least what I thought was everywhere, and with a heavy heart told my son to go and grab his lunch from the refrigerator because we needed to leave. When he opened the door to the fridge, out popped little Maia Louise with a package of ham in her mouth which she had already partially eaten. We both made a grab for her, but off she went with the ham, which was substantially bigger than she, and gleefully made off with her prize. She was chased upstairs where she was finally cornered under a bed and made to relinquish her booty after a much prolonged wrestling match.

This was just the beginning of a lifetime of quick snatch and grabs on her part, all of which send us scuttling to retrieve whatever it is that has tickled her fancy at that moment, as well as what seems like years of our lives spent searching for her when she's gone missing for hours on end only to find her shut in a closet, closed in a dresser drawer, stuck in the narrow space between the storm door and the inner front door, peeking out of the glass doors from within the china cabinet, and of course, snacking happily in the refrigerator, to name but a few. And she's never fazed in the least, she just patiently bides her time until someone comes along and frees her from wherever she's gotten herself stuck. Until the next time...

My Father and the Cat Show

My dad was a calm and very quiet man who loathed the idea of drawing attention to himself. He preferred the arts and more scholarly pursuits over playing ball and getting down with it. He was older than all the other dads I knew, having been almost 55 when I was born. I was the last (and an accidental) child and his only daughter. We had a very special bond: I adored him and the feeling was mutual. He died when I was only 16 and it's that aching hole left in my heart when he went away that makes me yearn for the chance to spend time with him as an adult, not a child. To really talk with him. To know him and see him beyond the child's eyes I had when last I saw him. So it is with great surprise I discover a tiny side of my father behind that austere outer shell that I never knew existed.

Long before I was born, nearly a decade in fact, my mother bred persian cats for show. She tells me that my father had nothing to do with the day to day proceedings. She fed them, groomed them religiously, tended to their veterinary needs, cleaned their cages and arranged for the cats to get with other expensive, fancy cats worth a ton of dough to make little expensive, fancy cats that would themselves be worth a bundle in the claustrophobic world of cat fanciers. It was a full-time job. My father would occasionally pet a cat as he walked by one while at home in the evening. Occasionally. And my father seldom attended the shows.

On one occasion though, he did accompany my mother to a championship cat show where she had a cat- just one cat that time- entered for judging. It had done well in it's group and had gone on to be judged in the Best of Show Grand Champion group. Her cat had been one of the first to be judged in that last group, so there was quite a wait while the judges went over all the other cats who had made it to within one step of the championship circle. My mother was in knots and couldn't settle down. My father, being my father, was calm as ever, and told her gently that even if the cat didn't win the big prize, this was a great victory and to be pleased with all that she had accomplished.

When the Best In Show judge proclaimed my mother's cat the winner, and my mother was about to take a step towards the center stage, my father stepped in front of her, pushed her out of the way sideways into a crowd of people and leaped up into the show ring where he not only excitedly shook hands with all the judges and thanked them for their praise for what a perfect specimen of cat he had bred, but also raised the trophy and the blue ribbon high over his head while turning in a circle to accept the crowd's adulation. My mother was stunned.

And so was I when she told me this story. I never saw my dad behave this way, but I sure wish I had. And this hidden side of him goes a long way in explaining a great many of my own behaviors. Clearly, it's genetic, a thought that makes me very happy indeed.