Jump to content

Type keyword(s) to search

Soft Kitty

Lisin

By Lisin
in Current Events & Politics

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 280
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Popular Posts

fishcakes
fishcakes
ClareWalks
ClareWalks

And their non-union Chinese equivalent (Simpsons paraphrase), PANDAS!

ClareWalks
ClareWalks

This thread is badly in need of BABY PENGUINS! 

Posted Images

stillshimpy

stillshimpy

Thank you for the dog posts, as always, Lantern.  My dream for humanity is that someday we will actually deserve how wonderful our pets are.  It could happen.  You don't know.  [/Angels in the Outfield]

Rats Holding Teddy Bears, New Digs.  And when I got done with my "oh my god, let me out of this car so that I can dance around screaming" fit and my husband opened the hood, he asked me, "Is it wrong that I think he's kind of cute?"  And he was.  

  • Love 4
stillshimpy

stillshimpy

(edited)

The rat was kind of cute.  I admit it.  Probably because he was so stunned he just stood there endlessly, looking alarmed and super confused and his expression reminded us of our dog Puddles.  Who is fully continent, by the way, just prone to looking like, "Oh lord, today's the day you've decided to stop loving me, isn't it?" levels of anxious sometimes.  

Edited by stillshimpy
  • Love 5
Bastet

Bastet

I'm nuts - I once pulled over to free a bee - so I'd have driven back to where I thought the rat hitched a ride so she/he would be released back into a familiar environment.  Because I, like I said, lose my damn mind and start anthropomorphizing the hell out of animals, worrying that being separated from family and "friends" is traumatizing.  But it would have been the same "open the hood and stand back" method of release; a friend/neighbor when I was in junior high had pet rats, and I used to play and cuddle with them all the time, but your average street rat/mouse is not something I want to touch.  (I would, however, let Mr. Squirrel into my house - something he tries to achieve about once a week, as he is completely unafraid of me or the cat and believes our yard to be his own, so he just suns himself on the patio door step and tries to come in when I open the door - if I didn't know it was a terrible idea.  And it's a good thing I understand how vicious raccoons are, because, oh my god, they are so cute!)

  • Love 6
stillshimpy

stillshimpy

(edited)

Yeah, at the time, we actually couldn't figure out where in the world the rat had emigrated from if you will,  so we did actually discuss the "well, now he'll be a displaced rat"  and then, my husband caught a gopher in the backyard and put him in an empty watering can for safe keeping, as opposed to drowning or anything horrid, and then we had a long discussion about how his mate was almost certainly there in our backyard....and how that was sadly the problem and why we'd set the humane traps in the first place.   So we drove him to a spot on a nearby hill, hiking area that we thought would be relatively free of predators and if we ever catch another one, which you'd think would be likely seeing as there is a village of them out there and maybe it could be like he was the lead gopher, going out to establish the new homestead, we'll take them there too.   We are, however, it turns out, really quite bad at trapping gophers, so at present I hope uprooted gopher found someone nice and that gophers don't frown on polyamory. 

It's nice that we found each other because we're probably too darned weird for anyone else at this stage.   Oh good lord, edited!  It literally just occurred to me, I meant, it's good that my husband and I found each other, because....shortcut: I wasn't calling you weird, Bastet, by the way.  

Edited by stillshimpy
Too many pronouns, not enough sense making!
  • Love 5
walnutqueen

walnutqueen

Bastet & Shrimpy - you are my people!  My back yard is a haven for animals, and my semi-feral cats share their food with raccoons, possums and skunks.  Everyone gets along - at least, they tolerate each other with NO fights, ever.  A while back, Mama Skunk brought her teeny triplets to the food bowl by my back door, and when I unwittingly opened the door, one of the babies skittled inside.  After locking my indoor cat in a bedroom, I proceeded to gently usher baby skunk back towards the great outdoors, but he fearlessly explored every room without stinking the place up before joining his Mum & siblings back outside.  Sooo cute!

Mama raccoon thinks she's a cat, and often rests in the cat bed by my back window watching tv (or watching me sleep).  She's been raising her litters in my back yard for years.  Now THOSE are some adorable little bundles of fur!  They start out very shy and run for cover when I step outside to fill the cat bowls, but quickly get curious and friendly,  begging for hot dog treats.  If I'm not fast enough breaking off pieces for them, they'll gently pat my bare foot with their soft little paws, or stand on their hind legs reaching up beseechingly.  I have these honkin' huge windchimes that sound like church bells, but they barely ever ring unless the Santa Ana winds are really strong.  One night I heard them chime, and looked outside to see a baby raccoon sitting under the chimes.  He stood on hind legs to reach the clapper, then sat back and slowly swayed his head to & fro, just like Stevie Wonder, totally enchanted by the music.

My place might be a total dump, but to me & the critters, it's the garden of Eden.  :-)

  • Love 10
stillshimpy

stillshimpy

(edited)

Ooooh, now with all my heart, I want to give Puddles a banana and see if she will eat it like that because she is long-bodied and stubby legged, so I'm sure I'd nearly perish from cuteness.  Unfortunately, she's also super food motivated, so I'm sure it would just be a flash of jaws and then I'd be googling, "Is banana peel bad for dogs?"   

 

Quote

A while back, Mama Skunk brought her teeny triplets to the food bowl by my back door, and when I unwittingly opened the door, one of the babies skittled inside.  After locking my indoor cat in a bedroom, I proceeded to gently usher baby skunk back towards the great outdoors, but he fearlessly explored every room without stinking the place up before joining his Mum & siblings back outside.  Sooo cute!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

walnutqueen, that must have been incredibly cute and not a little nerve-racking.   Honestly, when we lived on a couple of acres in Missouri, hardly a day passed when we weren't doing something daft for the animal population.   We hatched two separate turtle clutches by protecting them through the winter with weighted milk crates.  Our lawn guy thought we were absolutely nuts but mowed around them cheerfully enough.   Here's a picture from the first clutch, they're in my husband's hand for scale.   We actually had six from that clutch altogether and then carefully put them in areas of the woods where they'd be less likely to be picked off (at least we told ourselves that): 

WP_20131004_003_zps1e3fbab6.jpg

Fun(nish) story about that.  So, starting with the sad part:  we lived in an area that was secluded, but not remote, everyone was on a couple of acres and there were woods everywhere.  As a result, there were box turtles and they take a really long time to grow.  One day our mailman ran over one at our mailbox and we were both depressed about it for a week because it had taken the poor guy decades to get to that size.  The next week? My husband  glances out his office window and directly in his line of sight is a box turtle, digging and digging and digging...and then laying her eggs for what felt like ever (it took most of the day) and then taking almost as long to cover them back up.  This gave us plenty of time to find the blog of a Star Trek fan (unrelated detail) who had hatched a clutch of box turtles, had pictures and advice.   We did battle with a toad that tried to eat them and by battle I mean, "we lured it away with treats and made it kind of a pet in a garden well area, where it grew to very large toad sizes and is probably there to this day, helping to eat some of the million insects and burping contentedly).   The turtles were all named after Star Trek characters in that blog.  We were so excited because it was all very "Circle of Life!!" without any cliffs.  

We decided to be thoroughly unoriginal and call all of ours "turtle....and other turtle....and still another turtle" because to be honest?  Not that easy to tell apart.   One was lost to the toad battle but other than that, our turtle mortality rate was low.    

That was a funky house.   Between our negotiations with woodpeckers, hatching things, finding out that Wild Turkeys nest in trees and then drop down like EZ company in the morning was one of those hilarious things.   We were out working on the pool and hear "fwoop, fwoop"  turned around: Oh, two of the wild turkeys.  Interesting.  Also, what was that noise?  "Fwoop."  Huh, there's another....what the? "fwoop, fwoop, fwoop" all of the turkeys were apparently alarmed by my husband dragging a branch around (not as a hobby) and called revelry or something....and then proceeded to run as only Wild Turkeys can:  Like canned hams with legs and feet, only very quickly despite the ungainly shape.  

Also, there was Scritchy's last stand, but I'm not sharing that story as ....implied by the title....Scritchy went on to his next incarnation.  

Then we got Oscar, who we speculate must have lived on a farm and we stopped having so many "here's a bunch of creatures that we're protecting" places because....well, we had to protect things from Oscar, who is 100 pounds and since he'd been abandoned on a highway was an adept thing hunter.   We've since broken him of that habit but part of the Gopher Resettlement efforts of '16 and '17 have to do with "Uh, you all might want to listen up, he's hardly ever out of our sights, but we can't guarantee his good conduct when he is....Uhaul to Tarantula Hill via watering can, anyone?"  Instead, they are moving, as a group, slowly up the hill in our backyard.  

I'm sure the neighbor's back there think we're a splendid addition to the neighborhood.   We tried planting things they allegedly don't like to eat and I swear, my husband had no sooner gotten a plant in the ground that we were told would give them the "flee, flee for your actual lives!" sort of hint....then one popped out of a hole, looked my husband dead in the eye like they were reenacting something from Caddy Shack, ran over and tore a big leaf off of the "Gophers hate this" plant, looked right at my husband again, and disappeared down his hole.  It is somehow fitting that we have the contrarian gophers.  

The cod liver oil capsules do appear to get them to migrate.  

Edited by stillshimpy
  • Love 7
PatsyandEddie

PatsyandEddie

Oh shimpy, you would love my farm. 100 acres,mostly forest full of birds and critters big and small. Nobody allowed in the house ( I have 11 indoor cats ) but we do all sorts of rescues. Turtles,birds,coons,etc. It's fun for us and a learning experience for the grandkids. ( Mostly that their grandparents are nuts ! ) It's a wonderful calling to protect the environment. 

  • Love 7
stillshimpy

stillshimpy

Hehe, sounds like if I ever let my husband near your place, I'd have to send you funds for his care and feeding, as he'd constantly be wandering around, finding something to befriend.   By the way, we seemed to have the local "let's pitch some woo!" hotspot for turtles at that house.  Way back at the back of the lot, under a paw-paw tree (I know, it's starting to sound a little Candylandish but they were paw-paw trees back there) we were constantly finding turtles busily trying to make more turtles when it was the season. 

We'd make the worst chaperones for any kind of event as our reactions always ran towards, "Don't interrupt them! They're endangered!  Maybe we should light some candles and put on some music to get the others to similarly make turtle eyes at one another."  

We did not run that google search, by the way.    

  • Love 5
stillshimpy

stillshimpy

Truly, I'm glad we live on a relatively normal size lot here because there are an awful lot of lizards around here and I'm not really down with the "Next?  A Reptile Sanctuary!"  that would be bound to result if we were on more property.   It was bad enough that my husband was jealous of me for a year after I glanced out a window and saw a giant black snake boogying toward the woods at that house.  Since it was not coming at me, I called for my husband, but he got there too late to make the snake identification team.   My skills run towards, "It was black.  It also slithered.  It was bigger than you'd like a snake to be, but that might just be me."   

Friday furry fun, an oldy but a ....well, it's old at least :-)   

it-suspects-nothing_zpshgdzrkhc.jpg

  • Love 4
Bastet

Bastet

15 hours ago, stillshimpy said:

Oh good lord, edited!  It literally just occurred to me, I meant, it's good that my husband and I found each other, because....shortcut: I wasn't calling you weird, Bastet, by the way.  

Ha!  I knew what you meant, but no worries either way -- I had just called myself nuts, so I'd have taken weird as a term of endearment.

  • Love 4
walnutqueen

walnutqueen

@NewDigs
Thanks - but my life will forevermore be askew since my Mum died 11/22 (a day that will live in infamy for more than one reason, now).  :~(

On a lighter note - I forgot to tell y'all about my ducks (said in my best Tony Soprano voice).  Years ago, when I had a swimming pool and a pool boy, a pair of mating wild ducks decided to make my pool their courting place.  The pool boy (who was HOT & totally gorgeous) was unceremoniously fired when he complained about their presence and my request to reduce the chemicals.  I let the pool go green, and eventually drained it down to a sizeable pond.  Those lovely honeymooning ducks came back EVERY YEAR for 8 years to swim and bask in each other's company.  They were clever enough to nest elsewhere (because cats, raccoons, possums & skunks are not good for eggs/baby chicks), and it was a tragedy when in the final year only one returned, calling incessantly for it's mate.  However, the pond turned into a swamp that delights wildlife to this day - especially the raccoons who seem to be impervious to scum.  Perhaps I should send one of THEM to DJT - he could use a pet or any kind of animal in his life.

  • Love 7
Go to topic listing
×
×
  • Create New...