Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Category Archives: Critter foo
On this Valentine’s Day, I really, really do not love my cats
I know what you’re thinking: another writer writing about his damned cats.
Sure, some writers do a great job writing about their pets. Pat Kirby can do it, but then, what sort of hard-hearted sumbitch wouldn’t love Rat Dog? But me: if my animals aren’t having sex, I’m usually, well, uninspired.
Until now.
The future is now
Jules White, Typewriter, Photo-Collage
Jake finished reading Mark Twain’s The Mysterious Stranger yesterday, so today we had him begin reading Kurt Vonnegut’s Mother Night (upbeat stuff, eh?) He got stuck on this passage:
It is a curious typewriter Mr. Friedmann has given me — and an appropriate typewriter, too. It is a typewriter that was obviously made in Germany during the Second World War. How can I tell? Quite simply, for it puts at finger tips a symbol that was never used on a typewriter before the Third German Reich, a symbol that will never be used on a typewriter again.
The symbol is the twin lightning strokes used for the dreaded S.S., the Schutzstaffel, the most fanatic wing of Nazism.
Jake’s problem with this? He’d never seen a typewriter, and couldn’t imagine how such a thing could work.
Even with ample visual aids, he still didn’t quite get it. I showed him the high magnification image, pointed out all the parts, described how they worked. Next, I took a #2 pencil and scribbled out a dense rectangular box of graphite. I flipped this paper onto another paper, and by marking firmly on the back of the first paper, I left a mark on the second.
“Like that,” I said. “The key strikes the ribbon, which contains ink. That’s like the graphite on this piece of paper. It transfers the ink to the typing paper.”
He got it eventually, but the whole thing proved surprisingly difficult. Now, I’m wondering what’s next. Will I have to buy him a sliderule on eBay to prove to him that, yes, you can work trig functions with a clever bit of plastic?
Go on — I know some of you must have similar stories.
***
In other news: suddenly, I’m the WordPress God. I figured out how to put a frog on my header all by myself! You’re looking at a Dendrobates leucomelas, also known as the yellow-banded poison dart frogs. They are native to northern Brazil, parts of Guyana and Venezuela, and they’re a hearty species, easily kept and bred in captivity.
We don’t keep leucs. We keep blue poison dart frogs (Dendrobates azureus), a frog so beautiful folks never believe they are real until they hop.
Honestly, though, I haven’t yet achieved WordPress godhood. I have yet to solve my Blogger importation problems, and I can’t figure out why other computers besides this one refuse to recognize my password. That’s why I haven’t been able to post in the morning. No, it’s not a cookie problem; I’ve made the cookie settings as permissive as possible and it does not seem to help.
Time for The Daily Show.
D.
Is there a dog whisperer in the house?
I had to share this with you. This morning, RaZen at YesButNoButYes brings us a video of a possessed dog. I think St. Francis needs a day or two a month, not just one day a year — this dog needs to be blessed big time.
You may not know this if you’re sane, but dogs will acquire the psychopathology of their masters. I’ve seen it again and again. Mostly in my family. But I do have one family-safe story to tell regarding psycho canines.
As some of you may recall, I volunteered at Napa State Mental Hospital for a few years, during my time at UC Berkeley. Napa had a halfway house on their grounds, a building that looked and functioned like a real home, nothing ward-y about it. Folks who were ready for the real world could spend a few weeks there, cooking in their own kitchen, using actual knives.
The halfway house had a pet dog, one of those creatures that looks part poodle, part terrier, part chihuahua, and part Tasmanian devil, and this dog had a favorite pillow.
After you’ve watched the possessed doggy video (linked above), imagine our runty little hero treating his pillow in just this manner. Just when you think he had given that pillow what-for, he would change tactics and hump the pillow. A minute or two of fruitless humping, and he’d back in full attack mode, snarling, biting, ravaging that poor pillow.
I’d never met a dog with borderline personality disorder before, but I’m sure he had it.
For those of you who read my boogers blog, I’ve posted a long rant on ear wax. Just what you wanted with your Sunday coffee.
D.
PS: and this is partly a note-to-myself, so that I can find the links first thing Monday morning . . .
Vichy Democrats has a one-stop resource in the fight against confirmation of Sam Alito: Senators’ local phone numbers, fax numbers, email addies, web forms, plus where they stand on the cloture vote. Also, links to online petitions.
For those of you wondering what all the fuss is about, Georgia at Kos says it better than I ever could. Many of us who oppose Alito do so because of his opinions regarding the powers of the Executive branch. In the context of the George W. Bush power grab, Alito is downright dangerous.
This may be our best chance to block the Imperial Presidency, folks. Let your voice be heard, preferably over and over again.
Tomorrow, I’ll be getting up an hour early so that I can make lots of phone calls and send lots of faxes before my day begins. We can do this!
Who says they’re cold-blooded?
In the February 2006 issue of Reptiles*, Jim Pether, owner/manager of a reptile park in the Canary Islands, shares his experiences breeding Komodo dragons (Komodos: A Breeding Project With Teeth).
His initial attempts were nearly disastrous:
“Then, one day when I was not at the park, a visitor ran and told my wife Christine that one dragon was attacking another. She ran down to find the male chewing the female’s leg off and bravely (or stupidly, depending on your view) jumped in and began beating him over the head with a broom.”
She manages to rescue the female by luring the male away with a dead rat. The vet saved the female’s leg. Not willing to press his luck, Pether sent the female to the Rotterdam Zoo.
He had one more female to try out.
“Nervous at first, the female ran away and hid in her burrow . . .”
Word gets around.
“but after a few days got used to the male’s presence. They were soon basking together.”
On to the action.
“Actual mating began when the male started tongue flicking the female’s cloacal area, presumably to test if she was ovulating and releasing pheromones. The male then raked her back with his long claws and tongue flicked her body. He then positioned his body parallel to hers and tongue-flicked her neck. Using a rear leg, he lifted her tail to mate with her.”
Was it good for you, too?
D.
*Available at pet stores near you!
A liberally dirty joke
Long O.R. day today, plus two trips to the ER, so I find myself short on energy, creativity, and time. Soon, I hope to write a post on this little feller,
the blue poison dart frog, Dendrobates azureus. Hard to believe I’ve been blogging since April and I’ve made scarcely a mention of our frogs.
Maybe later. For now, here’s a joke I heard in the O.R. today. Stop me if you’ve heard this one.
Um . . . any of you who are still in that 36%-who-still-like-George-Bush demographic might want to sit this one out. (more…)
Your morning linkage
Check out Rae Alexander’s blog for a particularly creepy bird story. Yeesh. And I thought I had exaggerated their cruelty in my NiP. She also has some fine frog pix up, for you frog lovers.
More later.
D.
Formication
Subtitle: We be schleppin’ spiders
formication
An abnormal sensation as of insects running over or into the skin, associated with cocaine intoxication or disease of the spinal cord and peripheral nerves.
My ferret has fleas
Debi’s busy blogging about her dog, which made me think: You know, there’s no way a dog can be as much trouble as my ferret, Charlotte.
Her sister Emily ran off one day. I’d stupidly left the screen door open while cleaning their cage, and she made a mad dash. Ferrets are so damned domesticated that they can’t forage on their own, so I knew right away she had zero chance of survival. Hateful creature that she was, I knew she wouldn’t come back out of any feeling of affection.
Charlotte’s attitude improved with Emily’s absence. That’s not supposed to happen, by the way. Ferrets are social creatures, so the pet store owner advised us not to buy just one. Nevertheless, Charlotte has been much more pleasant, playful, and less inclined to nip since Emily left.
I noticed today that her back looked red. When I picked her up, I saw her skin move. Crawl — that’s a better word.
She’d become infested with fleas, and I had never noticed. I’ve never seen her biting or scratching, not once, so how would I know? I have noticed that our house is crawling with fleas, but I assumed the cats were bringing them in. Little did I know that Charlotte had become a vector.
I sprayed her with flea spray and took her into the bathroom. For the next twenty minutes, Karen and I shampooed her repeatedly and picked fleas from everywhere. Easily, she had over a hundred fleas. We even picked one out of her mouth.
I’ve showered since, but my skin is still crawling.
This is not a fun three-day weekend.
Blog-pal Rae Alexander is the new kid on my blogroll. She’s head honcho of the North Coast Nature Center, which Karen and I support (with critter donations, naturally). Rae, if you’re reading this, pay attention to my flea story. Do you still think the Nature Center needs a mammal?
D.
Dancing with Snoopy
Someone over at Miss Snark used the phrase Snoopy dance as an alternative to the more contemporary Homer Simpsonesque woo-hoo! I suppose Eric Cartman’s Sweeeet would be even more hip. Whatever.
Point is, Miss Snark liked my snippet. In fact, she used that other L word, the one you want so desperately to hear from your agent/editor/publisher. Here’s the link.
Aside from giving me a goofy smile for the morning, this also persuades me to rethink my plans. I’d gotten it into my head that I would have to sell my first story to a publisher before an agent would ever take me seriously. Hmm. Maybe not so.
I have a meeting tonight. Not one of those ‘pull out my wisdom teeth with rusty pliers’ hospital meetings, but a board meeting for the North Coast Nature Center. I wonder how Ray is doing with her moon jellyfish exhibit. She’s been having a devil of a time keeping them alive.
You lurkers who have known Karen and me forever (hi Kira!) are familiar with our creepy crawly love affair*. Our house is, as always, a menagerie. Unfortunately, we have way too many mammals for my liking: three cats, one ferret, and four degus.
What? Never heard of a degu?
Think big gerbil, but don’t think about it too hard.
Our cold-blooded collection, ignoring for the moment Karen’s tarantula mania, consists only of a Madagascar hissing cockroach colony, some freshwater fish, and a water dragon. For us, this is a mighty low census.
That’s enough for the morning. One Snoopy dance and one cute furry rodent. You’d get sugar toxic if I gave you any more than that.
D.
*Take that however you like.