Mutterings and Musings

A Zoo of My Very Own

Challenge: We need your help filling the Challenge War Chest with prompts! In your entry today, write three of your own 30DBC prompts and then choose one to respond to.

Do you (currently or previously) have any pets? What made you pick them and what would be your dream pet? If you don't have any pets, discuss your opinions on pets - are they not for you, are they not permitted where you live, do you disagree with the principle, do you want them but not yet?
You are hosting a dinner party. Who is coming and why? You can have historical and fictional, but you must give some detail.

You've woken up with a superpower. What is it and how is going to change your life? Bonus, everyone has woken up with a superpower; are they all the same superpowers? How is society going to react and change?


So the current pet list comprises of two parrots (Tali & Summer), one hedgehog (Millie), several African sun beetles, and six giant African land snails. Growing up, we had a string of farm cats (inc Peatie, Smokey, Boaz, Fonz, Squeaky, Ruth), a collie-cross (Bosun), finches/canaries, gerbils/degus (mostly my sister's), two other parrots (Harry & Akeira) and a rescue cat (Tinks) and a rescue hedgehog (Luna).
Oh and quail, piglets, cockroaches (no seriously, I was breeding them for the hedgehog), and tropical fish/aquatic snails and a little crab called Colin...


When I write it out like this, it sounds insane. But (apart from my first year at uni, in student accommodation), I've always had some sort of animal around the house. Harry was a tiny little parakeet, barely bigger than a robin. I had him for ten years. He died in my hands several years ago, suddenly and completely without warning - a heart attack I suspect. He was old for his species, without being elderly. I bought him shortly after my eighteenth birthday and (apart from that one year at uni when my dad cared for him) he was my inseparable little housemate. He had his wings already clipped when I bought him, and I learnt a few years later that if you clip a bird's wings too early, their chest muscles don't always develop fully - leaving them more prone to heart disease later in life.
Since then, I've always been a advocate of doing research before getting a pet and never impulse buying an animal (I went back on this one day and ended up with four Giant African Land Snails. They turned out to be runts, i.e. have very poor genes and lead short (but hopefully happy) lives. I did a lot of research before continuing with GALS). Which is why, although I pester Best Beloved on an almost daily (certainly weekly) basis for a puppy,* I'm only ever teasing him. We both work long hours, and although the birds are used to it (I've had Taliesin and Summer longer than I've had Best Beloved) and Millie actually prefers it when we're out** getting a puppy would be both selfish and stupid.

Perhaps in a few years, when we've started a family and one or other of us is working less hours, we'll seriously consider a dog (I'm holding out for a Rottweiler***, but hoping to compromise on a Newfoundland). I also point out of a regular basis that the family holiday park would be vastly improved with a pack of llamas or alpacas. I've even offered to look after them

* I'd actually rather a kitten, but know when I'm beat. He'll agree to a dog when it suits our lifestyle and is fair on the dog, but he doesn't like cats and will never cave on that.

** Damn h'hog is my spirit animal; eat, sleep, get really angry when anyone approaches.

*** Only partly because it'll annoy the hell out of BB, I want a really girly or old fashioned name like Daisy or Mavis. Why yes this is my 55kg black and tan ball of muscle, and yes she only answers to Princess Ivy-Bluebell.....