dirt mall redux

You see some crazy shit when you spend the weekend selling used videos at the local flea market.

You'd be amazed at how many different ways there are to tote a small dog. You can tuck your chihuahua into a leather man-bag. You can push it around in a pet stroller, or you can just go ahead and load three pugs into a regular baby stroller. You can stuff it in a canvas carrier made to look like a really ugly purse with vented sides. You can buy a sort of harness made to go around all the important bits and leave the pup's legs and tail dangling as you carry it by the special strap at the top, as if the whole animal was a yapping diaper bag.

Or you can do as one family I saw did: carry the small dog lovingly in your arms and clip the animal's leash to your small son's britches, solving two problems in one go.

furry damn snake

The small complex where I live involves a duplex (my side of the joint) and a triplex. (You can see the front of these above.) The middle unit in the triplex is our cursed apartment - everyone who moves in is a loser or an asshole. Twice now, guys have basically abandoned pets in there. The first time it was two cats - they finally got out; we rescued one but the other roamed free. Annoying, pitiful, and angering, yes. But not frightening.

The dude who "lives" there now (but generally stays with his girlfriend), on the other hand, keeps two ferrets. Well, I guess some time Saturday, one of them made a break for freedom. My friend and neighbor next to me saw the critter peering out of the bushes at him. The beast didn't stay shy long - by Sunday, it was chasing people. Ferrets are bitey little buggers anyway, and this one was pissed off, hungry, and fearless around people.

Monday night I needed to walk over to the triplex to talk to my bro there. In my flip flops, I strolled the few feet, flipping through numbers in my cell phone as I went. When, all of a sudden, that god damned ferret came rushing out of the bushes and bit the crap out of the back of my heel! So I yelped and hollered and jumped back to my place with it fast behind me. I shut the door yelling, "That fucker bit me!" and went to wash and disinfect the wound. Meanwhile, a friend that was hanging out with me decided to open the door and see if she could spot the animal.

Bad idea!

She cracked the door and it scurried inside. It tried to chomp her and she screamed for me, so I grabbed the broom and went to do battle, barefoot. The beast went for my cat, went for me, and went for my friend while we herded it back out onto the porch and slammed the door. I called my landlord and left a message telling her we had an attack ferret in the neighborhood and asked her to call the middle neighbor and tell him to come deal with his pet.

Tuesday evening, while I was still at work, middle neighbor showed up at my bro's front door. He apologized and lied about checking on the two ferrets Monday afternoon, saying it must have escaped right after that. My buddy told him, a) take it up with me, since I'm the one that got chomped and b) don't bald faced lie to people. Middle neighbor left the area, beast still free and aggro.

Finally, yesterday afternoon, a guy working at the print shop next door caught it in a trash can. He left middle neighbor a note on the door, but if he doesn't hear from him by today, the animal is going to a friend of his who already has two of his own and doesn't mind another. As I told my bro, I don't care if it goes to Ferret Hell.

Just business as usual in my neighborhood.

The Ding Dang Saga

One of my sisters wanted a hamster, so she got Ding Dang and a pink, plastic cage. Turned out that her cats also wanted a hamster. To prevent his name from changing to Kitty Snack, she handed Mr. Dang over to another sister. Well, she went off to live in a dorm at FSU, so the little fella wound up camping in mom's laundry room. But mom doesn't really like rodents much, plus he's got huge nuts and it's just kind of creepy (no, really, you should see them), so I said I'd give him a home.

Now Ding Dang lives in my bedroom, unless it's very cold (no heat at my house), when he lives on top of the fridge near the gas stove and hot water heater. He seems happy, but how can you tell a hamster's mood? Once a week he hangs out in a big mason jar while I clean his cage, and that's the only time that my cat remembers he exists.

Ding Dang the hamster - he'll never win any prizes, but he's really good at eating cherry tomatoes.