Fast Fiction

This week’s topic comes from dear Will. It’s all about one of my favorite things, pets.

1. Got pets? Give us a roll call!

I just have one right now. The lovely beagle & springer spaniel mix/mutt named Beckett. She’s probably about 11 years old now.

2. How did you and your pet(s) find each other?

The Man and I specifically wanted a beagle mutt like I had when I was growing up, so we went to Long Beach to the Beagles & Buddies rescue league. She’s bigger than a regular lemon beagle, which I liked. She was horribly sick when we got her (distemper) and we certainly saved her life that day when we took her home. She never would have made it a whole week in the kennel being that sick.

2. Dog owners: What’s your favorite place to take your canine for a
walk/run/romp? (yes, there seem to be two twos)

Our driveway. It’s long and she loves to play fetch with handballs.

3. Cat owners: Do you have indoor kitties or do you allow them outside as
well?

I consider Robin’s cat nearly ours, she’s inside/out. I believe she’s rethinking the outdoor thing based on the most recent coyote sightings. Of course I think Dorothy is pretty damn smart (she seems to spend a lot of time on top of cars) and can take care of herself.

4. Every pet owner needs access to a good veterinarian? Where do you go when
your pets need health care, and why?

Gateway Animal Hospital on Los Feliz just south of San Fernando Blvd. We’ve been seeing Doctor Jimerson since we got her and figure he’s some sort of vet/god for saving her life.

5. During any extended stays away from home, do you get a friend to care for
them, board your pets, or hire a professional pet sitter? Any
recommendations for the last two?

Always a pet sitter. I’m afraid to give you recommendations because then you might take them away from me. As bloggers go, Will & Jay have sat with Beckett before. For emergencies we’ve relied heavily on our neighbors.

6. Had any close contact with some of L.A.‘s native wildlife?

She caught a mouse once. And there was that time she got skunked. And that other time she got skunked. We now know to not let her off leash, even in our own back yard, after dark. Of course the skunks don’t know that they’re not supposed to be in our back yard in the daylight.

7. Good or bad, what’s your most memorable childhood animal encounter?

When I was in the fourth grade my mother was taking me and my sister to ballet class. It was all the way in Akron (we lived in Munroe Falls). When we drove past the B&K Rootbeer Stand, I saw a grand male lion in a cage being towed behind a truck. I turned to my mother and told her there was a lion at the root beer stand and I hoped he’d be there on our way back so we could see him. My mother turned and looked back, but didn’t see him. Everyone made fun of me for the rest of the day. The next day in the Akron Beacon Journal there was a picture of a lion in a cage being pulled by a truck in the parking lot of a local store.

8. What’s the funniest and/or most frustrating thing your pet does?

She barks a lot. But most frustrating I think would have to be when she plays with her ball she really likes to chase it or push it under the couch and of course can’t get it out. She’ll obsess about it. You can try giving her another ball, a ball you think is identical, but she wants that ball.