The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => People & Places => Topic started by: wombat on July 02, 2006, 07:02:48 pm
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Wombat's excellent but exhausting temporary job at the Reptile House of a certain prominient Mid-Atlantic region zoo recently ended. I just started working part time for a private breeder and dealer of snakes and frogs. The web site is here (http://www.herpetologic.net/). We would be happy to serve you for all your poison dart frog and green tree python needs. Or just go look at the pretty pictures.
Also I just got a second dog. Pictures here. (http://www.flickr.com/photos/38817438@N00/) Rose was a rescue from a puppy mill where she was a breeding bitch. She got no vet care so she is mostly blind from untreated eye problems. She gets around pretty well despite her limited sight - her more immediate problem is that her foster family made her very overweight. She is very sweet but can't do much of normal dog things yet, like walk on a leash, since she lived the first three years of her life in a cage, and the extra weight doesn't help. Fortunately she already knows to do her business outdoors, which is great because lots of puppy mill rescues apparently never get housebroken. She's OK on that, but is going to need a lot of socialization. It will be interesting to see if it's really possible to make up for the deficits in her early experience. If not, I have low expectations. I did the raising the overacheiving first child thing with Lilly already - if the second dog can just sit and walk on a leash, I'm OK with that.
(If you don't already know this, you should not buy puppies from pet stores, especially those big stores that sell nothing but puppies. They are bred at what are basically dog factories where USDA regulations allow dogs to be kept in cages that are just big enough to stand up and turn around and that's it and have to have litter after litter with no break.)
Number One Pug Lilly is not too happy about this development. The main point of this was for her to have a friend, so I hope that she gets to like her, but right now, she seems to still be hoping that this other dog will leave and go home. I keep telling her that Rose is just the emergency backup dog and isn't even fully functional, but she is not mollified. Anyone got any advice about running a two dog household?
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Those are some fine looking serpents being vended. I am particularly pleased at learning that there is an "Aquaman bloodline" of snakes, of which Aquaboy is the latest sire.
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I keep telling her that Rose is just the emergency backup dog
Wow, Dave Barry flashback.
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Wow, Dave Barry flashback.
Yes, although I believe that his was a full-service spare, as far as either of his dogs were 100% functional in the first place.
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Tomorrow marks my second year where I am unemployed for two months in summer, which become the months when I work as a writer full time. That means I'll be here a lot more... you know, writing to avoid the other writing...
I am starting with what I will hope will be a new routine - I will be getting up with the SO at 6 AM because he drives past our gym on the way to work. I'll start each day with a workout and some socializing, in hopes these next two months don't feel so claustrophobic.
Also, wombat, your new dog, paired with the other pug, just kill me. So cute. I don't know how you don't just squish them. Basically, if all goes well, at this time next year, I too will be working a rescue dog of our own into my household. The only good time to do this is when you have a lot of time at home, I think. Basically my only criteria for a rescue dog is being house broken and not killing my cats.
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Yes, I think I now understand why most people have overweight pugs and don't see the problem - the fat one is just unbelievably squishable.
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Yes, it is easy to have a stocky dog and make them even stocky-er. We had a Pembroke Welsh Corgi, and he basically looked like a log that had sprouted tiny legs. People would shout out "what happended to his legs!?" when they saw us coming down the side walk. Nothing, he was born that way. Then they'd say "where's his tail?!" He was born without a tail, as a are all of his breed.
Do either of you puggies have nasal problems? My cousin had a pug and it had serious issues - you could always hear it breathing, it would play,then get weak from not getting enough air, it snored horribly and had to have doggy nasal spray, and the vet said it needed some sort of operation, which it never got, and it lived a very short life. Apparently breathing issues are common with this breed, or so my cousin said - but he is the sort of person who doesn't properly care for anything, so I sort of always suspected he was not caring for his animal properly.
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We have been fortunate with the breathing issues so far, but Number Two Pug does snore. We are hoping to keep her in the habit of sleeping in the next room on the nice dog bed, because it's a bit of a racket. She is unable to jump up onto the human bed due to fatness and sight issues, which turns out to be sort of fortunate. We now have one pug who can climb all over stuff almost as much as the cats, and one that can't leave the ground - it averages out to one normal dog.
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I want a weiner partner-in-crime.
I love small dogs.
...mine is a king charles spaniel. a little runty one who is basically still a puppy, despite being 5. he is my favorite little guy, is what I am saying here.
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Those are some fine looking serpents being vended. I am particularly pleased at learning that there is an "Aquaman bloodline" of snakes, of which Aquaboy is the latest sire.
I noticed today that we have a manual about these snakes and inside the cover it says that the cover picture is of a snake named Darth Maul.
I have decided that the breeding of fancy colored snakes is what men do who think it would be too girly to breed fancy colored flowers. I don't really understand why you'd look at a green tree snake and say "Hey, let's try to breed a yellow one" instead of going out and buying a species of snake that was already yellow.... any more than I understand why you'd look at a yellow day lily and say "Hey, let's breed a purple one" instead of just going out and buying a flower that was purple to begin with. It seems like exactly the same inexplicable impulse to me.
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So painting the dog blue... that's totally wrong in your book?
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what if you were to red up the snake, hella Pittzburg stylez?
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Oh, not at all, painting it is completely different...
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I like the new pictures a lot! Glad you're enjoying the new gig. And new pug.
If it's any consolation, our kitties started out hating each other, but yesterday we caught them taking a nap all curled up together. It only took 3 months!
And do pet stores still really sell puppies? I don't think I've seen that since I was a kid.
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OK I need to share this. I had to look up that phrase to make sure it was being used correctly. and then, I looked around randomly on Urban Dictionary.
And i found this:
I am pregnate.
What an illiterate girl writes on the back of her hand so that she will remember to tell her boyfriend that she is with child.
"Todd," (she refers to back of hand) "I'm pregnate!"
I fell in love with this.
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And do pet stores still really sell puppies? I don't think I've seen that since I was a kid.
Since pet supply stores stopped doing it, unfortunately there are now stores that sell nothing but puppies.
I will definitely report back the first time I see the two pugs curled up sleeping together or something similar. Although I am also hoping for something a little more calorie-burning like a game of chasing each other.
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I will definitely report back the first time I see the two pugs curled up sleeping together or something similar. Although I am also hoping for something a little more calorie-burning like a game of chasing each other.
My vote is for "jumping up and down on a trampoline". That would be adorable.
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Although I am also hoping for something a little more calorie-burning like a game of chasing each other.
Oh man, our guys are all about that. We basically got the kitten just so Moggie would bite something other than our ankles. It's worked better than we could possibly have dreamed. She's slimmed down a fair bit, too.
I was so not aware of the puppy stores! Are they underground, or something? Maybe I just don't go to the mall often enough. I'm suprised that sort of thing hasn't been legislated out of existance.
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Maybe the puppy stores don't exist in all parts of the country, but the one we have here is a chain and it's definitely not underground. They advertise quite prominently. When I walk Number One Pug and talk to people who are interested in buying a pug, they will often mention those places and I will have to warn against them.
It's not the selling that needs to be legislated out of existence, in my opinion. I don't have a problem with people buying puppies. The problem that needs to be legislated is that people are legally allowed to breed the puppies in inhumane conditions.
On a lighter note: Pug trampolining. Yes, this is clearly a sport whose time needs to come.
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My vote is for "jumping up and down on a trampoline". That would be adorable.
Thank you. That made me laugh out loud or "LOL" as the kids these days might say.
In my head they are both wearing little work-out outfits and have little sweat bands on their heads.
Indeed when it comes to pet fitness, it's all about the pets having buddies. Since my cat made friends with my SO's two cats he began to slim down. Now that we've lived in our two story house, all three of 'em are noticeably more fit and muscular. It's a little crazy when all three get frisky at once though.
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sometimes my cats chase each other around like hell really late at night.
I failed you all with that urban dictionary quote, before. I should have ended it with "Todd: Bitches gotta take they cunt pills"
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It's not the selling that needs to be legislated out of existence, in my opinion. I don't have a problem with people buying puppies. The problem that needs to be legislated is that people are legally allowed to breed the puppies in inhumane conditions.
That's what I meant. Folks gotta get their purebreds somehow, I guess. Though I just went through a website for a local place and saw puppies that cost more than the blue book value of my car. It confused me - the people I come from only recently accepted the idea of keeping pets in the house instead of in the barn.
On a lighter note: Pug trampolining. Yes, this is clearly a sport whose time needs to come.
Yes! My neighbor has a baby puglet who would love to participate, I'm sure.
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Did you look at the website for the place I work for? Some of the snakes are also worth more than your car. And they don't even, like, sit and recognize their names. Very weird.
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Yes, but you can take the snakes... on a plane.
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Well sure but you could take much cheaper snakes on a plane and get just as much fun out of it, you know?
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Well sure but you could take much cheaper snakes on a plane and get just as much fun out of it, you know?
I know where you can get like.. like 50 garters if you want. I mean.. I'm just saying. They don't so much bite as they just kind of hide under rocks though.
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Dang, 4k for a snake? I only looked at the cool frogs when I hit that site up the first time. You gotta tell us interesting stories about your clientelle sometimes.
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Something tells me that a lot of their clients have ER trips in their future.
"A million to one shot, doc! I just totally fell on it while my trousers were off..."
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Seeing a doctor about a trouser sn...
I'll get my coat.
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Yeah, I have to say, the image of pugs on a trampoline is way past precious and verging on twee, but in a good way.
The snake breeding-line page is sort of weirding me out, if only because of the one with the status "female laid slugs." This has to be slang for something, right? They haven't actually figured out a way for reptiles to produce gastropods, right?!
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"Slugs" are infertile eggs, nothing more miraculous. No vertebrates giving birth to slimy inverts.
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As for stories about the clientele so far: When I left on Friday, my co-worker was still in the middle of a conversation with a customer that had already gone on for about half an hour, most of which had been about whether a particular frog was red or orange.
Granted, there was a price difference between the two colors so I guess it mattered. Don't ask me why there was a price difference - I assume the answer can only be about what the market will bear and the scarcity of the commodity or whatever, since all the frogs take exactly the same effort to produce.
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If one color is a recessive trait and thus more genetically rare then it's not as easy to produce.
Plus have you ever tried to get two frogs to get it on? I mean I had a little Italian Bistro set up with a Gerbil Violinist to serenade them and everything. All they did was ribbit and hop away.
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If one color is a recessive trait and thus more genetically rare then it's not as easy to produce.
Yeah, that might be why one is scarcer and more valuable. But as far as effort on our part it's all the same.
I am not sure yet what is going on with the genetics, though. I think most of the cases where we have different colors, they are not crossbreedings or anything like with the snakes. I think they're all different wild subpopulations in the first place. But I am not positive, as mostly so far I have been busy learning things like where we keep the fruit-fly medium and that there is nothing to listen to on 200 channels of satellite radio.