I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. We had a nice time at the Ex-Boyfriend household. My 85 year old grandma came to spend a few days with us and we ate our body weight in Tofurky and apple pie. My wife asked my grandmother what she’d like for Christmas, and she replied “I think I’d like a discman. I have a walkman but I can’t find tapes for it any more.”
“I don’t think they make those any more,” my wife said “But we can get you an mp3 player.”
“How many CDs can I listen to on that?” Grandma asks.
“All of them,” replied my wife, trying to suppress a chuckle “every CD you now own and ever will own. Plus the mp3 player won’t skip and it’s really small, it will fit in your pocket.”
“Because I have about TWENTY CDs” grandma says, suspicious that perhaps her overwhelming collection of music won’t fit on the mystical mp3 player.
“I think we’ll be able to make that work” my wife assures her.
Later we showed Grandma our iphones. I really can’t wait til I am 85. I bet by then iphones will have a teleportation feature. The future is neat.
So, as I’ve blogged before, my wife and I are pretty active volunteers at the local SPCA. Our love of companion animals is well-documented throughout the site, from our tee designs to our philanthropicendeavors, but it also carries over into the three dimensional world.
About a month ago, we got a call from the volunteer coordinator over at the SPCA asking if we’d be able to foster a pair of puppies for a couple of weeks until they were old enough to be spayed and neutered before going up for adoption. Despite a split second of reticence brought on by memories of our first attempt at fostering a dog, I said “YES!” Cuteness trumps good sense 99.9% of the time.
So I drove up the next day on my lunch break to pick up Grace (fawn) and her brother Harlowe (black).
Enjoy the cuteness while it lasts!
About six hours later, I was seriously regretting my decision.
While these two are unassailably adorable, all of that goes out the window when they’re, y’know, awake. It’s ridiculous how much energy and poop is contained in those tiny bodies. I feel like the Ms. and I spent two weeks just following these two around with paper towels and sanitary wipes. The good news is, these two were both adopted on their first day of eligibility. As much of a headache as they were, I wanted nothing more than for them to end up in a loving home as soon as possible. As great as the staff and facilities at the Maryland SPCA are, a 2′3 kennel is a 2′3 kennel, and the best thing for these guys is a lot of space where they can run around, if only to tire them out so they revert to their cute and unconscious state. It’s kind of funny how they’d run and wrestle and scamper non-stop for 20 minutes, and then just more or less keel over onto their blanket and pass out. ON or OFF, there is no dimmer switch!
For whatever reason, being an SPCA foster parent tends to be something of a feast-or-famine proposition. Once we’d been approved as foster parents last January, it was a whole two months before we got a call asking us to care for an animal. After that 10-day stint, it was another two and a half months before our next call. Then, we get the call for Grace & Harlowe in mid-October, and the day we returned them two weeks later, we were sent home with 18-month old Jezebel and her six kittens!
Nom nom nom!
Nom nom nom!
Originally (and imaginatively) named Momcat and 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, we slowly over the last two weeks got to know every member of the family on an intimate (very intimate—you should have seen the state of that litter box every 6-12 hours; yikes!) level. Being the jailbait strumpet single mom of six, Momcat became Jezebel.
Her brood is made up of two boys, Chunk and Thor, and four girls: Pixie, Rosebud, Clementine, and Valentina.
Sleepy Valentina
Rosebud!
EPIC CUTENESS.
Unlike Grace & Harlowe, these guys were a little more manageable when awake; small size and quiet voices are like that.
While we love every last one of these guys, I can say that I hope we get a little time off now. I miss living in a two bathroom household!
Oh my the cute! Admire this super fuzzy guy nomming on a snack with chopsticks. I kinda think I could get my cat Bigby to do this. I will give it a try and see.
Also, pictures of my foster puppies are coming soon. I will try to post them this weekend, hopefully I will have time. I say this because on Friday we’re going to start fostering a momma cat and her adorable itty bitty 2 week old kittens! Cuteness will abound.
OMG , guys, I have been too busy to even tell you what I’ve been too busy with. How is it November already? My camera is busting at the seams with pictures I am going to share with you guys. We saw some amazing Halloween revelers over the weekend around our ‘hood and we’re fostering the super cutest puppies for the SPCA!!! They’ve actually kept me too busy to even post their pix but I do have them and they’re coming up soon.
Second, some heartwarming local doggy news to be had right here. This story made me tear up a little. It’s the kind of thing that restores your faith in humans. You can also find an update to the story here. We love when good things happen for critters around here.
