Home of the Snarkmaiden

As of tonight, I have decided that the most appropriate collective noun for an assemblage of miscellaneous house pets is "a complication". You can roll your own examples, I'm sure, but this evening when I let out the dogs for one final bio break before I go to bed, there was a very large, quite fresh but wholly dead rat lovingly laid out on the back door mat. No doubt this is why Shoobie had been hanging out by the back door with such determined interest. But since both dogs pass the rat by as they dash out into the yard I figure I'm safe in waiting until the dogs are back in before disposing of the corpse. Ah, but no.

Neither dog was apparently that interested in peeing, so they both turn around to head back toward the house almost immediately, and I'm figuring I'll grab a plastic bag to pick up the rat with as soon as they're back in the kitchen. But no. Never discount Shoobie's prowess as a serious ratter. As Shoobie gets to the open door, I can practically see the exclamation point go off above his head. He spots the rat, and his whole stout little body vibrates with joy. Wagging his tail in majestic triumph, he grabs the corpse, and with head held high, marches proudly into the kitchen with a dead rat almost as big as his head and several times larger than his dinky little snout clenched firmly between his teeth. Because Shoobie has something, and she does not, Kaylee is now of course Very Interested and she dashes in after him, looming over him and making little sallies to take the rat away.

Shoobie is having none of it. He skitters aside and goes pitter-pattering off into the living room, ridiculous feathery tail curled high over his back like a warlord's banner. Shoobie is mighty. Shoobie is great. Shoobie has the kill, and he's damned if anyone will take his trophy from him now, however ill-gotten. (This is all so very different from when Shoob has a ball -- the minute Kaylee gets interested in a ball Shoobie has been playing with, he drops it and feigns complete disinterest. It's a question of picking your battles, I guess.)

I grab a plastic bag from the recycling dispenser beside the kitchen door to collect the rat with, and follow a distant third. My first two or three sallies to even grab hold of the rat fail, as Shoobie is dodging all malefactors, and every time I try to get a grip on Shoobie, there's Kaylee worming in trying to get her share of whatever fun is to be had. I finally manage to send Kaylee away, corner Shoobie in the dog bed, and manage to get a proper grip on the rat. And also on the deceased rodent. Shoobie will. Not. Let. Go. People will tell you about the stubbornness of bully breed dogs when they have a grip. Hah! Bully dogs are easy. It's the chihuahuas that will out-stubborn a starfish. I gave up trying to wrest if from him since I didn't really want to have to clean splattered rat guts off the oak floor should the corpse fail before Shoobie's will did.

After a couple more rounds of foolishness, finally I managed to get the rat, not by dint of prying it out of Shoobie's jaws but solely because he decided that the rat really was dead after all, and therefore not that interesting.

So yeah. A dog is just a dog, a cat is just a cat, but when they come in groups, they are a complication.


Kaylee and Shoobie share a rat-free moment

Or new ways to sustain (and embrace?) catastrophic yarn loss.

A sickly sweet miasma of death, rot, and corruption has been gradually seeping from the reading corner of my office for the better part of a week now. I had picked through the basket of yarns by my chair, since that seemed to be the source, several times and not found anything ghastly. But the smell did not diminish over time. It kept growing nastier, more pungent. Tonight the stank of it had reached a point where I figured I would move filing cabinets if I had to, to find and dispose of whatever mouse or bird head Tinka had put up to ripen.

Turns out I didn't have to work that hard. Kaylee's nose picked out the source of the pong. I had previously discounted the bag of ribbon yarn when I was rooting around the yarn basket because it was, well, not sealed exactly, but narrow and deep and not easy to accidentally drop random bits of carrion into. Yeah, well, then I lifted the bag and I noted that the side of it was torn out, and in among the nice copper-colored ribbon yarn that I had hoped to turn into a dressy tank top was a rather large white and black-tipped blob of...fur? I went and got a plastic bag to extract the trophy. It seemed to be mammalian rather than avian, and I wasn't sure if it was intact or a hairy gobbet. I wrinkled my nose, screwed up my courage, and grabbed the furry lump with my bag-swathed hand. It was surprisingly heavy, whatever it was. And big. With a thickish, naked pink tail and matted, long silky fur. Yes, ladies and germs, Tinka had buried an entire juvenile opossum in the bottom of my bag of ribbon yarn -- unless the possum wasn't fully dead when she left it, in which case I guess the possum buried itself there -- where it has been cheerfully turning into malodorous possum sludge ever since.

Can I just say, "EEWWWWwww!"? Yeah.

But I must tip my hat to Tinka. I guess the old girl still has it in her, even though she must be ten or more, by now.

I may just have to toss the ribbon yarn though. I'll try baking soda first, and then Nature's Miracle (old style), but I am not entirely hopeful. Where's Sunshine Cleaning when you need them?