Opinions
Column: Pet shop of horrors
Published: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 - 9:11pm
FOR MY 16th birthday, my parents said I could get a pet, if they approved it first. I took this to mean, “You’re getting a cat.”
Not that there’s anything wrong with cats; I love cats. When I turn 80, I’m going to buy eight cats and name them after MySpace celebrities and failed Democratic presidential candidates (Jeffree Star and Walter Mondale are always beating up on Dukakis).
But this left me to choose from rabbits, which are completely useless, or dogs, which are totally played out, and require too much love and stuff.
No, I wanted something cooler; I wanted a turtle.
Well, first I wanted a Galápagos tortoise, but apparently I’m not allowed to have a pet that has a longer life expectancy than I do. Also, some people think having endangered species for household pets is wrong, or something.
And it turns out that regular box turtles are a lot more work than I thought.
They’re also really weird. According to PetTurtle.com, turtles need light, shade, moisture, and clean water. Not only that, but some people let them hibernate in the refrigerator. And I personally find it kind of creepy that they have to lie under a lamp so they have enough energy to move around.
Besides, I haven’t heard of a turtle rescue or reliable turtle vendor in the C-U area. Mail-order turtle Web sites have turtles selling for hundreds of dollars, meant for hardcore turtle owners/collectors. Clearly a first time turtle-er would be in over her head.
So in the eight months that have passed since my 16th birthday, I have done virtually nothing to procure a new animal friend.
Until today, when my friend rang my doorbell after school and told me to get in her car.
Since there’s no good reason not to get in someone’s car when they tell you to, I went along. It turned out we were going cat shopping.
The Champaign County Humane Society had some cool cats, but most of them tried to attack us.
Nevertheless, in a month or two it will be “kitten season,” so I plan on going back and finding one while it’s young, so I can complete my quest for a compatible creature companion.
Comments
CCHS kittens
I am surprised at your experience at CCHS. Everytime I've been in the cat rooms the cats have either ignored me (asleep) or been excited to have attention and were really friendly. You must have been there on a bad day or had some rude person in before you who didn't know how to interact with cats and annoyed them all.
But yes, it's kitten season. The first of the spring kittens should be adoption age in the next 2-3 weeks. We're currently fostering a litter of 4, but ours still have 5 weeks before they go up for adoption.
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