Hobbes talks

Hey guys.

You don't know me too well, but I'm Hobbes. There's this lady who owns me. She spends a lot of time on the computer, and I spend a lot of time looking at her just like this.



Hi.

Whatcha doing?

Actually, this is a picture of me from a few years ago, when I was a little more worried about whether or not they would send me back to That Place if I screwed up. Which I don't. Ever. Well, except when the garbage gets tooooo yummy smelling. Mmmm. Coffee grounds. Mmmm.

Here's a picture of me from today.
My muzzle's a little greyer, but hey. Now I get to sit up here on the couch with all the blankies and comforters. I love this comforter. Hee.

So. You doing much? Cause I'm just laying around today watching my Mom clean pet cages. She does that a lot.

But it's OK. It's a good chance for me to give you a little tour.

First, we need to go visit the snake, Cloudy Sky. He's cool. He never comes out of his hides, so he doesn't bother me much. My Boy really thinks he's neat. And I think My Boy's really neat, so whatever he likes is cool. I've sniffed him once or twice. He smells kind of weird. But once a week, Mom does this really strange thing. She gets a frozen mouse out of the Silver Giver Of Treats (I Lurve Carrots!! Crunchy!), dumps the mousie in a cup of really hot water and gives it to the snake.

So weird!

How come I don't get frozen meaty thingies? I wouldn't mind frozen meaty thingies. But instead Mom gives me carrots. I do like carrots though.

Oh. Did you want to see Cloudy Sky? Here ya go.

He's grown a lot since Mom and My Boy brought him home around Christmas. Mom says he's getting a lot stronger too. But he doesn't do that much, and he doesn't need his cage cleaned, so on we go to the other pets.

The Big Girl likes these two a lot.

I think they smell suspiciously like rabbits. I like rabbits. They run REALLY fast, and I like chasing them. Mmmm. Rabbits. But Mom tells me that they're not rabbits, so I have to believe her. After all. She knows where the carrots live. I've learned not to argue with her.

Mom has these two things in a big run on a folding table in the Living Room. They eat a lot of hay and run around a lot. Sometimes they "popcorn" around in the evenings, jumping up and down while they're running. The Big Girl squeals when that happens. Which gets me worried a little bit. Why does she MAKE that noise?

The Big Girl named this one Takame.

This one the Little Girl named Rosa. Rosa just woke up from a nap under the blue blanket in this picture.
They crawl inside the blanket and sleep. Which makes it easy to find them--just open up the blanket.

Sometimes they bump into each other inside the blanket which causes all sorts of strange noises to come out from the run. But I've learned that if anything is too distressing, a good lie-down upside down on your back makes all the blood run to interesting places. I love lying on my back. Here I am watching Mom typpity type on the computer thingie.Anyway. Here's one of Takame trying to hide. Silly Piggie.












Anyway. They're weird.

Do you want to go visit The Big Girl's room? She's got frogs up there.

I like the frogs.

The Big Girl's been closing the door on me a lot recently. She told Mom that she didn't like it when I got sick on the floor up there. Sigh.

I didn't mean to.





Anyway. About once a month Mom and The Big Girl have to take apart the entire frog cage and disinfect everything. This is quite a process. But it's OK, because they let me in The Big Girl's room for the whole afternoon. Where I can lie on my back, right in the middle of the floor and get in everybody's way.

Mom saw me doing this and said, "Oh, Hobbes. You are so silly!" I don't know why she would say that. She knows that my belly needs airing. Sometimes I even fall asleep like this during frog cleaning and my lips go "Fthllllph. Fthlllph. Fthllph." When they get too loud I wake up.

Anyway. We were going to talk about the frogs. Right.

The Big Girl started bringing them home a few months ago from a friend's house. Her friend had caught loads of them in a storm drain and was keeping them in a plastic box on the kitchen table.

The first two she brought home were Osiris and Maat. (Well, there was one other, but he got out on the first night. The Big Girl never found his body and Mom never discovered a froggy smell. I might tell you what really happened to him that night he got loose in the hallway, but then you might think less of me. And I'm quite cute, don't you think?)

Here's a picture of The Big Girl trying to get the frogs out of the cage. It's not that easy.

The cool thing about the way the cage is set up is that the frogs are reflected in the mirror behind the cage when they go hiding in the back. I can't tell you how many times I've wandered into The Big Girl's room to find both Mom and The Big Girl craning over the tank, trying to peer behind the tank to catch a glimpse of the frogs. And here I am. Big solid old me. No need to lean over a dresser and turn your head upside down to see me.

When they do that for too long, I just lean on their knees as hard as I can so that they have to pet me. Stepping on their toes works too. I like to give out these little tips as they occur to me.

Here's the frogs hiding in the tank, very aware that they will be removed one by one for examination, squealing, and tank cleaning. Don't they look alarmed?

There's actually two in there, but you have to look really hard.

One by one, The Big Girl takes each frog out of the tank. Today Mom and I took pictures of each one. I was very helpful. Then Mom took apart the tank, cleaned everything, put everything back together again, and fed me a carrot. Hee.

Here's Osiris:










And his lovely back












This one's Horus












Who was a little hard to catch. "Squeeeshed! Help ME!"













This is Maat, a goddess










Maat is a lovely golden color. I love golden stripey things.










And this is Min, the god of Rain











Min's very jumpy. Like me. But he doesn't sit still like I do for pictures. Mom likes his eyeliner.












The Big Girl calls this picture: "Clean the cage already!"

I have to say, Horus is looking rather flat in this one. But hey, he perked right up when he got back to his cleaned out home. No more frog poop. Who could complain?

Mom has told me a number of times that she's pretty sure that Osiris is the only female in the group and that Maat, Min, and Horus are all boys. Three of them are certainly croaking. But I don't know about male and female frogs. Female dogs still confuse me. Especially those little ones which can run right underneath my belly at the dog park? They are very worrisome.

I've found that I can get them to stop running at me if I just lie down on top of them as soon as they're under my belly. Unfortunately, this seems to cause all sorts of yelling back and forth between the humans. I don't really understand humans too well. Sometimes the dog park is a little upsetting too. I get nervous you know, with all those dogs barking at me, and then I growl back at them, and then people start throwing tennis balls, which I have to chase, even if there are six of them in the air, and then I don't always remember to give them back to the dogs who brought them. There are so many social rules about balls and dogs that I don't quite understand. Why CAN'T I have every ball in the park? Hmmm?

I should stop talking about the dog park. We were here to look at my animal friends. Right.


I guess I should talk about this guy. He was very disturbing. He made the Little Girl cry because he tried to bite her, and he made Dad angry because the the Little Girl was crying. Sometimes Mom put him in a big clear ball to clean his cage, but he never ran around in it. Mostly he just sat in it and hissed at me.

I don't know why. I never did anything to him. I would certainly never bite the Little Girl. She lets me up on her bed.

One day his cage was in the garage and he wasn't around anymore. Mom scritched my ears a lot that day and told me not to ask too many questions. So, hey. I don't. I'm a dog who likes my comforter and my people.

The Little Girl has Takame and Rosa to play with. And me. Of course. So I think no one's missing Kung Fu Rat too badly.

We had a big day today. Dad's painting the bathroom. Mom's cleaned the frog cage, and I've taken you on my little tour. Honestly, it's been great showing you around, but I'm getting a little tired. I didn't get quite enough sleep upstairs upside down, so I'm going to snuggle into my comforter here and snooze a little. Later on I'll fall on the floor, stretch out, and sleep some more.

Drop by if you have a chance. Don't forget the carrots. Little baby ones in a fresh bag. Juicy. Mmmm.

Later!