Animals – Nutshellcity.com

2022 Nutshells, Animals, Houses, yards and projects

A critter who is getting chummy with my critter

August 5, 2022 No Comments

My critter has a critter problem.

My critter is a geriatric 11-year-old chicken name Ruby. I think that’s 275 in people years, and sometimes she walks with a cane. She is a buff Orpington – picture what a basketball would look like if a kid glued feathers to it and stuck a beak and red comb on top.

She is the last of her brood – outliving all of her original sisters, and even a second round of poultry – to become the queen of her house: House Pollo.

Her egg-laying days are long over. She never really cared for all the work it required to provide us with something we would scramble or add to cakes. She saw her purpose as more of “house chicken.” A pet. A bird who preferred to be given the attention she deserved. She demanded to be carried around like a football, tucked snug under your armpit. There she cooed, watched the world and told you where to go.

Now, my critter has developed a critter problem. A vermin. A rat. From House Rattus. Infiltrating our chicken run, which has stood nearly impenetrable for all these years. It is wringed with thick wire mesh, locks, sturdy doors and even used to house a chicken who could dispatch invaders with a merciless strike. Not a chicken to be trifled with.

2022 Nutshells, Animals, In the News

The men who fight lions, and win

July 24, 2022 No Comments

It was one of those headlines that will catch a man’s attention.

It was also one of those headlines that will make a man think. And what it should make us think is: “What’s wrong with us?!?”

Or at least some of us. The insane ones. The ones who think it isn’t crazy, or a joke. Maybe a sign that women are clearly the more intelligent of the species. I mean, if that wasn’t already obvious. But here’s more proof!

The headline in Esquire read: “8 Percent of Men Believe They Can Beat a Lion in a Fist Fight, According to New Survey.”

I have read the headline over several times to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating from bad cheese. Or victim of a prank. Or, most importantly, to reflect on whether I myself was one of the 8% of certifiable dum-dums walking around waiting – just hoping! – for the opportunity to prove themselves.

Newsflash: I’m not.

2022 Nutshells, Animals

Time for K-9 allergy season and endless shedding

May 15, 2022 No Comments

Dog allergy season is upon us. I know this because I have spent the last several weeks shoveling dog fur.

Yes, dog fur. If you have a dog and your dog is not entirely bald, you know what I mean. This time of year, they shed in blizzards. Streams of hair cascading off your animal. They sit in their bed scratching and gnawing while the hair swirls in every direction. It creates a condition that Northerners refer to as a “white-out.”

A fur-pocalypse

Science needs to find the answer to this most important question: Where does it all come from? And yes, I know: From my dog. But it doesn’t add up – the math of it. Consider this: We have one dog. She weighs approximately 45 pounds. She is considered a medium-size dog. Yet, at least twice a week we sweep up a pile of fur that could cover the entirety of an overweight hippo. There would even be extra for a fancy mustache. The fur collected weighs twice my dog.

Biologically, how can an animal produce that much? It’s like she is a fur-shedding factory. I keep checking her expecting to find large bald patches or spots where it’s thinned out from her incessant scratching. But her coat remains full and lush. Thick. And as I pet her, more comes off in my hand.

“You can keep that,” her face seems to say. “I’ll make more.”

2022 Nutshells, Animals, Travel

Leashes up for a little dog-sitting 101

March 21, 2022 No Comments

Oh man, dog-sitting. There is nothing better in life than dog-sitting. Taking in someone else’s K-9 and trying to get them to assimilate with your family. And they can’t do that. They’re dogs! They do dog things. You can’t explain things to them. You can’t say: “OK, so we have rules here. That means you can run the Kentucky Derby in the dining room and then throw up in the living room. It’s NOT acceptable!” But they don’t get it. This is normal behavior for them.

I haven’t had to dog-sit my brother’s dog, Ella, in a while. We had a porch cat who slept inside, and there was too big a risk she might eat him. So she didn’t stay over. But now that the cat has passed away, we’re back in the dog-sitting business. And it has reminded me of all the tips and tricks that every dog-sitter should know:

• The dog-walk tango. Inevitably your family will bail on you and you’ll get stuck having to walk multiple dogs on your own. When your own dog is 45 pounds, and your family member’s is 362 pounds, it will make for a challenge. Especially if the new dog walks like a drunken sailor, zig-zagging down the street from side to side, and going up on hind legs like a kangaroo at the first sign of a cat or a squirrel or a leaf. This will make you twist and turn and pirouette down the street until you’re dizzy and your neighbors are applauding your performance. “Bravo!” they shout. Only, walking two dogs who have their own speeds and priorities (pee and smell flowers vs. KILL THAT SQUIRREL!!!) is a lot like being drawn and quartered as your limbs are nearly torn from their sockets.

2022 Nutshells, Animals, Family, Houses, yards and projects, In the News

A plea for more useful how-to articles on the Web

March 4, 2022 No Comments

If you haven’t noticed, the Internet is awash in how-to articles. I stumbled across a few gems the other day: “How to make a candle at home,” for those who don’t know how to flip a light switch; “How often to clean your dryer lent,” Answer: When you can’t shut the door or smell smoke; and “How to play Wordle, but look like you’re doing work,” which is actually kind of handy.

But with all the problems in the world, why aren’t so-called “experts” writing about useful topics we can actually use? How-to articles about things we might actually need. For instance, why isn’t anyone tackling these pressing topics:

• How do you get your dog to stop shedding? I came downstairs the other morning when the early morning light was starting to crack through the French doors and light up my pecan-colored floors. I gasped.

“Honey!” I called out. “When did we install carpet?”

2021 Nutshells, Animals, Family

What a porch cat can teach you about appreciating life

November 17, 2021 No Comments

It’s a bit emptier in the house. Losing a pet is like that. Even a pet you didn’t mean to have. Especially those. Like the old man porch cat named Sunburst who had trickled into our lives. Eventually, he also trickled off our front porch and onto the wicker Ottoman we kept in the dining room. There he would curl up like a loaf of bread, watching all the craziness around him.

Our house is always crazy. A hive of activity. Like rush hour at Grand Central. Running. Screaming. Unintelligible PA announcements about boarding trains or getting ready for school. A flurry. An unending bustle. A panic and a whirlwind.

This cat was fascinated by it. He watched it all – these fish in their bowl. Going about their multi-tasking and manic lives. “Don’t they see there’s a perfectly warm Ottoman here?” he seemed to say. “Why don’t they just kick back with me?”

That was the look on his little critter face: Content. Grateful. Always at peace.

Lucky bugger, right up to the end.

2021 Nutshells, Animals, Family, Getting old ... er ... older

The home for ever-aging critters

April 14, 2021 No Comments

Suddenly, I feel I am running a house for elderly critters. Varmints who are getting up there in years. Reaching their senior moments. Getting all geriatric on me. Demanding the early-bird buffet.

I’m not sure what to make of it all.

Our dog, Lily, must be about 10 years old. She’s starting to show gray in her muzzle. She doesn’t act old, or seem her age. But there are little hints that it’s coming. That she isn’t the young pup she used to be.

The cat, Sunburst, is a reformed stray who is pretty ancient. We don’t know his exact age, but it must be up there. When we asked the vet, they offered to carbon date his one good tooth. That means they know he’s pretty old. Our best guess is he comes from the Paleolithic era. But he seems to be managing just fine, old fella’ that he is. He tells too many stories about the Civil War, but other than that – and a wobbly walk like he’s been drinking rum – he isn’t any worse for the wear.

2021 Nutshells, Animals, Family

On becoming ‘those’ crazy animal people

January 11, 2021 No Comments

We’ve become “those” people.

I realized this in the checkout lane of the grocery store while the cashier ran my goods over the scanner.

He was making idle chit-chat. As he scanned a large pack of crunchy kitty treats he said, “Got a cat, eh?”

I realize now the correct answer. The reasonable, maybe even sane answer. It would have been something along the lines of: “Yep. Sure do.” And that would have been the end of it.

Instead, I replied, “Yeah. He’s a deaf stray with only three teeth. I don’t know why he loves these so much. Can’t crunch them with only three teeth. Chuckle-chuckle. But, you know, kitty gets what kitty wants.”

Did I actually just say that?!?

The cashier stopped and stared at me. He had his mask on, but I know underneath his mouth was agape. He was trying to figure out something to say. Anything. Finally, he managed, “Yeah, OK, so … got any coupons?”

2020 Nutshells, Animals, Family, In the News, Parenthood and Children

When surreal elections and real life collide

November 9, 2020 No Comments

I looked back 4 years to see what I wrote after the 2016 election had finally wrapped up. This is what I said: “It’s over. The presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton is mercifully over. Look, forget who won or lost, just for a moment. If your candidate won, you’re still smiling and gloating. If your candidate lost, you’re still researching real estate in Canada. I get it. It’s been a tough one on all of us. It’s been emotional. It’s been trying. It’s tested us, individually and as a nation. But mercifully — whether you won or lost — there is this: We can all start to get our lives back.”

Rings true again today, doesn’t it?

I looked it up because I felt I had said it before. That I had FELT it before. Another time. Another place. What seemed like ages ago, but was just some 1,460 days in the past. (Yeah … I can do math. Not well … but math.)

And I’m feeling it again. Exhausted. Glad it’s over. Won’t tell you who I voted for. But I will tell you about what I’m sure a lot of us feel: Elation that we don’t have to deal with the election anymore. We can start to get on with … well … whatever did we do before there was an election. And no one quite knows what that is.

What did we do before the vote counting went on for days? Before we swiped endlessly at our phones for the latest updates, or sat glued to TV’s talking heads – all remarkably good at saying the same thing over and over again as if it’s always new and profound and full of revelation. Before the debates and the conventions. Before the primaries, and back and back and back.

What did we do?

2020 Nutshells, Animals, Childhood, Family, Florida, Parenthood and Children

The Lizard Hospital opens for patients

September 23, 2020 No Comments

“Good morning, Lizard Hospital. How may I help you? Oh, I see. You’re looking for a family of suckers who will take in injured everyday Florida yard lizards, nurse them back to health and potentially adopt them for life? Yep! You’ve come to the right place. Let me just go flush the rest of my sanity down the toilet and I’ll be right with you.”

My house is now … a lizard hospital.

There are two reptilian ICU containers sitting in my dining room. Stuffed with grass and sticks and pieces of drying ground beef. YouTube videos are on the computer about caring for injured lizards. A syringe sits in a bowl of water in the kitchen waiting for my daughter to dribble drops into their mouths.

I hope these two critters have insurance. Someone is going to have a hefty bill for this top-shelf care.

It all started a week ago. My daughter returned from walking the dog to recount the trauma she had witnessed: A massacre! Lizard carcasses scattered about the sidewalk. (There was a flat frog in the street, too, but that was a different problem. Speeders!) The lizards must have had a run-in with a cat. An angry cat. With a grudge. He left the broken bodies as a warning to others.

“It was awful!” she said. “There was just one survivor. And as you can see, he’s not doing so well.” She shoved the lizard in my face. He had one eye bulging out. It’s an image you’ll never forget.