Get your ow
n diary at DiaryLand.com! contact me older entries newest entry

10:25 a.m. - 2003-12-15
Santa and his many doggy friends.
Yesterday I went to the dogs. It was a fabulous day!

Yes, I spent the day at one of the local Petsmart stores, helping with their "Have your pet's picture taken with Santa" promotion. Half of the proceeds went to my favorite no-kill cat shelter, and I'm happy to say we had so many dogs who wanted to see Santa that we made the cats a small fortune.

I also got to meet Monique, my new found friend and rabbit rescuer. Turns out she is a lovely Dutch woman with a degree in ceramics which she doesn't use, and 27 cats, all rescued from horrible circumstances.

She is also divorced. Her husband left her after the eighth cat. Since Bruce and I have four cats and two rabbits, I made a mental note that I should only plan on two more cats. I wouldn't want my dear husband to make a sudden exit.

Anyway, in between hearing Monique's heroic cat rescue stories, I manned the camera while a parade of dogs hurled themselves at the lucky volunteer playing Santa. Our morning Santa was a stoney faced guy who just was not into the whole thing, and glared at the dogs as though planning to put nothing but coal in their stockings.

The afternoon Santa was much happier. He actually took his Santa-ly duties seriously, and even heard the Christmas lists of a couple of passing five year olds. He liked the dogs much better, too, and was happy to put up with the licking, jumping and occasional peeing of the furry beasties.

At one point we had a mastiff (have you ever seen these dogs close up?!! Dayam!! What a HUGE FREAKIN' DOG!! I want one!), a half grown great Dane the size of a Shetland pony, a black lab mix, a Schnauzer, and two Chihuahuas, all at the same time. Strangely, it didn't turn into a dog riot, and Santa emerged intact.

We only had one cat, an orange Persian whose owners brought him in because he was 15 years old and they were afraid this was his last Christmas. He let Santa hold him as I took picture after picture till we got it perfect. I have to admit, I was sadly thinking of our Ty, and I wanted to give his owners the best memory possible of their little guy.

We also had a miniature poodle and his 8 month old human sister. The little girls mom had put a weird headband on her that made her ears stick out, and the minute Santa held her she started screaming. I hate to say this, but in the photos she looks terribly like Gollum.

And how's this for weird? Do you know that they have now bred a miniature Chihuahua? That's right folks, a *miniature* Chihuahua!!! Does the world really need an even smaller and yappier version of this already insanely small and yappy breed of dog?!!

And I found my dream dog - a bearded collie named Dottie. She came in with her caretaker, who was happy to tell me all the good and bad points of bearded collies. Man, I want one of these dogs. Even their bad points attract me! And they look like small Old English Sheepdogs, which I have always been in love with. I played with Dottie for so long that Santa started making humpfing noises.

All those animals really got to me. I had a dream this morning that I brought home a new kitten I had found and told Bruce it was a special "alien sex kitten". This, of course, is a spin off from the fact that we refer to Zesto as our "alien sex cat".


0 comments

 

 

previous - next

about me - read my profile! read other Diar
yLand diaries! recommend my diary to a friend! Get
 your own fun + free diary at DiaryLand.com!