| Product: |
Top Five Pets |
| Date: |
17/08/06 (147 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Pets... We love them!!!
Disadvantages: They don't live forever... but then again... who does?
I saw some reviews about the top five pets and as an animal lover, I felt compelled to share my top five pets with you. These are not in order of preference but to the best of my ability, are in order of my having them as pets.
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- GOLDFISH
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Back in the bad old days where you could win goldfish from the fun fair, I used to have lots of goldfish - who in hindsight seemed to have a life-span of about a week or there abouts.
Let’s just say there were lots of visits to the garden with a dead goldfish in a matchbox.
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- DOG
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I'm definitely a dog person and not a cat person - partially because I'm allergic to cats - and partially because cats are so selfish, up their own arses and don't seem to have as much character as dogs.
Okay, I admit - dogs are pretty gormless in a lot of ways and are pretty much a life-support system for a stomach... perhaps that's why I can relate to them so well?
My first and only dog so far was a black Labrador who we called Jet (how original, eh?). He was a lovely dog but I didn't have him around nearly as much as I would have liked.
Unfortunately, he had an accident and was never the same following it. His character changed and he became more aggressive. We had to get rid of him as he was becoming out of control - digging into the kitchen wall - right down to the wires etc... The sad thing is that I don't have a single photograph of him - but I'll never forget him.
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- HAMSTER
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Someone who lived near us was getting rid of their hamster so we took her in. Her name was Monty and she was a beautiful little bundle of fluff with ruby red eyes (nicer than it sounds!).
As is the norm for hamsters, she didn't live long though when she caught a hamster disease called wet-tail - which sounds lovely!!! I had another hamster a few years later called pip but sadly she didn't last too long either.
I guess the hardest thing about having any pet is the potential of losing them. *Sniff!*
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- RABBIT
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We once had two rabbits - they were sisters and were named Fawn (as she was a fawny colour)and Sweep (who was jet black - original name, eh?).
They were generally very funny. I remember when we used to let them run around the garden when we would let them out of their run (while keeping a very sharp eye out for cats) I would sometimes chase them around - and they would jump high into the air - changing direction as they did. Sometimes Fawn would stop running and lie absolutely flat on the ground - with her ears flat on her back - in an attempt to not be seen. Of course with her being a speckled brown colour, this worked a treat when she did this on the grass! I guess she just never mastered the art of camouflage!
One morning, we discovered that they had gnawed a hole through the side of their hutch and had vanished. We were totally gutted and thought we had lost them - until our neighbour (not the one who I will mention next - but a nice, non-retarded neighbour) came to our door to tell us he had found them both - they were hiding under his garden shed. They were eventually rounded up and put into a repaired hutch.
Although they were both female and therefore sisters (I guess rabbits don’t really think too much about that last one… or maybe even the first one, actually!) the most bizarre thing to witness when they would hump each other like it was going out of style! Oh well… I guess they were rabbits after all!
We had Fawn and Sweep for a while but were forced to give them away to someone who lived nearby when we had a pair of complete idiots who moved in next door and made our life hell. The woman next door worked as a nurse (or was that an arse?) and worked night shift sometimes. One night they came to our door at almost midnight to complain about the rabbits thumping in their hutch as it was warm. Sadly, my dad and myself were actually stupid enough to move the rabbit hutch to the other side of our garden instead of telling the idiots to get stuffed!
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- BUDGIE (THE NOVEL… SEE BELOW!)
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Budgies have been a favourite of our family for about sixteen years now. This started in about 1989/90 when we got our first ever budgie - a little green and yellow one that we named Spud (don’t ask me how the poor little bugger ended up with this name… I have absolutely no idea!).
Spud, Spuddy or Spuddy Boy as he was often called was an amazing character. It upsets me when people say that animals are stupid or pointless. They fail to see how you can get attached to animals - even an ‘insignificant’ little bird. Spuddy was an incredible little animal. I remember the day we got him as though it was only yesterday. He sat on my finger from day one - which is amazing as it can sometimes take budgies quite some time to learn that - and some never take to that.
We had Spuddy for a long time. The life-span of a budgie is normally that of between 6-8 years but remarkably, we had Spuddy for very close to 14 years. He’d become a huge part of our family over the years and was a great source of amusement for us. He spoke a lot and knew lots of words and phrases - including a couple of swearies (guess who got the f**king fault for that?!?).
It hit the family hard when we lost him and I know that we will never forget him.
Within a few days of Spuddy passing away, my parents (my mum especially) were going out of their minds with the huge space created in the living room without Spuddy or his cage there to fill the gap. They started toying with the idea of getting another budgie - which amazed me. I really thought it was a terrible idea but the more I thought about it, the more I realised my parents would be happy to have another little pet fill the void that the loss of Spuddy had created in their lives - and bought a new budgie cage (as having Spuddy’s one out again would have proved too painful) and contacted a local budgie breeder.
When I went to see him, I eventually settled on another green and yellow budgie but noticed a little blue and white one with only one leg. Apparently his mother had pecked one of his legs off when he was just a chick - and having been there for quite some time, I took pity on him and took him too (he was given away free… poor little thing) as I was told his fate was uncertain as the breeder mainly breeds budgies for shows and the remaining ones were sold as pets - and believe me - he has LOTS of budgies! So, this little blue one was deemed not good enough for either shows or as a pet… I at least changed the latter.
We named the little green and yellow one Fluke and the little blue and white one Echo (so named as he initially echoed the chirps of Fluke when we first got them). We thought they were both boys but eventually found out that although Echo was a boy, that Fluke is a girl. Despite this, we never ended up with baby budgies - maybe because little Echo couldn’t balance well enough for those kind of shenanigans?
Sadly, Echo died in the February of this year - after a year or so with us - which is likely longer than he would have got if he’d stayed at the breeder’s aviary. So now he’s buried out in our back garden - next to Spuddy. All I will say on that subject is that things have come a long, long way since those goldfish in matchboxes.
So - Fluke was left on her own - and so my mum pestered me into getting another little budgie to be a companion to her. So I went back to the same breeder and bought another little green budgie (though he is a more bright yellowy-green - so we can always tell them apart). When he was put into the cage with Fluke, they sat on perches at either side of the cage and stared at each other. This reminded me so much of one of the Rocky films - especially the one where Rocky goes up against Dolph Lundgren - East Vs West… Hence why we called the new addition Rocky!
Now Fluke and Rocky bug the hell out of each other everyday and look like a bizarre little married animal couple with the way they get on each other’s nerves! However more often than not, they make us smile - which is what having a pet is all about and why I and others have written about their top five pets here. I’m sure more people will write about theirs too. Keep them coming, everyone!
Summary: Pets can bring happiness and comfort to a lot of people. I love them!
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