Sunny

Mike's post last week about got me thinking about some of my old pets. My family is big of animals, so growing up we always had something crawling around our house. The first pet I can remember was my parents cat Kitty-Witty. Kitty-Witty pre-dated my sister and I , so by the time I met her she was an old lady. She did a lot of lurking. Now that I think about it, she was less of a "pet" and more of a "presence" in our household (not much fun). So I don't count her as my first pet.

We had a pet duck named Daffy for a few days--but he doesn't really count either because we had to give him up.

I guess I consider our first dog Cherokee to be my first "real" pet.

We got Cherokee because my parents were worried my sister and I were afraid of dogs. So to cure this fear they decided to get us one. While I appreciate their intentions, I shudder to think what they'd have done if they'd know that we feared clowns MUCH more than we feared dogs. I can almost see it, we'd have just come home from school...our parents sit us down...a leering clowning "honking" his nose in the corner of the room.

My father would have said something like:

"Jason, Amber...we have something for you! His name is Bubbles and we want you to make sure you feed and brush him every day."

*HONK-HONK*

I guess it's good we kept our clown-phobia a secret.

Anyway, they got us a dog.

Cherokee was a Golden Lab, which is hands-down my favorite type of dog. Labs are just great overall, a little on the destructive side as puppies (but aren't we all?), but great with people. Cherokee quickly wiggled her way into our hearts, and my sister and I were free of dog-anxiety. The next pet I got was a pair of gerbils I named Mario and Luigi (after my two favorite Italian plumbers). Once they met a sad fate (tails cut off by psycho kid next-door) I got Sunny.

Sunny was a Red-Eared Terrapin. I named him (at least, I assume it was a him...telling the sex of a turtle is tricky for a small child) "Sunny" because the sign on his aquarium at the pet shop said he hailed from Florida.

Where it's sunny. Get it?

This is roughly what Sunny looked like.

Anyway, Sunny was great but he freaked me out. When you pick up a little turtle like Sunny they tend the swipe at you with their feet. It doesn't hurt, but it felt strange and one time he did this to me I dropped him inside our house. Now, whatever lies you've been fed over the years about turtles being slow are false. Let me assure you that Sunny was a SPEED DEMON when he wanted to be.

He landed on the floor with a plop! and bolted towards the bar in our kitchen. My Uncle David was visiting at the time, and he managed to quickly bend down and snatch Sunny up before he could crawl underneath (and be lost forever)--but it was at a high cost.

For you see, David spit the ass of his pants out...

That Sunny was a real rebel.

He didn't care who's pants he ruined.

I used to dig up worms for him to eat and then watch him slurp them up like fat, writhing spaghetti. Because he was from Florida, Sunny lived mostly in the water, but he did have a big piece of quartz that he liked to climb up on. For the most part, Sunny was a fun, unoffensive pet--however there was one problem with Sunny.

He stunk.

Or rather, he stunk up his water. The water in his aquarium needed to be changed, and it was pretty gross (what with his turtle poop floating around in it). My mother, bless her, was the one who ended up doing this nasty bit of work. In fact, my Mom got stuck taking care of pretty much all of our pets after a while. I guess this is why we never got a pet without Mom's approval. She knew she'd be the one to take care of it, so unless she agreed it was a no-go.

Sunny became stinker and stinker as time went by, and eventually I knew that I was too old to have my mother cleaning-up after my turtle. I figured he'd die and I'd be off the hook--but reptiles live FOREVER--so instead I ended up giving Sunny to a neighborhood friend just before we moved away.

I never saw him again, but I like to think he had a pretty good ride. In fact, he's probably still alive...pooping and swiping. I'm serious, think twice before buying a reptile as a pet. Really be prepared to go in for the "long haul." There are turtles that are over 100 years old! Imagine all the pants they've ruined in that century!!!

So little Jimmy/Susie: I know you want that pet turtle, and you say you'll take care of him--but I know what'll happen...you'll enjoy him for a few decades and then get bored.