House of HaldePets

Me telling people things is sometimes a curious mix of “yeah, I saw that on Facebook” and “I’m not on Facebook” and “wait, you still have a blog?”

Peppa Potato adopted a stray dog, and as you can see, it’s going just terribly. I hope they start getting along soon, HAHAHAHA.

Jeff popped his head in my studio a couple of weeks ago and asked if I’d seen that German Shepherd. I hadn’t, when he asked, but I did about two days later. I think it was the next day I saw her close enough to get some pictures, and in zooming in I saw how skinny and hungry she was. I started feeding her, and she started showing up more regularly and more boldly (although still running away). Then, she and Peppa saw each other through the fence and it was love at first butt-sniff.

As I’m writing this, they’re in Puppy Jail for the week. When I took the New Dog in to try to get her scanned for a microchip (she didn’t have one), I went ahead and made an appointment for her to start getting her shots, and to board them both. I figured that if I found her family, I could just cancel her appointment… and if I didn’t, then either by then I would have decided to keep her, or it would give me an extra week to decide and her family would owe me if I found them.

Surprisingly, the vet gave her a good report. No heartworms, no intestinal parasites, a little bit of a high white blood cell count but she had a half a dozen big ticks on her when I found her so she might be fighting something off. I got her vaccines started, got her microchipped, and oh, yeah, have given her a name… Honey Butter. To go with Peppa Potato.

Also surprisingly, she’s a wonderful dog. She does chase the cats who run from her, but she shies away from Troublesome and while she sniffs Moya she doesn’t nip or bite. She just looks longingly like she wants to be friends. And she and Peppa are always playing, unless they’re asleep, and in that case, they’re probably snuggling. You would seriously think they were litter-mates, the way they’ve taken to each other.

Peppa is definitely the boss, hahaha. Honey is sweet and submissive, letting her bossy little sister chew on her leg… chew on her face… clean her ears… Peppa follows my lead, though, and after one reprimand about not trying to stick her face in Honey’s food dish while she’s still eating, now she lays down next to Honey while she’s still eating (Peppa gets fed a lot less because she’s smaller, and not as underweight, and also she gets fed first since she’s the senior dog in the house).

I know I had to board them in order to travel, but I MISS THEM SO MUCH ALREADY!!! Why can’t all hotels be dog-friendly?!

Anyway…

How’s everyone else…?

Troublesome was barely taking ONE new dog well… he’s pretty upset about the second. Especially because the second is SO MUCH BIGGER than he is… he usually walks up to dogs and swats them in the face and then sits there like “yeah, what you gonna DO?” but he took one look at Honey Butter and got as far and as high up as he could. Look at that bottle-brush of a tail!

The rest of the shop cats, ferals and pets, are kind of non-plussed. Goblin really loves Peppa, and she’s already trying to stick her face in Honey’s chest for headrubs. The Shittens…. well, I never really know what’s going on with them. Sometimes I see all four, sometimes I just see two… most times I see three, playing in the yard and laying on the brick walk in the sun… until I appear and then everyone takes off for the hills. They’re fat and fluffy, though, and definitely eating what I’m putting down. Even if they won’t let me catch them, the little ingrates. All I want to do is take away their baby-makers! You’d think they’d be grateful!

The tortoises are all doing fine. I think it’s about time for me to start thinking about a permanent outdoor enclosure for these boys, though. They’re getting big, and honestly, I want something for them that I don’t have to take care of three times a day. If I had something outside, with lots of room for them, with real sunlight instead of lamps, a heated area for the rare freezing days (I’m thinking something like a doghouse, with a heated floor that can be turned on and off) and a bigger water feature so they could soak themselves whenever they wanted and not just when I have time….?

On the rare occasion that I don’t have a dog or two with me in the studio, Troublesome likes to help. And by “help” I mean “make me absolutely crazy.”

I do feel a little guilty about Newt. She was just getting to the point where she would come out and sit on the couch with me after Peppa fell asleep on the couch… just getting to the point where it seemed like a mutual chase game… and now there’s a second dog. She and Tulip are NOT HAPPY and they have MANY THOUGHTS. They’ve both been spending a lot of time in the Catio, and I’ve been sleeping with my door shut and the dogs in the bedroom with me so that the cats have the run of the house at night. I usually sleep with the door open so the cats can come and go out of my room, but… with the new (big) dog, ain’t no cats trying to come in my room at night!

Oh, and Moya? Yeah, she’s like a Honey Badger. She doesn’t give a fuck. “Another dog? Really? I couldn’t possibly hate it more, thanks. But I’m not moving from my spot on the floor so that smelly beast can just suck it up.”

That’s the current State of the Pets.