List on the 3s: Top 1 Pets that Shiny Has (Co-)Owned

“List on the 3s” occurs on ever calendar date on which I happen to include a list of some sort in my blog.  On those calendar dates, I try to make sure that I’ve included a 3 somewhere.  That makes everything fall into place.

I know that many of you have wondered quite a few things about me.  While there is a lot of my life which is an open book, there still remains quite a bit which is a mystery.  Perhaps the question which comes up the most often is this one:

Shiny, did you get turned on during Salma Hayek’s dance scene in “From Dusk ‘Til Dawn?”

The answer to that: Are you kidding me? If you haven’t seen the film… well, here’s the dance in full:

Direct YouTube Link

It’s not every day that I see someone dance with a live snake. But she pulls the dance off just — just wonderfully.

Oh — and although hers are quite sexy, I’m not a feet or toes person. They simply don’t belong in another person’s mouth. Not even Quentin Tarantino’s. But still — it doesn’t negate from the whole of the experience.

But back to the snake: I’ve heard that they’re pretty cool animals to have as pets. But I never had one growing up. It simply wasn’t a priority for my parents to have a pet. My mom never had one, and my dad’s family got one only after he left for college. We would take care of the cats next door when their owners were on vacation, and there was a dog on the other side who was very friendly. That was the extent of it.  It’s not that we had any animosity against animals as pets; it just didn’t happen.

I married into a family that had pets.

And through my marriage, I inherited my first and only pet (so far). Which brings us to the list:

Top 1 Pet That I Have Owned

1. Fyona R. Cat

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(click for the full-sized photo)

(The photo above was taken about 90 minutes ago.)

Fyona was the lone roommate of socKs when we started dating in 1996.  And she certainly didn’t like me invading her space.

You see, she was a very protective cat. I was a stranger. A threat. She would retreat and hiss around me. It took a long while for her to get used to the fact that I was going to be a pretty active staple in her life — especially after we moved into a new apartment (which, fortunately for her, had more room to run around).

This was taken sometime in 1998. She’s all nice and comfy atop the Sega Genesis. Still kind of standoffish, though.  Only after a bit of time did she discover that I would feed her every so often and clean her litterbox. We tolerated each other.

We moved to our house in 2001. Fyona doesn’t do car trips well (without throwing up), and we had medicated her so she would be okay for the trip. When we got there, she was a bit woozy — and a bit out of her own surroundings.  And — here was a big house! We showed her where her litterbox was, and then we showed her this phenomenon which freaked her out — stairs.  (She had lived in a one-floor apartment since socKs got her in 6 years earlier.) She climbed down carefully, step by step.  And then she was having trouble getting back up!  She spent the night traumatized under the covers of our bed.

Within a week she had the stairs completely covered, racing up and down them like no tomorrow.  She knew that she had the run of the house.

Until the thing arrived…

(Taken February 1, 2003. Click to enlarge.)

That was a rude awakening. First of all, the kid got her room. That’s enough to piss anyone off. And secondly? The thing smelled and made noise! She would regularly retreat from the level Av was on. And as he got bigger, he would start scaring her a bit. Eventually they got to be friends (after he learned to feed her).

Since then she’s mellowed a bit — understandable for a cat who is pushing 15. She’s had a run of health problems throughout the years, but seems to be doing relatively okay nonetheless.

(Also taken today. Click to enlarge.)

You may be able to notice her eyes are fogged over in the latest pictures.  She has extensive cataracts rendering her almost blind in one eye and totally blind in the other. But she still gets around quite well. She still knows who we are, when it’s time to be fed (although she has that yente-ish meow where she sounds like an old complaining woman from Boynton Beach), and she still poops like a motherfuckin’ pimp.

And that’s Fyona. The only pet I’ve ever had.

For now…