Petco is a Legit Zoo

When you live in Alaska, particularly off-the-road-system parts of Alaska where the weather is especially harsh and dismal, you need to make the best of what's around.

The best aquarium in Juneau is the Douglas Island Pinks & Chums (DIPAC) fish hatchery, and the best zoo by far is Petco at Nugget Mall in the Mendenhall Valley. It's also the only zoo. Ok, fine. It's not actually a zoo at all. It's just a giant pet store chain with more than 1,200 locations nationwide and signs everywhere telling you that even though you've heard pet stores are bad, this one is really careful and humane. Ok, fine. Juneau doesn't have a zoo. But Isaac doesn't know that. He thinks Petco is a zoo, and he can quite literally spend hours staring into the cages of the reptiles, rodents, birds, and fish at Petco. 

Let me say right upfront that my track record in pet ownership is dubious at best. As a kid we had cats, gerbils, hamsters, guinea pigs, fish, and turtles. All of these animals (except perhaps the cats and one of the gerbils) met an untimely demise owing to a combination of negligence, neglect, and--I'd like to think--bad luck. (The death of Wilbur the amphibious turtle on Halloween night 1986 was particularly traumatic, but that's a story for another time).

I'm hoping that my own children--or at least the one who's riveted by animals--will do a better job of caring for a pet. I told Isaac he can have one when he's older and can deal with it completely by himself. We fostered a leopard gecko named Peblo for several weeks last year. Feeding Peblo live, refrigerated "meal worms" and keeping his cage at a toasty 80 degrees using two different colored heat lamps was too much for me to handle. I spent a good portion of every day making sure Peblo wasn't dead, and that's just too much pressure. It's all I can do to put on my pants in the morning and ensure that the two humans who came out of my own body live to see another sunrise.

The employees at Juneau Petco really seem to love their jobs. Unlike a clerk at a Borders Books, say--who generally won't know The Great Gastby from Kim Kardashian's coffee table book of selfies--the Petco dudes seem genuinely invested in their charges. Isaac found a soul mate in one such young man, who kept taking out frogs, spiders, iguanas, birds, and snakes to show me, Isaac, and my mom, who was with us last weekend during an especially torrential Juneau downpour. 

This guy knew the difference between constrictors and venomous snakes, and that these two "defense mechanisms are mutually exclusive." He knew that chameleons (cute as they are, what with their little bulging eyes and capacity to change color) are bad "beginner" reptiles, as they will drink only from running water and are very sensitive to variations in light and temperature. A tarantula is low maintenance and a good intro pet. Iguanas can distinguish between multiple human handlers, will grow to be six feet long, can be litter-box trained (he had a litter-box trained iguana at home), and the toughest thing about them is that they are enormous and outgrow their cages and pretty soon you will have a free range iguana roaming around your house. 

Best of all, he was no less attentive even as it became increasingly obvious that we didn't intend to spend a single penny at Petco that day. (I didn't have the heart to tell him that the "50%" off tag on the tarantula cage was not exactly a ringing endorsement of tarantula ownership).

Basically, I learned more about animals in two hours at Petco than I was expecting to, and so I kind of think Petco needs to be placed on the field trip rotation for the Juneau School District. At the very least, it needs a new slogan: Juneau Petco: Your go-to-destination for rainy day desperation.

Abstinence Only-Education for Parakeets

Does avian sex-ed exist? I’m guessing no. I’m generally not a fan of abstinence-only education, but when it comes to Violet and Steele, the two parakeets Isaac successfully lobbied me into getting from PetCo, it's the only acceptable route. I'll back up for a minute to explain how Violet and Steele (original proposed names Ruffnut and Tuffnut or Fred and George) came to be members of our family. 

Isaac and I were killing time at PetCo one day, which is Juneau's only zoo and a place Isaac likes to window-shop. The store smells like death, but that's because it's housing rodents, reptiles, birds, fish, amphibians, rabbits, and all of their food and excrement. So it's understandable and after awhile in there olfactory fatigue takes over and you don't notice that there are chinchilla turds in your nose.

"Not today," I told him, as he insistently pressed the issue of parakeet ownership while deploying his most cloying voice and most crestfallen expression. "Maybe another day." 

I felt sort of bad about it. I grew up with cats, gerbils, and guinea pigs, but am now somehow deathly allergic to anything with fur. Even a weekend with Oliver, the class rabbit, proved too much for my histamine response. We have an aquatic frog named Squiggles, but as Isaac correctly notes, Squiggles "doesn't do anything." My retort is that he (or she) croaks out mellifluously in the night for a lover that will never arrive, but Isaac remains unimpressed.

Isaac loves animals. Absolutely loves them. He will pick up and cuddle everything from a gecko to a spider to a puppy or a rat. He's always been this way. One of my earliest Isaac memories is taking him to the gorilla exhibit at the Bronx Zoo in his little car seat carrier. A female gorilla came right up to the glass and began pointing and gesticulating wildly at him, eager, it seemed, to mother another primate.

Eventually Isaac wore me down about the parakeets, and Paige and I returned home from a weekend in Anchorage to find Violet and Steele in our abode. 

I had placed two conditions on the purchase of the parakeets. Well, three: (1) Isaac had to pay for them with his own money; (2) he had to read about how to take care of them and do it every day; and (3) we had to get two, because sentencing a lone parakeet to a life of solitude without a cell-mate seemed mean.

This last condition was problematic, though, because a quick Google search of "how to sex a parakeet" both drops weird cookies on your computer and makes clear that it is not easy to determine if you have two parakeets of the same sex or, God forbid, a mating pair. Something about the color of the "cere" which is the little hard piece over their beak might be a clue, but the basic gist is it's a crap shoot and you can't tell the sex unless you do a DNA sample, and my living room isn't 23&Me meets Jurassic fucking Park, now is it? And will I pay a vet a zillion dollars to neuter them? If that’s even a thing?

I don't think so. And that's where abstinence-only education for parakeets comes in. 

They are loud as all ever-loving fuck (I was warned about this). And I know you can teach them how to talk. But can you teach them to say "let's not fuck?" And have them actually internalize it and mean it? I hope so, because the last thing I want is to wake up to a parakeet egg (or worse, eggs plural) in Violet and Steele's cage.  

Because then my options are limited, and each one seems worse than the last. I wouldn't even know if the eggs were fertilized eggs or if one or both of the birds was a girl and just squirting out unfertilized eggs? That being said:

(a) I could let them incubate the eggs and--potentially--make a bunch of baby parakeets that I would then do . . . I'm not sure what with? I don't think the parakeet breeding and adoption market is particularly hot, though I haven't done a focus group or anything.
(b) I could remove the egg and compost it and/or return it to Mother Earth where a lucky raven or eagle would have it for breakfast.
(c) I could have it for breakfast.

Option (c) sounds disgusting. I eat chicken eggs so why should this be worse, and yet somehow it is worse. Much. Option (b) seems a little close to abortion to me. Don't get me wrong---I am fully pro choice. But I don't think Violet and Steele could consent to a compost-abortion, and consent is critical. Therefore, without knowing whether the eggs were fertilized, I don't think I would feel comfortable hucking them over the edge of my deck into the Tongass beyond.

Sadly, I think option (a) is the only possible solution. I know what's going to happen. I can already tell. There will be eggs and I am going to let nature take its course. The only thing that will fix this is repeating "please don't fuck" to Violet and Steele over and over again until they too can repeat it over and over again and actually act on it by refraining from copulating.

Good luck to me.

I Have Alllllll the Questions for That Woman Who Flushed Her Emotional Support Hamster Down an Airport Toilet

My dudes. MY DUDES! 

I have AAAAAAALL the questions for Belen Aldecosea, the 21 year-old college student who was allegedly told by Spirit Airlines to flush her emotional support hamster down the toilet, rather than being allowed to take it on the plane from Baltimore to Fort Lauderdale.

Please permit me to postpone my Q&A of Belen for a brief throat-clearing digression.

Before I went to law school, I worked for a city agency called the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which investigated public complaints of police misconduct against the NYPD. And in my two years in that job, I learned pretty quickly--and any good lawyer will tell you this--that there is always ALWAYS more to the story. 

I recall one woman in particular who came downtown to our offices with a claim of force and discourtesy against a patrol cop who’d arrested her in the South Bronx. 

"I was just standing there with my linguana [iguana] on a leash, and next thing I know? I'm at Rikahs!" [Rikers' Island jail], she said indignantly in a thick Nuyorican accent. 

"Now wait a minute," I said, putting a hand up. "Something must have happened in between the cop approaching you to ask about your iguana on a leash and ending up on Rikers' Island? No?”

All of which leads to my many--MANY--questions for Belen. 

While the reporter did a good job of making a viral internet story on the click-bearing heels of "emotional support peacock-gate" and O.H.M.'s very own "emotional support giraffe" post, he didn't ask NEARLY enough questions.

Doesn't she have better things to do than a deep dive into Emotional-Support-Hamster-Flushed-Down-the-Toilet-Gate?, you might be asking yourself. And you'd be right to ask that question. 

But no, would be the answer. 

So without further ado, I give you quotes from the original Miami Herald article followed by all the questions the reporter should have asked, and that I certainly hope Belen's lawyer (she has retained one in this matter, of course) will ask, both of Belen and all the other people involved in this whole sordid, furry affair.

With her only friends hours away at campus, Aldecosea was stuck. She says an airline representative suggested flushing Pebbles down an airport toilet, a step that Spirit denies. 

M’kay.

Now this is a classic case of "she-said-he-said-she-should-flush-a-pet-rodent-down-the-toilet/he-said-he-never-said-she-should-flush-a-pet-rodent-down-the-toilet." 

And my question is, is there any record of this conversation, either orally or in writing? If not, I'm afraid the only two people who will ever know the truth about what exactly was said in that fateful exchange are Belen and the unnamed representative of Spirit Airlines.

And as will soon become clear, however, Belen arguably has a *slight* credibility problem.

Panicked and needing to return home promptly to deal with a medical issue, Aldecosea unsuccessfully tried renting a car and agonized for hours before doing the unthinkable. She flushed Pebbles. “She was scared. I was scared. It was horrifying trying to put her in the toilet,” Aldecosea said. “I was emotional. I was crying. I sat there for a good 10 minutes crying in the stall.”

Was Belen's medical issue clinical stupidity and lack of resourcefulness? Is that in the DSM IV? If not, Belen’s case proved that it should be. 

And HOW promptly was promptly? In the ten minutes that Belen and Pebbles were mutually scared in this Shakespearean toilet murder, did she ever stop to ask herself, “How have I made it to the age of 21 just doing what some random customer service rep tells me to do? How have I not jumped off a cliff yet? Should I follow my GPS into a lake like in that episode of the Office?” Maybe a lemming should be Belen’s next pet.

Aldecosea, 21, of Miami Beach, is now considering filing a lawsuit against Spirit over the conflicting instructions that wound up pressuring her into making an anguished decision with a pet certified by her doctor as an emotional support animal. She shared her story with the Miami Herald weeks after the story of an emotional support peacock — denied entrance to a United Airlines flight — went viral on the Internet.

Ah, you accidentally revealed the real reason you wrote this, reporter-guy, didn't you? It's okay, I get it. From one click-whore to another, I get it. Believe me. But at least ask all the questions, can't you? 

Like was Belen really "pressured into making an anguished decision?" Like was this REALLY a Catch-22? Was there really NOTHING Belen could have done other than flush the very creature she so desperately needed to the point that she got a fucking DOCTOR'S NOTE saying she needed a rodent for EMOTIONAL SUPPORT down the SHITTER? I mean, she couldn't have needed him THAT much?

I've had boyfriends I've treated better than this!

This case is much different, said her South Florida attorney, Adam Goodman. “This wasn’t a giant peacock that could pose a danger to other passengers. This was a tiny cute harmless hamster that could fit in the palm of her hand,” he said.

My question here is for the lawyer, Adam Goodman. Based on his name, Adam is a fellow traveler in the Tribe of Israel and we are probably related, if not through DNA then through American Jewish Geography. 

So from one Jew to another: What would your mother say about this? You know she thinks hamsters are disgusting, so good job overcoming your own genetic disgust to represent this worthy cause. 

But are you sure you've asked your client everything? Everyone thinks their case is a "much different" special snowflake.

How do you know Pebbles couldn't endanger other passengers? Maybe he had Hamster Plague? Would a jury find Pebbles tiny or cute? You'd better anticipate that. What is your cause of action here? What are the damages? A gift certificate to Petco? You gotta think these things through before you go running off to the courthouse steps, my dude.

Aldecosea says Pebbles was a true comfort animal and she had her doctor’s letter certifying the rodent. Dwarf hamsters grow no more than four inches and weigh less than two ounces. A typical cellphone is longer and twice as heavy.

But a typical cellphone doesn't shit and piss in your hand, right? There's not an app for that, at least not yet? Is there?

A Miami Beach High grad, Aldecosea played volleyball at Barry University before transferring to Wilson College in Chambersburg, Penn., last year. It was during her first lonely semester there that Aldecosea developed a painful golf-ball size growth in her neck, leading to a cancer scare. Frazzled that fall, Aldecosea decided she needed a distraction. At a Pennsylvania Petco, she bought calm and quiet Pebbles. The hamster lived in her dorm room in a small plastic cage with a green spinning wheel, always scurrying to the front of the cage to greet her owner. “She was so loving. It was like she knew I needed somebody,” said Aldecosea.

Wow. Lots of questions for Belen here. 

They let you graduate from high school? And they let you into not one college, but two? Do you think you were maybe lonely because you couldn't figure out how to operate a doorknob? Was Pebbles really so loving? Do you think she was maybe just using you for your lettuce? And if not, why did you betray her by, I don't know, DROWNING HER IN A MUNICIPAL SEWER?!

In November, Aldecosea learned the growth was benign, but it was still painful. Withdrawing from school and going home hoping to have it removed, Aldecosea booked a Spirit flight from Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport to Fort Lauderdale.

Okay. Critical plot point in the case (listen up, Adam). The growth was benign (although Belen's idiocy is malignant, unfortunately). So Belen was going home to have the growth removed, leading to the natural conclusion that it was not an emergency after all, so again I ask, could she not have gone back to her dorm to figure this out?

“They gave me the wrong information more than once,” said Aldecosea, now a student at Texas State University.

A THIRD college?

After hectic discussions, an outraged Aldecosea accepted a flight later that day to try and figure out what to do with Pebbles. But she had no friends or family in town to pick up Pebbles. It was then, Aldecosea insists, that an employee suggested letting Pebbles go free outside or flushing her down the toilet.

Wait wait wait wait. How do we know that wasn't just Belen’s brain giving her one kinda stupid option and one really stupid option?

For hours, Aldecosea said, she struggled with what to do. She contacted at least six rental car agencies, but no cars were available during the busy holiday season and she wasn’t old enough to rent a car anyway. A Greyhound bus would have taken days to get to South Florida.

Okay, but ... Once Belen figured out she wasn’t old enough to rent a car, why did she THEN contact FIVE more rental car agencies? 

With her flight boarding soon, she pondered whether to just let Pebbles free outside. She said she considered it more humane to end her life right away, and not let her run around scared in the cold, only to die getting hit by a car.

What made Belen think that Pebbles wasn’t smart enough to avoid getting hit by a car? Like pretty much every small rodent escapes death by car, if they’re spry enough, and if not, well, that’s just evolution for ya. Belen could have started a breed of feral super-dwarf hamsters. Total missed opportunity here.

“I didn’t have any other options,” she said.

I'll end on a statement as opposed to a question, and I'm going to say Belen is right. As a general rule, Belen does not have any other options.

An Ill-Fated Trip to Double Tube Town?

Our history with pets in this household is dubious at best. (Recall: the short, eventful life of Shimmer the fish; the Valentine's Day demise of Feathers (also a fish); and treating the local Petco as a zoo). But Isaac's fifth birthday tomorrow presented an opportunity for redemption.

And so it was that a potentially ill-fated trip to "Tad Tubetown" (doubles version) began. Tubetown isn't a bong shop in Berkeley. It's a mail-order tadpole habitat service, which believe it or not, is actually a thing. 

You can see from the photo below that Isaac greeted the arrival of "Squiggles" the tadpole with enthusiasm. What he didn't know--and what I remain reluctant to tell him--is that Squiggles' sibling (the "double" in "Double Tubetown") didn't survive the trip to Alaska from whence he came.

When the habitat showed up on our doorstep, I opened the box and shook Squiggles' buddy around in its plastic baggie like that little brat in braces does in Finding Nemo in her uncle's dentist office. But he was tits up, and there was no getting around it: Squiggles' unnamed companion went to the great lily pond in the sky somewhere between the Portland Fed-Ex service center and Juneau.

Then there was the water. 

As you can also see from the instructions, it was "VERY IMPORTANT!!" that the inhabitants of Double Tubetown swim around in bottled SPRING water. Well, I went to the convenience store down the street and spent $17 on six bottles of Desani only to discover that Desani was filtered DRINKING water, not spring water. 

Then I had to go to a totally different store (after returning all the Desani), and choose between DISTILLED, DRINKING, SPRING, and some other types of water. I only ever drink tap water, so I was rather shocked at the sheer variety of "water" that exists in the supermarket.

Two jugs of SPRING water in hand, I finally came back with the right kind of water and we set up Double Tubetown with careful adherence to the directions.

Squiggles survived his first night chez One Hot Mess, but as of this writing, he looks a little listless and had to be prompted to motion with a sharp rap of knuckles on plexiglass.

I won't lie: the trip to Double Tube Town is looking ill-fated to say the least ...

The Emotional Support Hedgehog

“My Facebook feed has gotten about 40% less angry since Libby Bakalar got that hedgehog.” That’s what someone overheard in Anchorage, according to this week’s Stalker column in the Alaska Landmine.

Since I’m mostly too numb to be offended by anything anymore, I turned this phrase over in my mind a couple of times this weekend: Do I really seem that angry? And if so, wouldn’t it be justified? I mean, look at how the country is behaving, for fuck's sake! Or maybe I just invite the rancor of people who get off fighting with each other online? I rarely wade into that fracas, preferring instead to let my original words speak for themselves, come what may.

Still, I chose to interpret this tidbit of gossip in a flattering light: that my recent blitz of pet hedgehog pictures has, in fact, brought joy to Mess Head Nation™ as my blog creeps from social justice/woke scold territory into the rantings of an Unhinged Crazy Hedgehog Lady.™ 

The story of Bonbon—a reverse pinto African Pygmy hedgehog (who is NOT a rodent but an erinaceinid, he will thank you to remember) began two years ago with a relentless campaign by my then 9 year-old son. After the “failure” (euphemistically) of two pet parakeets and the impossibility of dogs or cats in light of my troublesome allergies, Isaac had glommed on to the idea of a pet hedgehog as a solution to all of our non-existent pet woes, and the harbinger of new such woes to come.

My first answer, of course, was “no,” my second was “hell to the no,” and my last and final answer was “over my dead body.” 

These solitary, nocturnal, omnivorous spiny mammals are not like bunnies, gerbils, or hamsters. You can’t just walk into PetCo and buy one. Some species are legal in Alaska and some aren't. You have to find a licensed breeder. You have to get a special type of cage and keep it at a very particular temperature and feed it cat food and certain other elements of a low fat, high protein, dairy free diet. They require specific types of bedding and wheels. You have to clip their tiny little toenails without making them bleed (not easy). They are covered in sharp quills and trend to the ornery. The whole thing sounded like a giant, expensive pain in the ass, which of course it was.

But Isaac’s isolation and boredom during COVID and the misfortune of being the youngest child in the family eroded my resolve, and at long last, I capitulated to the hedgehog. Bonbon, as Isaac named him, was 8 weeks old and arrived in a cat kennel on an Alaska Airlines cargo flight from Anchorage about three weeks ago, courtesy of a wonderful breeder from Kenny Lake named Wendy. In researching and purchasing Bonbon, I discovered an entire world of online hedgehog fandom, full of the usual "spirited debate" you've come to expect in any Facebook group, all of which seem to court controversy, no matter how benign the subject.

I had cats, gerbils, hamsters, turtles, guinea pigs, and fish growing up, but never a dog (my parents said they were too much work and it was inhumane to keep a dog in a New York City apartment). Naturally, I assumed Bonbon would be like one of the other rodents I'd bonded to loosely in my youth, but right from the moment he arrived, I forged a different connection to him than previous pets.

Rather than feeling resentful and annoyed about cleaning Bonbon's cage, I found myself fighting Isaac for the privilege of power-washing a raft of shit off his wheel each morning with the garden hose. I carefully measured out low-fat cat food and ground it up in a Ninja behind the backs of my daughter and husband, both of whom are vaguely disgusted by the hedgehog, and needn't know about the dry cat food smoothie prepared in the same blender we use for human smoothie-making and consumption. Isaac and I have been working as a team to clean or change out his fleece bedding and snuggle sacks, scrutinizing the thermometer in his cage to make sure he is living in the requisite 75-80 degree warmth window. We give him foot baths in the sink to get shit off his feet and have long debates over what his "special nighttime treat" should be--egg, a meal worm, or chicken baby food? Maybe one of the less frequent fruits or vegetables?

But most of all, Bonbon is ridiculously cute, and so we vie for his love and affection, neither content to have him sit on the other's lap. "Yes it's your hedgehog, but I want a turn with Bonbon!" I tell Isaac each day after school, which is the time we feel OK about waking him up to play with him a little bit. Indeed, as I write this, Bonbon is curled up on my lap and I'm hiding so Isaac doesn't interrupt my hedgehog cuddle time.

See, Bonbon is surprisingly cuddly for a spiny mammal. Less cuddly than a dog, more cuddly than a cat, and not as sharp (physically) as you'd think, because he puts his quills down when he's happy and relaxed, raising them only when cold and/or in defense mode. He doesn't try to scurry away and escape like a hamster or gerbil, seeming to understand on some non-rodent level that he needs his humans, and is generally calm and affectionate towards us.

And it turns out that a couple of humans needed Bonbon too. Pandemic Puppies are everywhere--so I guess it's not surprising that Pandemic Hedgehogs are close behind. Bonbon is giving me the mommy-son bonding and emotional support hedgehog therapy I never knew I needed.

Yay! These Parakeets Were an Epic Fail and Source Number 5,462 of Self-Loathing

The thing is, guys, I’m willing to admit when I make a mistake.

And I’m one hundred percent ready to concede that these parakeets (not the actual parakeets in this picture, but Violet and Steele, my “kids’” parakeets) were a Very Bad Idea.™ And I say this as someone who’s no stranger to bad ideas.

From the woman who brought you other popular bad ideas like “faking throat surgery in kindergarten” (long story),"buying 'shrooms in the projects," and “throwing underwear on stage at a concert in a bar on the Jersey Shore”— comes . . . 

PARAKEETS.

The careful reader will note that I put “kids” in quotes above. That’s because—and I knew this would happen—they became MY parakeets within a few weeks’ time. And that, in turn, is because my good-time Charlie crotch fruit were happy to play with Violet and Steele, but not to actually take care of them. And since I’m not a monster, I don't plan to teach my kids a lesson in “natural consequences” at the expense of these critters’ actual lives.

Which is when I really began to see the error of my ways: because Violet and Steele were now my parakeets, and I had to face reality. I didn’t do my homework, and I bought a couple of parakeets from PetCo without considering their dubious origins, which a visiting teenager from Switzerland rightly pronounced “unethical." My mind began to spin with guilt and skipped from one neurotic parakeet-related musing to the next:

I just took them from one sad cage to another. 
Maybe this cage is better. 
But it has fewer parakeets. 
And I also unwittingly subsidized and supported the unethical parakeet trade. 
At least they aren't male and female and I don't have to worry about parakeet babies. 
But they are both males, I think? 
And they definitely hate each other. 
People told me they were loud. 
I didn't realize they were this loud. 
I had no idea birds could be this loud. 
Maybe I should let them out to fly around. 
But then how will they know to fly back into their cage? 
Millet? Cuttle bones? What's up with cuttle bones, anyway? So random.
They won't fly back because they are dumb--bird-brained, if you will. 
They will probably fly into a window and die. 
Maybe I should "set them free?" 
But that would be insane. 
They are an invasive species. 
They wouldn't make it five minutes. 
An eagle or a cat would eat them before they could freeze to death. 
They are also filthy. 
How do two such tiny creatures create such a mess? 
I wish I loved them. 
Maybe I should find them a new home? 
But that is such a cop-out. 
I made a commitment to these fuckers. 
They are going to live a miserable life for 20 years and so will I.

UGH WHAT HAVE I DONE.

In the end, my decision to capitulate to my kids' request for parakeets was a bad one, and a metaphor, really, for my multiple life failures. It's also one that I can blog about, much to Isaac's dismay. 

"I know what you're going to write on your blog, MOM," he told me, rolling his eyes and imitating a high-pitched "mom" voice: "The parakeets are loud and gross and your son doesn't take care of them and blah blah blah."

You got that right, you little turd-monster. Also, you forgot to take the blanket off their cage this morning so I had to do it, and they will get depressed without sunlight.

Squiggles 2 is a Survivor!

I have interacted with my last anus, and I refuse to deal with the feces or anal orifices of vertebrates anymore, at least on purpose.

What does that have to do with Squiggles 2 the frog, you might be wondering? Well, wonder no more—I’m about to tell you.

We don’t have “real” pets for three reasons:

• (1) I’m deathly allergic to everything with fur; 

• (2) I don’t want to be a slave to anyone’s asshole anymore. I had this unenviable job for the past decade on and off, and at this point, I am done. I’ve wiped my last butt and handled my last turd, and that’s all there is to say about that; 

• (3) I have a hard enough time keeping the human beings in my care and custody alive. The last thing I need is to be responsible for yet another life.

And so it was that we settled long ago—on Isaac’s fifth birthday, to be exact—upon mail-order tadpoles as the perfect pet.

Grow-a-Frog will send you tadpoles of indeterminate species and origin in a bag (not even PetCo sells tadpoles—they just give them away for free if they show up with other creatures). Some were dead on arrival, and some were hearty survivors.

Squiggles 2 was in the latter category, and best of all, he doesn't shit. Well maybe he does, but I don't know it, and that's the point.

Squiggles 2, as Isaac named him, has been squiggling around in his habitat for going on three years now. He’s endured the benign neglect of a poor filtration system and the indignity of a giant finger tapping on his tank, periodically, to check for signs of life. 

But not until yesterday evening was his amphibious mettle truly tested.

It started out as an ordinary bi-monthly tank cleaning. This task is Geoff and Isaac’s joint responsibility, as I made quite clear when we ordered Squiggles that I would not be held responsible for his well-being. 

Geoff put Squiggles 2 in a ceramic cereal bowl of water, as usual, while he cleaned out the habitat. Isaac was shellacking me at Uno on the living room floor, when all of a sudden I heard Geoff cry out:

“OH NO! WHERE’S SQUIGGLES?”

He (or she?) was not in his bowl on the kitchen island where he’d been temporarily stationed during his routine cleaning! Apparently, he’d outgrown this vessel, and not knowing that the world was an even crueler place than his underwater plastic catacombs, leaped out impetuously.

Isaac immediately began to howl in grief-stricken agony as Geoff and I launched a panicked search for our charge. Geoff carefully studied the wet trail of slime and water, and within moments, Squiggles 2 was located inside the folds of a paper airplane and deposited back into his home. Relief was short-lived, however, because an odd white film was oozing from Squiggles 2's back.

“Google 'my frog has a weird white film coming off it,'" I demanded of Geoff. “DO IT NOW!”

Geoff demurred, reasoning that such search terms could drop unwanted porn cookies onto our devices, but I was panicking for Isaac’s sanity, and needed a prognosis regarding the ramifications of Squiggles 2’s misadventure on terra firma.

Google yielded a partial answer: the oozy white film was perhaps a routine molting of frog-skin, but I wasn’t convinced, especially because we were missing critical information, such as Squiggles 2’s actual species of frog.

Imagine my surprise and relief this morning, when we went to peek in on Squiggles 2. The white oozy film was gone, and he responded with as much vim and vigor as ever to my index finger flicking the plastic shell of his home.

No matter what happens from now on, one thing is clear: Squiggles 2 is a survivor.

A Great Business Model

There’s something about the phrase “a great business model” that makes my skin crawl like a meth head covered in fleas. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s sort of like the word “legit.” I can’t say I've ever heard an honest person use the word “legit,” (besides M.C. Hammer, of course). Oh wait a minute. Whatever, never mind. There’s just something sleazy about it.

Maybe it’s the fact that the line between “a great business model” and a “scam” is sometimes hard to draw. Take for example the following “great business model”:

I take a not insignificant number of dollars from you each month/year with the promise that when you need it again for something important, I'll give it back to you. You go about your business, riding the bus and eating nachos and going to PetCo and mowing your lawn or whatever, and I keep taking your money, la la la. 

Then one day—whoops! You need some of your money back for something important. Namely, the something important that I said I’d pay for, and that I have been siphoning money from you all along for this very purpose.

That’s when the good times start to roll. ‘Cause I don’t actually just do what I said I would, no questions asked. Nope. No sirree, Bob. I ask LOTS of questions, in fact. I play full court, zone defense with your money. I’m gonna stuff those dollars into every crack and crevice I can find that is not your wallet. I’m gonna staff an entire team of people whose sole job it is to keep you separated from your money.

I will send informational books—and even people—to your house to devise more and more creative ways for me to keep your money and try to intimidate you into not asking for it ever again. If you're lucky, assertive, resourceful, and willing to spend 8 zillion hours on hold, you might be able to wear me down. Otherwise, you’ll just be in debt for the rest of your life.

Oh, I almost forgot: I'll also have a powerful and corrupt lobby in Congress to ensure that you and your dollars shall never be reunited again.

And that, my friends, is the great business model known as health insurance.