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Pastimes : NNBM - SI Branch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: abuelita who wrote (26871)	6/13/2003 7:10:16 PM
From: elpolvo	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 104157

ziter- yes i wrote it. yes tom and toni went. (to be cont.) gone saylin' -bly

To: abuelita who wrote (26871)	6/13/2003 9:10:50 PM
From: Lost1	Respond to of 104157

John Kelso A doggone poor excuse for a pet AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Friday, June 13, 2003 There are too many animals these days being turned into house pets that instead ought to be sold as hand muffs in gift shops. Take the prairie dog, a cute and cuddly, small, brown rodent. Prairie dogs burrow so many holes in the ground that people have been driven to suck them up for relocation with special prairie dog vacuum machines. Because of an outbreak in the Midwest of a disease called monkeypox, the sale of prairie dogs at pet stores nationwide has been stopped. Seems the outbreak could possibly be traced to some prairie dogs that might have been infected at an Illinois pet store by a Gambian giant pouched rat. What are rats doing at a pet store? Why would you spend money on a rat? Heck, you can find one for cheap in your garage -- with a wedge of Gorgonzola and a springloaded trap. Why would you want a prairie dog as a pet? Last time I looked, the pounds were full of real dogs that need homes. Sure, people will tell you that prairie dogs can be trained to get up on the couch. But they'll never replace an actual dog. This is why they didn't pick a prairie dog to play Lassie. One good thing about having a prairie dog is that if you were trying to sneak it into a motel that doesn't allow pets, you could hide it under your armpit. But let's face it. There are some critters that are meant to be pampered, and others that were meant to be a pair of slippers. The prairie dog is a member of a family of animals I refer to as the fast-pitch group. You've heard of the herding group and the working group. Let me introduce you to the fast-pitch group: It's any number of small animals that you could pick up and use in a fast-pitch softball game. Not that I'm blaming prairie dogs for monkeypox. Sounds as if the rat started it. It's just that you might not want a prairie dog around the house. If left unattended, it might eat the wiring in your TV set. Then the prairie dog shorts out. And you end up on the evening news. Still, the sale of prairie dogs as pets has become so pervasive that they're even popular in Lubbock. Pet prairie dogs in Lubbock: Who woulda thunk it? "We sell a pretty good amount of 'em, yeah -- probably three or four a week, at least," said Tommy Vernon, a manager at Pets Plus in Lubbock. Because of monkeypox, the store had to stop selling prairie dogs Wednesday. Tommy said a prairie dog used to go for $99.99. Tommy and the pet store owner catch the prairie dogs by hosing water from a 500-gallon tank down the holes into their faces, then grabbing them. "The water is kind of cool, and it slows 'em down, and I guess it surprises them so much that they don't react much at all," he said. "They're pretty calm about the whole thing." So the prairie dogs are getting a free bath. Ever known a groomer to give a summer trim to a prairie dog? No, you haven't. This is because rodents look funny in pink bows. By the way, that reminds me of the old joke: You know what looks good on a prairie dog? How about a boa constrictor?