What Hoku needed was a companion to keep her company (I know that was redundant, but it was either make a parenthetical comment here or interrupt the flow of my freeform writing and think of something more clever, thus derailing my train of thought. Crap. Now I've done just that. Anyway...) and I thought that I would get another dog. But that in itself presents problems. It's not bad traveling with one dog and a simple matter to take Hoku to my parent's home when I have to travel, but 2 dogs complicates matters a lot more than one. Hoku is already a handful at races and meets, and having two dogs to look after would be a challenge. Addtionally, I thought that dumping off two canines at my parent's home would be too much for a couple of retirees, and seeing as I'm going to be gone for three months next year, making my dad take care of 4 dogs was too much.
So, what then? Something between a dog and a gerbil that is mostly independent, won't destroy the place and won't mind at all if left alone while Hoku and I go to the races. The obvious choice was a cat. Hoku loves cats and not in that "they're delicious" kind of way. That decision made, I went off to the Berkeley Human Society in search of a pet for my dog.
Right away I was drawn to a very cute kitten whose colors were described on the tag as "dilute tortoise" whatever that meant. Here's what a dilute tortoise looks like:
She's already integrated herself and made the apartment her playground and she's only been here 2 days. Upon meeting Hoku for the first time, she made the requisite hissing sound, something I would probably do if I'd never seen a dog before, but she didn't run or even growl at Hoku any further. It was probably more like a hiss born out of surprise more than warning. After that, the new kitten's curiosity got the best of her and later that evening she went and gave Hoku a very close sniff. Hoku, being the dog she is, treated the new cat as almost dangerous, and has been taking great pains to give her a wide berth, until she figures this new roommate out.It didn't take long, and after 48 hours in the same apartment together, managed to conspire against their benevolent mutual guardian to hijack the couch.
Funny thing is, they even have similar facial expressions.
My next dilemma, one that has bugging me ever since I decided weeks ago before I got a kitten, was what to name her. Getting out a pen and paper (I recently re-discovered writing with pen and paper, something that lends itself well to brainstorming in a way that a neatly arranged keyboard can't) and played around with a few anagrams. I wanted something unique that would be a combination of letters from the names of other pets I've known over the years. I thought of Shandy and Isis. Shandy was my very first pet, a rat that I had while I was living in the dorms. She was perfect in every way except her lifespan. Isis was a cat that I adopted when I was living in my first off-campus apartment. Everyone loved her and she was a great cat, capable of some extreme cat toy driven stunts. Rearranging the letter in "Shandy" and "Isis" gave me a number of interesting combinations, however the only one that made any sense as far as being a name for a cat was...Daisy Shins.It made sense in some weird way. Hoku and Daisy Shins are going to get along just great. They're already beginning to emulate each other.
No comments:
Post a Comment