{"id":414,"date":"2019-09-26T08:39:59","date_gmt":"2019-09-26T12:39:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/?p=414"},"modified":"2019-09-25T23:41:17","modified_gmt":"2019-09-26T03:41:17","slug":"throwback-thursday-pet-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/2019\/09\/26\/throwback-thursday-pet-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"Throwback Thursday: Pet Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Howdy everyone, good to see you again! Today, I\u2019m going to talk about some memories I have of pets that I\u2019ve had throughout my life, or that I\u2019ve known throughout my life. I have no pets at this time, as it\u2019s too expensive in my apartment, but it\u2019s not like I\u2019ve never taken care of animals before. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I was a toddler, we had a dog that came with our apartment named Cuervo. She was a collie\/golden retriever mix, and wasn\u2019t my greatest fan. She didn\u2019t mind me, but she wasn\u2019t exactly pleased I was always climbing on her back trying to ride her. I have very few memories of her in reality, but I saw a home video a while back. She would always run towards a wall to knock me off her- looking back, I almost feel a little guilty, even if I was a two year old with no understanding of what was going on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had a hamster once as well\u2026 But the only memory I have of it is a story my dad told me where I left the cage a crack open and it disappeared. I cried in hysterics, and my mother said we should\u2019ve gotten another dog. I calmed down immediately at the idea of a dog, because I was six with no attention span. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On my 7th birthday, my parents brought home a two month old golden retriever puppy. He was already my size in length, and strong enough to knock me over regularly. I named him Cuervo Gold, after our first dog. Cuervo Gold, though, was very different than the collie mix we\u2019d had. He was hyperactive and playful, and hysterically loyal in weird ways. Whenever I got home from school, he\u2019d tackle me to the ground to give me kisses; when he came to the bus stop with my dad and I, he\u2019d growl at the bullies to scare them away. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, what I still find fascinating to this day is how differently he reacted when one of my family members gave him a command. If it was my father, he wouldn\u2019t listen the first or second time- dad would have to yell to get him to listen many times. For me, he\u2019d listen immediately- as a child, I was his favorite. But what\u2019s funny is when my mom would command him. No matter what the command was, if it came from my mother\u2019s mouth, he\u2019d pee on the spot. Yes, it was a conditioned reaction- because frankly, he didn\u2019t like my mom much. And nowadays, looking back, I don\u2019t blame him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A story that I wanted to share about Cuervo Gold is actually why I decided on this topic. Someone shared a gif of a squirrel with peanut butter, and it reminded me of something fairly silly. There was a time, you see, where we had his food in a bowl on the patio. One day, I noticed a couple of chipmunks come close to the sliding glass window that worked as our gate out of the house. To my amazement, the chipmunks were taking the food! It was something I\u2019d never seen or thought of before. Chipmunks eating dog food? Apparently they\u2019ll eat more than nuts, that\u2019s for sure!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That also eventually led me to wondering if humans could eat dog food, and that curiosity led me to pushing my dad to eat a doggy treat. To this day, whenever I ask him how it was, he goes back and forth in regards to whether it was good or not, and I don\u2019t know what to think of that. So, I try not to. Though because of it, I do sometimes think I\u2019d like to try one for myself\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyway\u2026 We had to give up Cuervo Gold when I was ten and moving into my grandmother\u2019s house with my dad. He\u2019s since passed, but lived a long and happy life with my dad\u2019s best friend, whom I call my uncle. In my grandmother\u2019s house, we had new pets. There was a giant fish tank in the front hall, and a bird cage with two cockatiels in the living room. The fish didn\u2019t have names that I knew of, but I did often help feed them. It was fun to watch them zip around the tank for food. What wasn\u2019t so fun was when it was my turn to take the eggs out of the cockatiels\u2019 cage. Those birds are quite possessive of their eggs, even if there\u2019s no way they\u2019ll hatch- after all, they were both female! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I unfortunately remember the death of one of the birds. Sparky, the younger cockatiel, died drowned in the water trough of sorts that was in the cage for her. It was after Tweety, the elder bird my grandmother called mine, had already passed. Sparky and I weren\u2019t as close as I was with Tweety, but Sparky loved my dad\u2026.especially enjoying grooming him in his sleep, so that he\u2019d wake up with bleeding cuticles. It made me sorta glad she wasn\u2019t my fan- though it didn\u2019t make it less difficult to see her dead body. I remember crying and clinging onto my dad. Sparky and I didn\u2019t get along well, but I still saw her as family!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve likely got other pet stories I can share, though most of them are of other people\u2019s pets, not ones I had myself at any given time. Would those be interesting? And what about your pet stories? I\u2019d love to hear some. Please feel free to share any or none- but if you do share, I will be extremely happy! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until Saturday- bye bye, guys!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Howdy everyone, good to see you again! Today, I\u2019m going to talk about some memories I have of pets that I\u2019ve had throughout my life, or that I\u2019ve known throughout my life. I have no pets at this time, as it\u2019s too expensive in my apartment, but it\u2019s not like I\u2019ve never taken care of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[33,2],"tags":[162,34,43,163],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8uAZQ-6G","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":415,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414\/revisions\/415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrolik.caludin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}