The Most Convenient Cat Ever!

Sorry dog lovers but the most popular pet in America is the cat. This may be because as recent studies evidence almost half of all cats have multiple owners! This is one indicator among many that despite their popularity cats are often quite difficult on their owners. Lets face it, cats are inconvenient pets! Dogs are inconvenient due to their neediness. Cats are inconvenient out of their utter disregard. Modern science just may have a solution for cat lovers.

Through the genius of genetic engineering, you will soon be able to own the most convenient cat ever! The starcat is a miraculous creature, part feline, part echinoderm. Ever tried to catch a cat? It's practically impossible! Cats are fast, they can hide under or behind almost anything, they climb like crazy and if you do corner them they attack! The starcat solves all these problems. Starcats are as speedy as starfish, your 90 year old grandmother could outrun one using her walker without breaking a sweat! Starcats can hide sort of, but they cannot flatten themselves out or squeeze themselves behind stuff like an ordinary cat can. They can't climb at all, with the exception of glass, their tube feet are great at adhering to sliding glass doors. It can be startling to turn around to rinse off your back in the shower only to find your pet starcat staring at you! Most convenient of all starcats are virtually incapable of attack, there is an insignificant risk of asphyxiation should a starcat somehow attach to your face, so avoid passing out on the floor.

Starcats have difficulty mating so you can probably avoid the embarrassment of having them spayed or neutered without paying the consequence of having to deal with a litter of starkittens. If do want another starcat there is a simple method of getting one to five new starkittys! Just break off one, two, three, four or five of your starcats "arms," each will grow into a brand new starcat, with only minor and temporary inconvenience to your current pet! What could be more convenient than that? Many cat lovers also like birds, squirrels, bunnies, butterflies, ornamental fish and any number of the other of God's creatures typically murdered by cats. Good news! none of these darling animals is in any danger from the ground hugging, slow moving, clawless and non-pouncing starcat. The starcat is indeed the most convenient cat ever. Look for one, coming soon to your pet shop or aquarium store!





Russell

Adorable Pets From The Future!

The other day my younger sister (my little sister doesn't sound right anymore) texted me pleading for help. Her house was being overrun with "Crazy Ants" (Formichidae Wacko) and she desperately wanted to annihilate them. I suggested the traditional icepick method. This method requires great speed, extreme accuracy and incredible control. The trick is to skewer these minuscule and frenetic insects without scratching the Formica. This of course requires fantastic skill and concentration. Some exceptionally devout Buddhist Monks are able to do it but won't. They are unwilling to harm any sentient being and they foolishly believe these ants have souls! Buddhists, go figure! I thought my sister could handle the challenge what with years of ballet practice and her aerobics regimen but she declined. She figured maybe an aardvark could devour the little bastards and wondered if I had access to one. Unfortunately I did not.

I got to thinking about it and decided an aardvark was not an adequate solution to my little sister's (sounds better now) ant invasion. What she needed is a catvark! A catvark combines the appetite of an aardvark with feline cunning and stealth! Unfortunately these magnificent creatures do not yet exist. Luckily I have a nephew studying Biochemistry at the University of Houston and I am certain he can gene splice one together in short order. A catvark is judged by it's conformity to the ideal, which I have predetermined. The ideal catvark has a long sticky tongue. The snout is also elongated and adorned with adorable whiskers which the catvark uses as a sensory organ for detecting ants. The catvark's eyes are adapted for night vision. There is nothing so exhilarating to witness as the sight of one these wonderous beasts slowly creeping up on a column of unsuspecting crazy ants. Suddenly the catvark strikes! It's long sticky tongue repeatedly flinging out and snapping back coated with hapless ants! Truly an awesome pet and quite utilitarian too!

The catvark is not only pet of the future that will make prosaic cats and dogs obsolescent. Old fashioned cats and dogs hardly ever worked out as mutual house pets. Not so with catvarks and platypoodles. You see catvarks are wholly terrestrial while platypoodles are amphibious. Because of these differing habits catvarks and platypoodles rarely conflict. And there is nothing more delightful than the sight of your very own pet platypoodle paddling around in the koi pond. The platypoodle with his dignified duckbill, regal pom poms, webbed paws and rudder like paddle tail is a mammal any discerning pet lover would be proud to own. Similar to the catvark platypoodles are easy to maintain, not that they eat ants, but they eat any manner of disgusting stuff found in pond water including tadpoles, crayfish, water bugs, and duck shit. Platypoodles are intelligent, friendly and they love children, which can cause some embarrassing scenes at swimming pools (be careful).

Hopefully these wonderful pets will soon be available. Until then my sister is going to have to hone her ant ninja skills with the icepick!





Russell

More Pets Of The Future!

Tiny dogs like chihuahuas are so delicate they do not make practical pets. Yet they are so adorably hideous people cannot but help loving these pissy little beasts. Thanks to the ultra modern science of gene splicing you can now have a robust little pet that retains all the abominable charm of the original Mexicanine! The armahuahua combines the finest qualities of Americas two favorite illegal immigrants, the armadillo and the chihuahua. Instead of jumping around and pissing everywhere when alarmed the armahuahua curls into a ball and starts bouncing around in random directions. This is highly stimulating to children and helps them develop hand eye coordination as they try to literally catch their pet!

Neither armadillos nor chihuahuas have much of a sporting reputation, although armadillos are sometimes used as a ball in games of automobile polo. Armahuahuas are sporting dogs! Not surprisingly their sport is futbol! (soccer to you whitey!) It takes a relatively large armahuahua but when they curl up they make a decent soccer ball. Finally after a lousy crappy day at work you can come home and kick the dog without feeling guilty about it! Everybody is going to want one of these little hybrid mutts. Science scores a, GOAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

However if the armahuahua does not appeal to you perhaps the lhasopossum will. These quiet omnivores are an ideal pet for shift workers or anyone who stays up late and sleeps all day because like an opossum they are nocturnal. Lhasopossums are shy and sometimes one will hide in a closet hanging from a hanger rod by its prehensile tail. If the family pet chooses to hang from the shower rod it can be upsetting for both of you! Lhasopossums do not react well to be sprayed with water. They are generally easy to maintain and have an appetite for garbage which makes them a favorite pet for avid recyclers. They are not especially playful but not surprisingly they are really good at playing dead. They hate shaking hands and usually mistake a proffered digit for a tempting morsel, ouch!

Lhasopossums are extremely prolific and generally produce a litter of a dozen or more! Becoming a breeder should be easy but you will have to make your profit by selling in volume. Seeing a mother lhasopossum skittering around with her pups clinging to her erect tail is a heartwarming sight. The pups are tiny but develop fast. The puppies wrap their prehensile tails around their mothers tail to hitch a ride. This propensity can be used in a charming way during the holiday season. If you are giving pet lhasopossums as gifts you can simply hang the puppies from your Christmas tree by their tails. Children love finding the cute pet Santa left for them hanging on the tree! Be careful though because lhasopossum pups have a taste for tinsel and the shiny pellets they defecate are attractive to children, yikes!





Russell

I Am A Caffiend!

I really like coffee, alot! I don't adulterate my coffee either. I know people that claim they like coffee but, what they drink is some kind of syrupy sweet tan milk product with a vague coffee flavor. Coffee is an acquired taste. Nobody was born craving coffee, it takes discipline! Real coffee is a dark brown liquid with an adult flavor not some sweet kiddie drink.

What happened to percolators? Does anybody remember them? I decided to buy a stove top percolator. I figured I had time to actually percolate my coffee. I decided to buy a cheap aluminum percolator I could set on top of the stove. I went to the grocery store, nada! I went to Walgreen's, zilch! I went to Target, null and void! I actually went to Walmart and they didn't have any percolators either! This was a Super-Walmart too. Ace Hardware had a camping percolator, the kind you use on a campfire for Chrisakes! I felt like I was asking for a buggy whip.

I think I could buy a percolator online. It would probably be manufactured in India. Somehow it just seems crazy to go online in order satisfy some bizarre retro tech impulse for genuine percolated coffee. But then again I am blogging about it.

One day I found an online store that sells old fashioned candy. Not homemade candy, just brands and flavors that haven't been popular since the Eisenhower Administration. That is so weird because who would buy it? Nobody that ever ate the stuff shops online and nobody online ever heard of this crap. Well there is me of course. I mean it's tempting but I remember how bad Necco Wafers really were and I only buy stuff for my daughter online.

Maybe I will look for a percolator on the net. Right now I'm going to load up the Mr. Coffee dripolator and drink some manly coffee in a manly way out of a manly mug! Well actually I am going to drink it out of one these cups I hand decorated. That doesn't sound to manly does it?







Russell

Cartoon Physics

I think this may be my first incarnation. I just don't seem to have the hang of it. Have you ever gotten some of that Ikea furniture and somehow lost the directions? There you were with all this one sided veneer particle board, assorted bolts, some unidentifiable slotted metal cylinders, an odd number of tiny wooden dowels, and some kind of pygmy wrench. Remember how lost and confused you felt? I don't feel that way all the time, sometimes I am in denial. That's fun! But then reality yanks the floor out from under me. It's like cartoon physics.

I believe in cartoon physics. Cartoon physics is so much more relate-able than are quantum physics or relativity. Einstein and Schrodinger had nothing on Tex Avery! Schrodinger and Einstein had some good ideas I guess but they didn't know how to defy gravity! Tex Avery understood how to do it. It's the first law of cartoon physics. You can in fact walk on air as long as you don't look down! That's where I go wrong every time. I just can't help looking down, and there I am standing on nothing!

Life is a pop quiz in a subject I didn't know I was taking this semester. I'm here doing improvisation because I have the wrong script! That's how I feel when I pay attention. Fortunately I rarely pay attention. Nearly all the time I am blithely strolling along on thin air. Only occasionally does some shiny bit of reality distract me. Then I realize how unprepared I am. It's damn uncomfortable!

There are those people who always seem to have it together. Those people that always say the right thing. Those people who seem to have it all figured out. I am probably being petty but I like to believe those people are fakes.




Russell