My fur babies!!!

Pets pets pets!

As a child, I was not allowed to have pets. I had two goldfish, Orange Juice and Orange Soda, for a while. I had won them at a carnival, but they weren't really the kind of pet I wanted. My parents weren't "pet" people. They didn't like the mess or responsibility.

Right after we closed on our condo, my soon to be hubby and I adopted a sweet black and white kitten, Ziggy (real name, Danzig). He was our first "baby." 10 months later, he surprised my when he brought home a matching kitten whom we names PJ (real name Pearl Jam). After a few rough weeks getting used to each other, they become brothers. Their fur matched so well that when they slept on the bed, you couldn't tell where one ended and the other began.

Almost a year later, a cat was dumped at a shelter and we ended up rescuing him.(This tends to be a theme with us.) He came with the name Zeus and he sure lived up to that name. We soon moved out of our condo, which had a two cat only rule (we figured Ziggy and Peej looked so much alike, that as long as they weren't in the window at the same time, no one would ever notice....shhhhh). In no time, in our own house, a friend of mine took in a stray cat, who looked a bit chubby. That chub turned out to be a litter of kittens. There was a calico that no one else had claimed, so as soon as she was weaned from her mom, we named her Scarlett O'Hara, after my favorite book and movie, and brought her home.

At the same time, a little grey and white tabby started showing up around my home. He looked to be only a few months old. He broke my heart as he played outside my window with rocks. Hubby has a really soft heart and started feeding him. And yes, we ended up bringing him inside to stay, right after we took him to the vet for shots and gave him a good bath. Since his fur was grey and white stripes, and he even had a little grey mustache, he *had* to be named Rhett Butler. The tow of them, Scarlett and Rhett were hysterical to watch together.

So in case you are counting, we are up to 5 cats. That was when we ended up with a dog! My baby girl was my birthday present 11 years ago. Hubby loves Harley Davidson's so that is what we named her. She is the bestestestest sweetest baby ever.

A year later, we somehow ended up with another cat- hubby went to the shelter-- baaaad move!-- and came home with a grey sweetie that we named Elvis. He eneded up sooooo huge that we called him the "Old Elvis."

Over the years we have lost many of our pets, but they are still in our hearts. We have since added another two cats, a black guy named Merlin and a black and white tuxedo, named Floyd. His real name is Pink Floyd, but since he is a maniac we call him Hurricane Floyd after a hurricane that hit NJ in 97.

Rounding out our furry family we now have two rats who belong to my son. They are Scabbers and Chewie. I really wanted DS to call them Scabbers and Petigrew, but well, they don't belong to me.

As for non-furry pets, we have a bunch of goldfish, and an albino frog named Al. As in Albino.

My baby-girl, Harley is one of my best friends. And sadly, she is getting old. She has had two malignant tumors removed, and is now in her third bout of cancer. This time is was a highly Methodist kind, and I just found another lump in her throat. I have to say, I don't know what I am going to do without my girl.

And this is where I have to stop writing, b/c is I go on.... I'll be in tears.