Sitting duck

I'm babysitting tomorrow. I haven't babysat since the summer, and if any of you remember the anything I have written about the kids I babysit; you will realize that I need a battle plan.

Go unarmored into munchkin territory you will be faced with screams and cry's- your own.  I have gotten hit, spit on, and sworn at at this house. Once, the little boy was trying to pee on the other children, now that's a weapon I can't compete with.

So, I bring toys, crayons, books, my wit, and my manners. Yes, I will teach them manners if it kills me. But I'm not going to take their crap sitting down.



PS. I think it's kind of wrong of me to use a duck hunting reference in my title considering my improved moral stance on animals rights. PETA might not approve, but it does remind me of Another Story.

Another story

In the operating room before my ear surgery, a bunch of people were milling about doing their jobs preparing stuff when one guy starts. "So, I went hunting this weekend..."

But then the anesthesiologist cuts him off and was like, "Don't say that! She's [me] a vegetarian!" You see, in pre-op I had mentioned I wanted to be a small animal vet and he was like, "You could go into research if you want to work with small animals." He got major death stare for that.

Then the fist guy said, "Well, it was just ducks. They don't matter [yadda, yadda]" I stopped listening then rolled my eyes, but no one saw.

How could ducks not matter?!?! Mean medical person. Poor ducks.

I owe one injured duck a huge favor

I was in kind of a bad mood today because it's spring break and I had absolutely nothing to do, so I thought to cheer myself up a bit I would take my guinea pigs outside- the weather was a little nicer today and they like being outside. They were in their little plastic igloos and I also put a little fence-thing around them, which I usually don't do, but since I didn't want to bother with them running away or anything, I did. My sister, who was about to leave for a chiropractor's appointment, came outside and we started to play whiffle ball. All was going well, and I was up to bat. I noticed a man who started walking down our street and I was kind of watching him because I'm a suspicious person like that. Well, apparently, while I was watching the man, my sister was watching what she thought was a duck fight, until she realized it wasn't a two ducks- it was a duck and a hawk. I don't know if you understand the significance of this but hawk+ guinea pigs = dinner. And there it was- across the street and two houses down. It was so close I couldn't believe it. I knew there was a hawk around here, but I had never seen it so close before. So, my sister screamed and I looked and yup, that hawk was giving one heck of a beat down to that duck. I looked away quickly because I had to go save my pigs and frankly I did not want to watch that. As we were picking up our pigs, my sister froze. "Forget the igloos! We have to get the pigs inside!" I said to her. She informed me later that the reason she hesitated was because she thought she saw the hawk flying at us. When we came back outside to get our stuff, the hawk was sitting in the tree right outside our house. Holy Shit.

My sister says she saw the duck fly away. That was probably the moment when the hawk came after us. But think, if that duck hadn't been there, it could have been my guinea pigs- and they wouldn't have been able to fly away.

As much as I love all animals, I'll admit that I want that hawk dead. My guinea pigs get so few pleasures in their life and eating the grass and playing outside is one of them. Now that is taken away from them. I am, however, extremly grateful that my guinea pigs were not a victim of the hawk's hunger. So thank you God, and thank you duck.