This diet is awful.

First there's not enough food. Then there's too much of it, and it's almost all bad.

Long before we started traveling from mini-house to mini-house, the humans were very troubled about my weight. Every week, I'd get put on the scale and she'd be upset about it. We went through a variety of unpleasant foods before settling on one I was willing to eat. She never gave us enough of it. Every morning, Jasper and I had to stand on the bed, calling her and tapping at her face until she finally got up to feed us.

We went through this every single morning. You'd think she would have learned, but that's humans for you.

Now that we're traveling, however, she gives us plenty of food. There's still not enough of the crunchy food, but more than enough of the mushy, strong-smelling meatlike substance.

Now, whenever I get weighed on the scale, she keeps putting me in front of the dish of meat-mush. For days afterward, she's constantly waking me up to bring me to the dish of mush. It's as if she doesn't believe that I can smell it. Humans may not have any sense of smell, but trust me; I can smell the meat-mush even after they've washed the dish and put the remains through the growler in the kitchen sink.

It's a strong smell. If I wanted to eat it, I'd go over to the dish on my own. But I didn't want it. I even decided to fast for a day. That was a bad idea. She completely overreacted and is feeding me a watery chicken pudding.

It's awful stuff. Jasper and I refused to eat it when she put it in the dish. Now I get fed like a human baby. I've been spitting it out like a human baby too.

Passive resistance is going nowhere, and I can't just ignore this behavior. I hate to resort to drastic measures again, but the humans are really slow. If she tries to feed me after tomorrow's weighing, I may just have to draw some blood.

Birds and Butterflies

We're in an unplanned stop-over on the way to the Sole Family Reunion, which got moved from its original location at the last minute. When you consider that we only stopped in Charlotte because it was midway between Orlando and Altoona, it's surprising that we were able to find a dozen places we wanted to see with less than an hour's research.

CKL's first choice was the Carolina Raptor Center, so we spent several sweaty hours there today. It got so hot by 2pm that the flight show was canceled to keep the birds from overheating. CKL and I were quite drippy by the time we had walked by every one of the bird enclosures. Most of the birds we saw had permanently damaged wings or eyes, or both. Mostly caused by cars or guns. Damaged wing and blind in one eye or not, a bald eagle is still amazing. I got to stand just a few feet away and listen to it call. I was inspired to help, and "adopted" two of the smaller raptors, which means that I paid for 2-3 mice a day for each bird for a month.

My own first choice was the Butterfly Pavilion at the Charlotte Nature Museum, where, as CKL noted, we were singled out for special attention and got to see many bonus animals. My favorites were the American mink and the five-lined skinks roaming the butterfly enclosure, as well as a captive . The mink was as cute and playful as a kitten (even when gnawing on its frozen mice). While we were looking at the butterflies, we also watched a pair of lizards run around. Later, we saw the same lizard in captivity. He was labeled for handy identification, so we learned the name of some wild lizards. It was very educational.

Hmmm... When we each get to pick a place, we go for ones with animals. I wonder if CKL and I are taking this opportunity to relive our childhoods?

USA Everyday

Spotted outside the Penguin Drive-In yesterday:



I appreciate the sentiment, but I must deduct points for not including a satirical infographic. Or perhaps the artist merely feels (as many do, I'm sure) The Onion has already strip-mined that territory.

~CKL

A Couple of Suspicious Characters

Earlier today, D and I visited the Charlotte Nature Museum--mostly to see the Butterfly Pavilion, where we witnessed several new butterflies hatching out of their chrysalises! Very cool. We also got to see a bunch of bonus critters, including live owls, a mink, and baby mice.

But here's the weird thing. When we paid for our admission, the nice old lady at the front desk asked for our zip code. And then she asked D for her driver's license, and held it until we left the museum. I thought it was a bit strange, but didn't say anything at the time--hell, we'd already been fingerprinted at Universal Studios, and the license had our old address anyway.

We discussed it afterward, and the only thing we can think of is that the lady had been trained to be suspicious of two adults, by themselves, visiting what was clearly intended to be children's museum. And the only reason they would have been trained that way is if there had been some kind of incident, either at that museum or another in the area, in which children had run afoul of such evildoers.

The fact that we paid cash probably didn't help.

Anyway, it's a bit of a sad commentary on our times that people have to think about these things. But what do I know? It might have been something else entirely. Maybe the lady was taking night classes to become a bartender, and she wanted to see what a real California driver's license looked like. Maybe the locals just don't like us blue-staters. It could be anything!

~CKL

Heat!

The new places have been hot lately. I can tell by the windows. If the windows are hot, even when the sun isn't shining, it's a hot place! Atlanta, Orlando and Charlotte are all hot places.

Atlanta and here (Charlotte) have animals to look at. Orlando is wet, so the humans were damp and especially fragrant. They would come into the mini-house, strip off all their clothes and leave them in a pile. Bayla and I would come and roll in the pile later, so we could soak up the interesting smells!

I hoped that the humans would see animals in Orlando too, but they just rolled in grasses and were around lots of other humans. No animals there, I guess, unless you count the noisy dogs at the hotel!

The grass smell made me wish they would bring me grass for eating, like they used to. And they got some for me here! It didn't come with its own pot, but I don't mind eating grass while they hold it for me.