Pets and Phobia

When Foal was about 2 years old, Dad came up with a brilliant idea. The boys needed a pet.

The first problem was (and still is) that we rent and it can be really tricky to find rental properties that allow pets. Children – yes, but pets – no. Go figure…

The second problem was what sort of pet should we get. I’m more a cat person and Dad is more a dog person. I don’t like birds in cages and I do not want a hand-reared bird wandering all over the house leaving a mess behind it. We had already tried the fish tank experience and that can get really expensive when the stupid things keep eating the plant life. What’s even worse is that they die easily. If you so much as look at them funny, they roll over and play dead - except they do it for real.

Dad decided we should get some mice. Never mind the fact that we had just recently spent a few dollars on mouse traps to remove the ones that had wandered in on a cold night and decided to stay. As Pup says, Anywho…

I agreed to have a look at the rodents and we popped into a pet shop. I became rapidly bored at looking at all the ‘mouse accessories’. Who knew they needed so much stuff? I could hear puppies barking and kittens mewing and thought it might be a good experience for Foal to see them. And so I maneuvered him, and his stroller, towards the sounds.

Then, I looked up and spotted a giant rock python behind glass. That was when I ran screaming from the pet store. Leaving Foal abandoned in his stroller to fend for himself.

Dad followed fairly quickly. At least he had the hindsight to rescue the child. He was extremely embarrassed by my ‘display’ and asked if I’d heard the shop attendant yelling, “It’s not real!”

My main question then, was if the “Rock Python” was not real, why was it behind glass?

The only funny thing about that whole incident, was that it truly was a “Rock Python”.