Menagerie

The Cameron household features a modest but engaging menagerie of critters.

Her Royal Highness, Nene

The uncontested master of the household is Nene, known variously as Her Royal Highness, The Boss, and in honor of Rumpole, She Who Must Be Obeyed. When crossed, Nene has been known to bite, but never viciously. It is always a disciplinary measure, and is limited to me. If she issues an order to someone else in the house and they don’t hop right to it, she’ll track me down forthwith for the purpose of behavior modification. Her one weakness seems to be cars. When we happen to pull up to the house while she’s outdoors, we’ve learned to drive slowly, since she lunges without thought into the path of the car. Then she chews us out for failing to be present when she was ready to come back indoors.

If Nene is the queen of the house,

The Dark Poodle of the Apocalypse

Jasmine is the princess. Known variously as The Cutest Widdle Wuppy Ever (yes, I actually say that out loud, often in front of others), Dipsy Doodle Poodle (yep, I have said that within earshot of others as well), and the Dark Poodle of the Apocalypse, Jasmine is perhaps even more over-indulged than Nene. In the picture to the left, you can see her with one of her approximately five hundred plush toys. The key to plush toy purchasing for Jasmine is this: if it is available and expensive, we buy it for the dog to chew on. Jasmine has a thing about the faces — poor things never have a face for long. I suppose one might reasonably suggest that Hannibal might be an appropriate nickname for her, but I could never bring myself to call my Widdle Iddle such. Besides, if you’re not a plush toy, the only danger she poses to you is in the form of gleeful licking.