The Cute and Cuddly Beasts Within

First of all, a shout-out to the authors of Troll on a Powerbook and One Among Many, for becoming the fourth and fifth people, respectively, to roll alts on my server to say hello. All of you guys flatter me, really, and I still sort of can't understand it-- I don't find myself very interesting at all, and I'm even less interesting when I'm talking in real-time, because I can be pretty shy. But thank you anyway. I'm quite a lucky hunter. (I'm also getting to be quite the enchanted-out hunter, and thus quite the broke hunter... but that's another story.)

In my recent "essay" on the Beast Mastery spec, Faradhim asked me if I have pets in real life. As a matter of fact... yes I do:


These are my guinea pigs Reno and Vincent. (First person to figure out where their names are from, and then deduce which is which because of it, gets a big ol' cookie. Turns out I name my real-life pets the same way I name my pets in WoW... always a hidden meaning.)

Reno and Vincent have been living with me for the past couple of years. They are intelligent, mischievous, and also possibly the most spoiled guinea pigs on the planet. You see, I work at a pet store. (Yes, that's right, the hunter works at a pet store!) Specifically, I work in the pet care/small animal department. This means that I not only spend most of my time working with and handling fish and small critters, but I also get to stock the shelves in my department with all the new goodies that come in. And the whole time I'm doing it I'm thinking "Oh my gosh, they would LOVE this new treat... oooh, and that one too..." and then I come home with a bunch of snacks for them and they don't eat half of it.

At least they've gotten a little less picky lately.

They've caught onto my sleeping schedule and decided that maybe if they start making noise before my alarm goes off, they will get fed earlier. Cue lots of squeaking at 4:30am, every morning. Fortunately I am prepared, with earplugs! Bwahaha.

They have also decided that merely eating their food out of their bowl is not exciting enough, and it's much more fun to eat food off of the floor of their cage. So they wedge their head under the bowl, and then when you least expect it... BAM. Bowl goes flying, food goes flying, and the guinea pigs are happy and Pike has to grab the vacuum again.

I can't help but love them though. And I wouldn't want to get on their bad side... I don't know if I'd want to deal with the wrath of a Big Red Guinea Pig anytime soon.