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So Many Peteys

I am known to have bizarrely detailed yet bizarrely unrealistic dreams. This one is absolutely begging to be blogged about.

I go to clean Petey's cage, but Petey looks smaller than usual. Then I notice he has a different pattern on his back than before. I'm super confused. Then upon closer inspection, I realize that's not Petey at all, it's a younger crested gecko and oh my god, his cage is full of little crested geckos from the size of pinhead crickets to almost as big as Petey (no part of that makes sense but we're gonna roll with it). Eventually I find Petey too, who jumps into my hand when I call his name (HA!). I surmise that the following has taken place: Petey (now Petrie) has actually been a female the whole time and was gravid when we got her (this much was inspired by true but non-Petey related events). She has been laying eggs under the substrate in her cage this whole time but now they have begun to hatch, judging by the size difference in the little Peteys, five clutches at least (also, either the incubation time on those eggs was really short or I haven't cleaned that cage ever). Anyhow, having solved the mystery, I go to work feverishly cleaning and setting up spare cages so that I can sort out Petrie's brood before the big ones start eating the little ones. I even think to myself, "I'm gonna have to e-mail Valerie and tell her I can't take any of her collared lizards since I will have my hands full." (Aside: In real life there's a lady named Valerie who's going to be shipping me a baby collared lizard sometime very soon.) I've just started setting up the first new cage when I wake up.

In case it wasn't clear, this dream was not a nightmare at all. It was kick ass. It is possibly the best dream I've ever had.

Also, a couple weeks ago, Petey grew up. As in, I Iooked in one day and he was an adult. It was pretty abrupt.

Tiny Cat

Justin's sister, Nicole, got a new cat a few days ago. He's going to keep Simon company after Vilka moves out (we'll be getting a kitty for Vilka too once we move into our new apartment). As is expected, Simon and Vilka spent the first day hissing and spitting at Tiny Cat (formally named Lionel) but by the second day, Simon was more curious than territorial and by today he's letting Tiny Cat chase him all over the apartment. Vilka, however, has not been as quick to warm up to Tiny Cat and Tiny Cat seems to be returning some of her ill will. Today, Vilka was sitting on the floor giving Tiny Cat the eye but being more tolerant of him that she usually is. He walked over a little closer and sat, staring right back at her. Then, without any provocation, Tiny Cat starts hissing at Vilka. Justin and I were bewildered and slightly amused. Vilka considered this for a few minutes and then casually walked up to Tiny Cat, raised one of her paws, and bitch slapped Tiny Cat in his little kitty face about five times before I could get out a startled, "Vilka!" It was really pretty hysterical. When we told Nicole about this later, she said Tiny Cat "shouldn't write any checks his body can't cash."

Circus/Sideshow Miscellania

Audrey fire eating




Ian fire breathing


Audrey doing poi






Justin let his sister pull the sword out of his mouth at Cirque Stupendo. By the way, the show raised over $800 for flood relief so I'd say we did pretty good. Justin's even decided to get everyone together and form a permanent performance troupe.

Petey

Also, I wanted to post this.


Petey is the very cutest Petey ever. I highly recommend the large size. His eyes are amazing.

More Circus Stuff

Justin can sword swallow. It used to freak me out a lot but he's really good at it so I don't worry too much anymore.


Luther is a really, really good juggler. He has a bunch of neat three-ball tricks and he can do them all with an amazing amount of fluidity.


He can even juggle whilst riding a unicycle. For a little while anyway. (Ignore the crappy photo. It's a hard thing to photograph. Also, he only did it for a few minutes.)


Matt's idea of juggling tricks are doing things like feeding Luther a cookie while he and Justin pass. Matt is all sorts of goofy. He will be doing some sort of ventriloquist act for the circus. He will also be performing in the ABBA cover band, BABBA (formerly Swedish Delight).

One of Mirri's friends, Leigh, has taken quite a liking to poi and stuff like that so she's been showing up at practice trying to learn what she can. Last time, Justin showed her a video of Todd Robbins, the guy who inspired Justin's sideshow freak career, eating a light bulb. This was her reaction.



Justin added another act to his routine. He will now be juggling, sword swallowing, performing a human blockhead routine, and doing this hilariously, gross balloon thingy. (The video starts off with the blockhead act which will be helpful for those of you who had no idea what I was talking about.)

Tonight, some people from the Daily Iowan (the Univ. of Iowa's newspaper) came to take pictures and video of Luther and Justin juggling torches and Audrey eating, breathing, and spinning fire. It was kind of neat. The video should be up on their website on Thursday.

Belated photos from my last trip to the Quad Cities

Emma, one of Justin's parents' dogs.


This is all Emma ever wants to do, play fetch.


This just cracks me up.


Bailey and Cinnamon look on as Emma fetches.


Cinnamon and Junior, another one of the farm kitties. Not pictured: Brown Kitty, the farm cat whom I've only ever seen once and only because I surprised her.


Junior was really squinty that morning. Perhaps it was all that damn sun.


Mama Llama and Ande


The rest of these are from Leech Park in Davenport where they are possibly undergoing some sort of biblical plague.


Ducky in Flight. Larger.


Larger. That mallard got really angry that the other duck caught the bread, even after it was all eaten.

I've sort of completely stopped writing more than photo descriptions in here. How about that?

FYI

Last night, Justin slipped on a banana peel.