Relocating the zoo

One of the major bonuses of moving to Canada is that there is no quarantine for your pets. A lot of countries make you put your furry babies in quarantine for up to 7 months, and I'm sorry, but how could you banish these faces for that long?











Note: If you don't think my pets are cute as sin, zip your lip or just lie. White lies are easy and socially acceptable. After all, I've told a lot of parents that their bald, cone-head, forcep-delivery, jaundiced babies are adorable.

So part of the whole preparation phase includes getting all 4 of our pets' injections up to date etc, which is what I spent this morning doing.

This is how it went:

Was wildly optimistic and loaded 2 cats and 2 dogs into the car and pulled off.
Within 2 seconds, ended up with a cat wrapped around my face with its claws embedded in my skull, and a Golden Retriever on my lap.
Reversed and decided optimism was wildly overrated. Popped a few Gavascon, offloaded the 2 cats, and headed to the vet with just the pooches.

It's hard to drive with a 26kg dog on your lap licking your face with the kind of enthusiasm only a puppy can maintain for such a task, but not impossible.
Got to the vet in one piece.

Opened the door and the dogs bounded out, ready for a walk. The bounding lasted thirty seconds until they realized they were at the vet, after which they rolled over, played dead and refused to budge.

Dobby, the Daschund, is 12kgs, so she's easy to carry. Muggle, the large golden one, is not. You can't even drag her when she puts her mind to being contrary.
So with a lot of grunting, groaning, pleading, sweating, pushing, pulling, threatening and swearing, I finally managed to get them inside. Where Muggle made straight for the treats, where she polished off a large amount of the really expensive ones before I could get to her. Revenge is sweet apparently.

An hour later, I was back home to drop off the pooches, pop more Gavascon, load up the kitties (this time in cages), and head out again. Note to self : always take your iPod when traveling with cats, so you don't need to listen to the blood-curdling hissing and yowling. It's like listening to the soundtrack of a particularly violent Kung Fu movie.

When I got back to the vet, I noticed the receptionist checking out my frothing white mouth, wondering if I didn't need a rabies shot. I had to explain about the Gavascon overdose.

Three hours later, covered in scratches, drool and fur (and a lot worse for wear), I'm home with 4 pets who have vaccinations and are ready for the jet setter lifestyle. Is it too early for a vase of wine?




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