All Animals Go To Heaven… But First, They Stop By Our Apartment.

#75

Queen E <while walking around the apartment holding the sleeping hamster>: You know Mummy, I think Gemma likes it here. After she dies, she’ll want to come back and live with us again. 

Me: As in Reincarnation, or as in Haunting Our Apartment? <Rockstar snorts from his laptop> D’you think maybe she’ll enjoy Hamster Heaven more?

Queen E: What if they don’t have bedding in Heaven? Our bedding is purple…

Me: They probably don’t have cages in Heaven, she could maybe dig a hole in the wild and sleep in it, just like nature once intended.

Queen E: <frowns>

Me: And snakes go to a different heaven.

Queen E: Oh, alright then. 

——————————————————————————————————–

Queen E: Mum? 

Me: Yes darling?

Queen E: After JD goes to Heaven can we get a Pug?

Rockstar <not looking up from laptop>: I second that.

Me: ?! How come you don’t think JD will want to come back here?

Rockstar: Probably had enough of her <nods at Queen E>. 

Queen E: Yah Mummy hamsters only live for like, 2 years, but JD’s been around a long time.  

Note long-suffering expression of dog.. And yet she continues to sit there…

Queen E: Oh yeah and after Gemma dies can we get a lizard? <mutters> Or snake… I want to try something with scales… but.. I don’t know where they sell snakes…<trails off> 

What are they doing now?

That’s the discarded exoskeleton of a spider – light as air, and about 2inches long, you can even see where it split open so the spider could pull itself out of its outgrown shell… She carried her prize for a good 2km before the wind took it, and she was so upset… Because a nature walk with the Queen often takes several long hours, she has to stop at every web and cocoon and seething mass of insects.

Me: So what, we are just going to have an endless parade of animals going through this apartment?? We give them a good home on the way to Heaven and then go get something else? 

Both kids: Yeah! 

Me: We’ll always be living with hair balls or seeds (Gemma has the charming habit of emptying her pouches everywhere Queen E takes her, so we find seeds among Legos, in dolls houses, in the sofa, among the Nerf guns, in the piano…) and maybe now also… molted skins? And Rockstar, you don’t get to say much, you don’t really entertain the animals that often. (But to be fair he didn’t say anything when the hamster chewed off entire spines of 3 or 4 of his books after Queen E forgot to close the cage one night… and yes, Queen E still faithfully helps with every cage cleaning and water changing)..

Queen E: You have to take care of us anyway, Mum-may – did you know we are a kind of Great Ape? That’s also an animal…

Holy pile of animal facts books

And no kidding. Shissa monkey.

Me: (To Rockstar) How come you didn’t go all Stick Up Your Butt Big Brother at her about the Pug?

Rockstar: DanTDM has Pugs.

Holy fluffy unicorn. (pic from pinterest)

Epilogue:

Me: DanTDM also has multiple piercings and tattoos, did you want those too?

Rockstar: <not looking up from laptop> N-ope, just the pug is fine.