Monday 25 June 2012

Childminding, Pet-sitting, And Similar Worries

Once upon a time we had two guinea pigs. Their names were Derek Tidball and David Coffey [long story, don’t ask!] When we went on holiday, our friends looked after them. And when we got home, I telephoned and said “Can we come and collect the pigs?”

copy_guinea_pigs

[these are not our pigs, I cannot seem to find a photo of DT and DC anywhere. These are from here]

“Well, you can collect Derek” said my friend. “And David…?” I asked anxiously. “He’s OK. But he is at the vet’s” It appears that the day before our return [Friday] DC had suffered a minor seizure. Joy had promptly rushed him round to the Vet.

The Vet gave him Vallium [??!!] and suggested that as he did not belong to Joy, she should leave him at the surgery over the weekend till our return. When we got back at 6pm on Saturday, the Surgery was not open to customers again till Monday 9am [although the Vet’s Nurse was obviously inside tending the ‘overnight’ pets] It cost us £28 to retrieve him [Vallium plus 3 nights ‘in care’] Which was six times more than we had paid for him in the first place!

“I wasn’t sure what to do!” said Joy [this was in the days before mobile phones, so she could not contact us to ask our advice] We thanked her, and said this was probably her best course of action. [But back in 1992, £28 was an awful lot of money for us – especially just after a holiday]

Facebook:Pet Sitting is a huge responsibility. Everyone has an anecdote. Similarly child minding, and plant watering***. But I have now found a new, scary responsibility – Blog Minding!  Kristin and Twinkle Twinkle is hosting a Blog Fest called Summer of Color.

I am not involved in it. But my friend Fishcake at FHMH is participating. And she is on holiday this week. So I must remember that later this morning I sign up to the Mr Linky to ensure that F’s charming embroidery is registered.[Especially has F has mentioned on her blog that she has appointed me to this task]icecreams

I shall have to leave post-it notes all over the house so I do not forget.

[***never, ever ask me to water your plants. They will die. Either I’ll forget completely and they will dehydrate or I will operate the once only-total immersion- Baptist approach, and drown them!]

6 comments:

  1. That is a worrying responsibilty!

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  2. Oh the responsibility. I couldn't manage any of the above!

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  3. Perhaps instead of people offering a pet sitting service, there should be a life sitting service. Where the employed person tends to every aspect of their life. Answers emails, walks pets, records programmes, waters plants etc. I think I have just come up with a great business idea!

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  4. Mr Linky safely negotiated. Now I can relax...

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  5. We had a sad guinea pig experience. When we got home from a four week summer camp stint, we called our guinea pig minder and she said, "Dave is dead." (Our son had named him after a friend) Yikes!
    I'm sort of a worry wart when it comes to responsibility. I think I inherited this from my mother.
    I'm glad you've checked Mr. Linky off your to do list now!

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  6. I'll bet you checked Mr Linky three times to ensure the link was there!!
    Jane x

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