Microstory 2150: Phone Calls in Jail

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I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but I have some things to think about now. When you start reaching an audience of a million on this platform, it starts looking like you can focus on that fulltime, and not have to worry about any other job. If I were to push myself towards multimedia content, endorsements, and even public events, I would be at the point where I not only could quit my job without suffering, but also should, since it would free up my time for those other pursuits. I’m still working on that partnership I told you about not too long ago, but I remain reluctant to branch out into other types of content, and I don’t really want to make public appearances. Someone once told me that I have a face for radio...and a voice for print. It was mean, but they’re right. Even without all that, if my readership keeps growing, I may be able to quit anyway. I didn’t even say that during my interview for this job. My interviewer brought it up unprompted, acknowledging that I may not exactly be destined to retire from there. Now, I’ve not made any decisions yet, but it’s definitely becoming an option, which I know could be weird for you, since you still don’t even have a clue what I do for a living, let alone who specifically I work for. The great thing about quitting a job for a form of self-employment is that I can take my time with it. If I were to transition over to somewhere else, I would want to do it within two weeks. That’s standard practice in this country, and beyond. But here, I can hold off, and wait for them to find my replacement, and perhaps even train them. Not forever, mind you, but longer. I’m sure I’ll be getting a call from my boss as soon as this installment posts, but I’ll be in jail by then, so I will not be able to answer. There is a way to take phone calls in jail, but it doesn’t happen all that much, because we’re all only in there for a couple days at a time. And other people have families that they want to stay in contact with, so I wouldn’t want to take any time away from them. I’m alone whether I’m in there, or out here. Maybe I should get a pet. Now that I’ve made friends with my neighbor, I might be able to leave on the weekends without worrying. That’s yet another thing that I need to be considering, but I’ll put it on the backburner.

Microstory 1852: No Friends

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My dog and I were born on the same day. He was one of the first faces I saw when my parents brought me home from the hospital. Their neighbors didn’t realize that the dog they adopted was pregnant, so they needed people to take in the pups. Frankenstein and I grew up together. There are tons of photographs of the two of us snuggling together in a shared crib. Back then, there wasn’t anything you could do with the photos you took except put them in a physical album in case company came by, and asked—or agreed—to look at them. I was really attached to Frankenstein. I always considered him to be my brother, and I didn’t really have friends beyond him. It probably didn’t occur to me that we weren’t actually related until I was much older. I think I recall asking why we didn’t look alike. My older human brother just laughed, because he thought I was a dummy. He confirmed that I didn’t make up this story once we were well into adulthood, and expressed regret at laughing at me, and just in general mocking my relationship with Frankenstein. As you can imagine, I didn’t take it very well when he died. It’s the cruelest thing God did, making humans live so long, and our pets live so short. That didn’t make any sense to me, and I struggled with my faith a lot after it happened. My parents were concerned, but they didn’t want to be overbearing, so they let me tread my own spiritual path, knowing that it could lead me into atheism. That’s precisely what it did. I decided that it was the only explanation for my pain, and for the pain of so many others. Either God exists, and he’s evil, or he doesn’t. I would much rather it be the latter. The former is such a horrifying prospect. I can’t believe people live their lives under such obvious oppression. My family didn’t disown me, but we did drift apart.

I had to forge a new family with the people that I met along the way. I sort of collected them from the various groups that I was a part of. One guy was on the football team with me. We were drawn to each other, because we both enjoyed the sport, but we weren’t passionate about it. We taught each other that that was okay. I met a girl in one of my classes that I got along with real well. She didn’t know the footballer, in case you’re wondering. Lots of people play sports for their schools, but for us, it was a separate thing. I had a part time job at the grocery store, where I hung out with another guy. I met a cool girl in college. It was about two hours from home, so it was hard to stay in contact with the others. Once I graduated, and started working full time, I strengthened my connection to my old friends, and built some new ones, but eventually realized that after all this time, they still didn’t know each other. That had to be remedied. I decided to organize my own birthday party, even though I hadn’t really celebrated it before. It was just an excuse for them to finally meet. These were the most important people in my life; it was ridiculous that they weren’t friends with each other. It didn’t go well. Politics, religion, general personalities; everything clashed. They tried, they really tried. None of them went into that dinner with the intention of hating the others, but things just kept getting worse. If two of them agreed on something, another disagreed so adamantly that it overshadowed that whole part of the conversation. For the next few months, we continued to try finding some common ground, but never could. I then tried going back to just keeping them separate, but that no longer worked. I drifted from them too, and I haven’t had a friend in decades. Isn’t that just the saddest story you’ve ever heard?

Microstory 1847: First Husband

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Let me preface this by saying that I’m not a slut. I try to tell people how I met my first husband, and they get hung up on the first part of it, which sort of throws off the flow of the rest of the story. Did I have relationships prior to him? Yes. Did I have relationships after him? Yes. I would ask that you kindly hold all questions until the end. I would rather just not bring it up at all, but it’s kind of important, because you’ll otherwise wonder what I was doing in that hallway in the first place. So. I don’t remember the guy’s name. It was Brad, or Gad, or something dumb like that. He had to go to class, but he said it was cool if I slept there. I knew it wasn’t going anywhere, but I’m really bad about waking up, so I took him up on his offer, and stuck around for the next couple of hours. When I was finally ready to go, I stepped out of the door at the same time as the guy across the hall. We smiled politely—I recall it being quite obvious what I was doing there, but also how totally nonjudgmental he was about it. We kind of had this moment when we didn’t quite realize how hard it was going to be to get down the hallway at the same time. We happened to be moving at the same pace, so right there, I would say it already would have been a meet-cute. Except, like I said, I wasn’t ever going to see the other guy again, so maybe we wouldn’t have even exchanged information. We certainly had time, though, after the next development. We both froze when we saw the same thing. There was a giant snake in the middle of the hall, blocking our way. I don’t know what kind it was, but it was one of the ones that wraps itself around its victims, instead of biting them. Or maybe it bites them too. Or maybe they all bite; I don’t know. I’m just saying it was freakin’ huge. It was surely someone’s pet that got loose and got lost. So we probably weren’t in too much danger, but neither of us knew one way or the other.

The only safe way to react was to get ourselves on the other side of a door. I remember thinking days later how strange it was that there wasn’t an emergency stairwell at the end of the hallway. It just ended at someone else’s room, and I don’t think he was there at the time. Neither was the dude I had just spent the night with, and the locks were the kind that automatically pop into place when you close the door, key or no, so I couldn’t get back in. Being the gentleman that he always was, my future husband, of course, let me sit in his room. You might ask why we didn’t try to call for help, but first, yelling down the hallway seemed counterproductive, because what if that freaked the snake out? He seemed pretty chill, but again, we couldn’t know that. Secondly, this was the early eighties. Lots of dorms installed phone lines in individual dorm rooms by then, but not all of them shelled out the money for it, and my school really wanted to budget for academics. I admired that back then, and I still admire it now. We generally didn’t need phones. The payphone by the front desk was good enough for the era, because most hallways weren’t infested with snakes. We got to talking, and found out what we had in common, and what we didn’t. It was nearly an hour before we heard a commotion outside. A couple of guys were a lot less nervous about it than we were. They picked it up, and carried it up to the third floor together. Evidently, they knew who it belonged to. And us? Well, as you know, we eventually got married. He will always be my first love, and if there’s an afterlife, I honestly hope we meet again, because I know that he and my second husband would get along so great.

Microstory 1711: Giorgia Giraffe

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Dear City Council,

I have a pet giraffe. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s a cousin to the giraffe, but it just looks like a baby giraffe. It’s even smaller than a dwarf giraffe—closer to the size of a large dog—and as far as I know, it’s the only one of its kind. I don’t know where she came from. She just wandered into my backyard one day and started drinking out of the birdbath. I thought about contacting the authorities about her, but I grew too attached in only the few short hours since we met. She seemed to grow attached to me too. She kept following me around the yard. I tried to look up what kind of leaves giraffes eat, but the internet listed all these trees I had never heard of, and they didn’t appear to be native to North America. She took a liking to bamboo leaves, so that’s what I’ve been feeding her all this time. I have a little naturally grown ceilingless hut up against the fence. All I did was plant bamboo in the shape of four walls, and it gives me this private little area where I can go to enjoy nature. I have an outdoor television in there, and a minifridge for snacks and water. I even buried the extension cord inside some PVC pipe to protect it from damage. It’s a pretty sweet setup, and I spend most of my time there, especially since the pandemic allowed me to work from home. It wasn’t originally designed to accommodate a tiny giraffe, so I cut down some of the bamboo, and planted more to make it bigger. This is where Giorgia sleeps. I bought a smartspeaker so she can listen to sounds of the jungle all night long, and she loves it. She loves me, and I love her.

The neighborhood kids like to come over and play with her, but she has a tough time with crowds, so I limit visits with a schedule so it doesn’t stress her out. Most people are overjoyed to see her, but not everyone is happy that I have a mini giraffe. Five blocks down—which no one in their right mind would call part of the same neighborhood—lives a middle-aged grump who stopped working when he started to receive disability checks, along with a settlement he won in civil court. He has nothing better to do with his time than complain about his neighbors. If the people on his street don’t have each blade of grass cut to an untenable range of length, he puts up a stink. I’m sure you have all noticed how annoying he is. I was able to keep Giorgia off of his radar for a good long while, but he’s recently learned of her, and now he can’t let go. Animal control came by last week to investigate, and a few days later, a decision was made to remove the animal from my property, and lock her up in a cold and heartless cage. I always knew it was illegal to keep a wild animal at my house, but I don’t think she qualifies. She’s gentle, trained, and not doing anyone any harm. I beg you to return Giorgia to me. The city had no right to take her from her loving home. There must be better things that you can be doing with your time than harassing a law-abiding citizen, and traumatizing an innocent creature. Attached is a petition to #BringGiorgiaHome, signed by over 300 of my closest friends, who all believe that she is better off with me than in some laboratory.

Thank you,

Sir Niall Muller Jr.

Microstory 1639: Smart Plants

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Aliens are rare. They exist for a few different reasons, the main one being that they were genetically engineered from humans, or evolved from a branch of genetically engineered humans. Or they were humans raised on something called a source variant, which basically means that something in the way they were developed—with every intention of keeping them human—altered them enough to make them a different species. Radiation is often a factor. There’s one other method of creating a non-human intelligent species, and it goes back to a multiversal maxim which states that God is human, and therefore God’s godlings are also human. This is vague, and doesn’t explain anything, so I’ll break it down. My people and I come from a god, who houses us in a special subdimension in his soul. But that god also has his own god, and he’s housed in her soul, and so is everyone else in my god’s universe. So too do they have their own godlings, running around, being human. Nothing can evolve that isn’t technically human, because they are all ultimately sourced from one theoretical universe that stands above all others. The people in this universe have no god, so they are not godlings; only gods. And from them, we all come into being. That doesn’t mean there aren’t other lifeforms; just not ones that are sufficiently evolved. These other lifeforms are often known as pets, and if one forms a strong enough bond with its human, it actually has an impact on the genetic evolution of the godlings that belong to that person. That’s what sometimes results in an alien species that is not very human. Something different has been introduced into the system. On at least one occasion, a God actually bonded with a plant, and ended up creating plant-based godlings in their subdimensional soul. So they’re aliens, and they’re not fully human, but they have to be a little human, because we’re the only species with complex souls, as opposed to the simplex souls that animals have, as well as apparently, this plant. The plant in the higher universe will not create godlings on its own.

This doesn’t mean that the hyperintelligent plant species will suddenly spring into existence either. Evolution still takes place, no matter what. It usually follows an inevitable path that will eventually lead to a version of humans, but even with this exception, it still has to follow evolutionary logic, or it won’t happen. Evolution takes place over the course of billions of years, and that remains true for Sapioplantaverse, so I’ll just go over the highlights. There was a species of plant that lived on a planet in the Milky Way galaxy. This plant struggled to perform photosynthesis, and get enough energy to survive. Trees towered above them, and blocked much of the sunlight, but it wasn’t just the lack of light itself. It takes a lot of energy to create the components necessary for photosynthesis in the first place. It’s a cycle, where the sunlight powers the plant, which allows it to build itself up, and gather more sunlight...to power the plant. This cycle was strenuous, and taxing, so this plant evolved to lower the cost of energy. It did this by eating nearby plants, and stealing their photosynthetic pigments. The individual plants who were better at leaning towards these prey plants were better at surviving, for they were able to steal more pigment. The leaners slowly got even better at this when they figured out how to uproot themselves, inch closer to their prey, and reroot themselves at this new location. Their descendants became better and better at this, until they were pretty much walking. Then eventually, they were walking. The rerooting process became so quick that they essentially had legs, and from there, the evolution was obvious. The mobile plants were able to move to areas of stronger sunlight, and better nutrients, making them larger, and stronger. The better the individual’s external sensors were, the better it was at detecting where it was going, and overcoming obstacles, so that genetic trait was passed down to its descendants. This led to them evolving eyes, noses, and appendages. They developed knees to move faster, tongues to gather nutrients more efficiently, and brains to navigate easier. After a whole lot of time, they attained human level intelligence, which made them just as skillful, and fully capable of conquering their world.

Microstory 1587: Nonstop

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Prompt

I found a treadmill on the side of the road, and started using it the next day. I could literally see the fat dripping off of my stomach as I was running.

Botner

A dude riding a bike passed me, looked at me, and said, “if you’re on there, you must be a junkie, you can’t be running.” Unfortunately, it took two months of running on that treadmill before my body could actually move again. I was basically incapacitated. I was barely able to stand or walk. But every time I went to the store, or a restaurant, I told people I was a military veteran. That was all I could remember—how to tell people I was in the military and that I had been hurt. People told me I needed to go to the VA for help, and I thought they were right. They were asking me if I was drunk, which at the time I was not. When I went to the VA, they said, “Well, we can’t give you any drugs because you haven’t been diagnosed. You just had your wrist blown off. But if you stop taking the treadmill, you’ll die.” They didn’t know what was going on with my brain. They were just looking at me like, “you’re scaring us. You need to get off of this machine.” That was the most dehumanizing...

Conclusion

...experience of my life, and I felt like crap for lying to people. I had never heard of stolen valor before, but I knew the whole time that it was wrong. I stopped telling the lie, but that wasn’t my most pressing problem. If I spend more than two days off of this treadmill, the fat I lost starts coming back. It comes back fast, like the frost on a windshield when the heater doesn’t work, and all you have is wiper fluid. It doesn’t stop either. When I first tried to take a break, I gained even more weight than I had when I started using the damn thing. Who would do this to me? Who would leave this cursed treadmill out there for anyone to pick up, knowing what it would do? I learn to run twice a day, just to be safe. I don’t have to run several miles, or anything, but I can’t leave it be for too long. It’s like the machine is a pet, and requires frequent attention, or it’ll start chewing up my shoes. I wish that those were the consequences. I would take a closet full of destroyed shoes over this nonstop life of running. The dude on the bike rides back up to my garage during my workout one day. “There’s a way to stop this from happening, you know. You can even keep all that fat off. All you have to do is give the treadmill to someone else.” What is he, the girl from The Ring? No, I’m not doing that, I’m not subjecting someone else to this horror. It ends here. It ends with me. But I’m not running anymore either. I take the treadmill out to the middle of an empty field, douse it with lighter fluid, and set the wretched thing on fire. I hope that ends the curse, but if it doesn’t, at least it won’t be able to hurt anyone else. The next day, the fat starts to return again, and it doesn’t stop. At my peak, I weigh 1,500 pounds. But then a funny thing happens. I start losing the weight again. It just rolls off me, and I have to take it out with the garbage. I’m happy for a while, satisfied that I broke the curse, but then I start to wonder if I did. Maybe the treadmill can’t be destroyed, and some other poor schmuck just happened to find it out in that field.

Microstory 1569: Killer Katz

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Prompt

Ever since all of the cats started deliberately killing the humans, I’ve been saving up for a boat, since cats hate water.

Botner

And I finally got one, so I’m very happy and I want to sail. I have a rule that if any other person should read this, they will have a legitimate claim for sole ownership of my blog; as I cannot control other people. The guest, however, claims that they found this post, and they were so amused and amused they decided to check to make sure the ID was legit. If so, I’d like to give a heartfelt thanks. A big red heart to go with it. It’s very warming. I’m amused. This post reminded me a lot of something that happened to my sisters and me when we were very young. We got a kitten when we were maybe two or three. We were out with our family for my grandmother’s birthday. This was before we could actually read, but we were very good at mimicry and my aunt, my dad’s sister, was babysitting us and brought the kitten into the living room for us to see. My sisters and I climbed onto her lap, and when we saw the kitten, we all said “Oh, kitty, kitty, kitty.” She understood what we were saying, and she said “Kitty is a boy cat,” which was very funny to us, since we had thought kitties were a girl cat. We didn't quite grasp that we were actually saying that kitties were also...

Conclusion

...a genderless species. We didn’t understand back then, about gender, and sex, and sexuality, and identity. We had to learn these things as we grew older, which takes time, and time is something we no longer have. I’ve sailed my boat into the middle of the ocean. I don’t want to find an island that’s too close to the mainland, because the cats could continue to evolve. They could develop opposable thumbs, and then they could sail as well. My family wanted me to fight, but I won’t do it. The cats are going to win, because they now literally have nine lives, and they’ve been watching us for thousands of years. We’ve been completely ignorant about their intelligence, and they’ve used that to their advantage. They weren’t just learning our behaviors and weaknesses either. They were around when we were punching in our safe codes, and hiding our keys under the planter. They’re gonna win, and I’m gonna be far from all the destruction. If they ever do find me, it won’t be for a very long time, and hopefully they won’t worry about what I’m doing, because they will have totally taken over the world by then. I anchor my boat, and paddle to the shore of the island. There’s no sign that this has ever been inhabited. It’s small, but it will have plenty to sustain me alone. I smile as I’m breathing in the fresh air. I didn’t abandon my family. They refused to come with. If anything, they abandoned me. I have no guilt about doing what I must to survive. I walk up the beach, and head for the treeline, but I stop when I see something out of the corner of my eye. It’s a panther, or something. We stare at each other for over a minute, and then I swear to God, it grins. More panthers, and other large cats, come out of the jungle.

Microstory 1568: By a Dog

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Prompt

Because of my horrible allergies, I have a poor sense of smell, but I can smell poop and popcorn, and I can’t tell the difference.

Botner

I thought there was popcorn in the seat of the grocery cart, but then I didn’t smell it. The smell was different, like rotten popcorn, but not quite. The smell disappeared about the same time as the smell of poop. He was leaning forward into the cart so he could see the screen and as soon as he heard me, he tried to hold his finger over his nose. I guess the dogs would be more sensitive to dog farts if they were in the cart with you. I’ve heard that border collies can smell out drugs but I wonder about different breeds. Does it depend on the breed? I was a black lab, lab retriever mix, but probably mixed with some other breed since we got her before we started breeding labs. My parents only got me when they already had three dogs, and I was somewhat self-sufficient. I had a job, but mostly I just kept to myself and did my own thing. I used to follow my parents around and go to their bed when they were asleep. I still do that sometimes, but they let me now. I went with them when they went to visit my granny and the park she lives near. I wanted to go home with them but they wouldn’t let me, so I waited for them at the house. I got my mom’s last bite of chicken. I...

Conclusion

...don’t normally get to eat human food, but they each sneak me some when the other isn’t looking. They don’t know that the other one does this, and think it’s just our little secret. That’s fine with me, I get more chicken this way. My friends around the neighborhood often ask me how my owners are, and what it’s like to be me. In fact, they ask me this question every single time that they see me, because they don’t have much in the way of memory. I don’t know why I’m different than the other dogs; why I’m so much smarter, but it is both a blessing, and a curse. My humans regularly walk around without any clothes on, which makes me uncomfortable. I don’t know why, I’m not wearing clothes either, but I guess my fur makes me feel less self-conscious about it if, at least it would if I were them. I sometimes catch myself dreaming of leaving the house, and going off on my own. I would be able to survive just about anything. It’s only my fingerless paws that would make things problematic. Though, I suppose I could teach the humans I meet to understand me, and help me out when I need it. Why would I do that, though? I love my humans. They give me food and water, a nice place to sleep (even if it’s my bed or cage, instead of theirs), and I don’t get as distracted by the crazy smells all over the yard as my friends do. No, I don’t think I would give up my life for anything, even if I do have a little more potential than the average pup.

Microstory 1364: Budge

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Co-Anchor: Thank you for tuning in this morning. I hope you’re already having a great day. Our first guest lives just outside of Hillside, and she has a special treat for us. Why don’t you introduce yourself, and your little friend?

Budgie Owner: Hello, I’m Budgie Owner, and this is my budgie, Kaleidoscope. I call him Kale for short, though. Say good morning, Kale!

Kale: [...]

Co-Anchor: Aww, is he shy?

Budgie Owner: I guess he is. I’m sorry, he’s not usually like this. Say hi, Kale!

Kale: Hi, Kale!

Budgie Owner: There we go. Good bird, Kale. Here, have a treat.

Kale: Thank you!

Co-Anchor: Aw, that’s adorable. Now, I understand that Kale does a lot more than just say a few words, right?

Budgie Owner: That’s right. I’m a retired engineer, and I rigged my house with a bunch of pulleys, levers, and other simple machines. The mechanisms are really sensitive, and easy to maneuver, so Kale here can actually do a lot of things for me. He can open doors, and crack the window. He can turn off the lights, and even start the coffee before I wake up.

Co-Anchor: And does he? Does he do that unprompted?

Budgie Owner: He has his own little alarm clock next to where he sleeps that chirps at him. It gives him enough time to start my coffee, yes. Don’t worry, though. He’s not my slave. He’s my best friend. I don’t make him do anything that’s too hard for him, or that he doesn’t like.

Co-Anchor: That’s lovely. So, he doesn’t live in a cage?

Budgie Owner: Oh no, birds aren’t meant to live in cages. He flies freely in and out of the house.

Co-Anchor: He always comes back, though, right?

Budgie Owner: Well, when I say he flies out of the house, I really just mean around the house. He doesn’t go exploring in the woods, or anything. There are a lot of predators out there, so neither of us wants him going too far. He just likes to feel the sun in his face sometimes. He always waits for me to open the door for him, and makes sure to stay in my line of sight.

Co-Anchor: I imagine clean up is quite a bit of work, if he can do his business wherever, instead of in a cage.

Budgie Owner: He has a special area for that. I’ve trained him to return to what I call his throne when he needs to do that. He’s very intelligent, as all parakeets are.

Co-Anchor: Are parakeets and budgies the same thing?

Budgie Owner: They are, it’s just a different name. I use them interchangeably.

Co-Anchor: Great. So, you have a demonstration for us?

Budgie Owner: Yes, the station has been kind enough to recreate the bare bones of my living room, and I’m gonna have Kale do a few tricks for you.

Co-Anchor: That’s wonderful. Whenever you’re ready.

Budgie Owner: Okay. I’m setting you down now, Kale. Go ahead. Breezy. Kale, breezy! Breezy!

Co-Anchor: And that’s a codeword?

Budgie Owner: Yes, that’s supposed to prompt him to open the window, to let some air in.

Co-Anchor: Perhaps he knows this isn’t really his house.

Budgie Owner: Oh, he definitely does, but we were just practicing before you went on the air. I’m not sure what’s made him so shy. He loves to perform, even for strangers. I just can’t get him to budge.

Co-Anchor: Ah, budge. I get it. Well, we’re going to go to a commercial break, and when we come back, I’m sure Kale will be more than ready to show us what he’s made of.

Microstory 1316: Wags For Days

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Local Anchor: That’s right, Co-anchor. Some of those dancers probably do have children of their own, who would enjoy it just as much. Well, it may not be as controversial as a park being built next to a strip club, but a new planned development in Twin Hillside has caused quite a stir. Local Reporter has more on the story.

Local Reporter: Thank you, Local Anchor. It’s called Wags for Days, and it’s a new pet care facility that does not yet exist, and if some of the neighbors have anything to say about it, it may never.

Local Anchor: Oh, that sounds interesting.

Local Reporter: Pet Expert was smiling on his way from the bank, where he managed to secure a big enough loan to found his own animal boarding-slash-groomer spot, but things quickly took a dark turn when he continued the process, and found himself butting heads with people he hoped would be his neighbors. They didn’t want him there, and at first, he didn’t understand why. For more, I’ve found a few residents who have a few things to say about Pet Expert, and his plans for Twin Hillside. Hello, and what’s your name?

Angry Resident: Hi. I’m Angry, and I’m angry. Pet Expert thinks he can come in here and ruin our quiet little neighborhood, but he doesn’t know who he’s messin’ with. We’re gonna fight back, and we’re gonna win.

Local Reporter: What exactly are you worried is going to happen if Pet Expert succeeds in his plans?

Angry Resident: He won’t! We’re gonna fight back!

Local Reporter: Right, but why are you fighting? What do you not like about Pet Expert’s plan?

Angry Resident: We’re upset about the noises.

Local Reporter: You mean you think the pets, particularly the dogs, will bark too much.

Angry Resident: Yeah, that’s it.

Local Reporter: Have you read Pet Expert’s proposal?

Angry Resident: Why would I do that? We’re gonna fight back!

Local Reporter: Yes, you’ve said that. What if I told you that Pet Expert’s development plan includes a soundproof simulated outdoor area where the dogs can do their business, and see the sun?

Angry Resident: Uh...what?

Local Reporter: The dogs won’t ever be outside. You shouldn’t be able to hear much barking.

Angry Resident: We still don’t want it, and we’re gon—

Local Reporter: Okay, thank you, Angry Resident. Let’s talk to someone else. What about you? Are you aware that you shouldn’t have to hear too much barking when this development goes up?

Annoying Resident: I don’t care about that. I got seven dogs myself, and my neighbor’s got pet squirrels, so my dogs don’t ever stop barking.

Nasty Resident: It’s true, it’s really annoying!

Annoying Resident: Shut up, Nasty! Your leaves fell on my lawn again!

Nasty Resident: I can’t control where the leaves fall! The wind takes ‘em!

Annoying Resident: Oh, you listen here, buddy!

Nasty Resident: Ya know, she only doesn’t want Wags for Days, because she’s trying to start her own doggy daycare place.

Annoying Resident: I’m not trying to start; it’s already started, I just can’t find any customers.

Nasty Resident: Gee, I can’t figure out why.

Local Reporter: And what about you, Nasty Resident? Why do you not want Wags for Days to be approved?

Nasty Resident: I ain’t got no problem with Wags for Days. I got a problem with Pet Expert.

Local Reporter: And why’s that?”

Nasty Resident: I heard he’s a homo.

Local Reporter: Okay, thank you, everybody. Please remember this is live. For ZZZZ News, this is Local Reporter, keeping you updated on everything you care about. Back to you, Local Anchor.

Local Anchor: Thank you, Local Reporter. Well, it may not be as divisive as a new pet care facility, but diners at a certain fast food restaurant are protesting its new menu, claiming its new Vietnamese owner might be feeding them dogs. In related news, I took a job in Kansas City.

Microstory 1270: The Bird and the Cat

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When a cat’s owner first brought home a new pet bird, the cat was hungry. He eyed the bird up in her cage, and dreamed of chomping down on her meat. The bird showed no fear, but did not antagonize the cat either. Over time, the bird and the cat became friends. The cat always had plenty of food to eat, and there was no need for them to be enemies. She would sing him sweet songs, and he would tell her fun stories. The cunning cat even figured out how to open the bird’s cage, so she could fly free when their owner was not home. One night, the owner left some chestnuts to roast under the fire. “Oh, how we would like those chestnuts,” tweeted the bird.

“They would be mighty tasty,” purred the cat. “But we could never get them.”

“You could,” the bird said to him. “You are quick and sly. Pull them out one at a time.”

“They are too hard for my teeth,” the cat lamented. “The owner cracks them open for me, and lets me have a little every year.”

“If you get us the chestnuts,” suggested the bird, “I will crack them open for us.”

“You promise to share?” the cat asked.

“I promise,” said the bird.

And so the cat reached into the fire, and retrieved the savory nuts with his fast paws. As he did this, the bird cracked them open with her mighty beak. All told, they were able to secure nearly two dozen chestnuts between the two of them! The bird ate eleven, and the cat ate eleven. They then buried the remaining nut into the rug, hoping to spring a new chestnut tree, because they were animals, and they didn’t know any better. But they were full animals, and happy, and together.

This story was inspired by, and revised from, an Aesop Fable called The Monkey and the Cat.