I have a lot to post about, but I’ve been busy, so I’ve been putting it off. However, tonight I have overcome… only to bring you this:

Do you know what this is?

Lacy and Que do. They already met The Pupae. If I recall correctly, when they figured out what was occupying the mason jar lid on my kitchen counter, screams ensued.

Tonight, I screamed, too. Why? Because one of those cocoons is empty.

Backstory: A few weeks ago, my mom plucked two big, juicy, green caterpillars off of her moonflower plant; they were eating it alive. She put them in a jar and figured they’d die. We thought one died for sure, then maybe the other had died. But… they kept moving. Caterpillars are resilient creatures! They kept living. Then, they turned brown and we thought for sure they’d died. But no, Mom dumped them out of the jar and they wiggled around in their new brown cases, looking strangely like they should be hanging from trees. They actually moved when provoked for several days (as [Que|que] discovered). But, after quite a while of just sitting there in their cocoons, I knew for sure they’d died. Much like posting on Pleonast, I was procrastinating taking their picture. And as tonight proves, I waited an hour too late.

Just a little while ago, I was downstairs looking at the pupae! I even prodded one looking for movement! Then, I came downstairs to get some dessert… and one was open.

Not only was it open…

…but there was goo on the counter, and the floor…

So I called my Mom, “Mom! The Pupae have hatched! It’s somewhere in the house! This is really creepy!”

“Well, it’s probably a really big moth.”

“Thanks a lot, Mom! I can’t find it! I’ve turned on the kitchen light to maybe draw it - AHHH! There it is!!!”

It doesn’t look that big in the picture, but he’s a good 3 inches or so. Oh man. OH MAN.

After I roped it into a big ol’ tupperware and threw it outside, I didn’t take any chances with the other pupae. It went outside, too.

Gross-o-rama.

As my first-born crab - not really, as he’s smaller than Clem - er, uh, first-acquired, last-born - he’s special to me. And not only because I called him Clementine the first whole day. He’s outgoing, and moves around a lot (in his sweet little pink shell), and is too little to pinch! Not that he would want to. Naming him took a while because I wanted it to be something big and meaningful. I was clinging to Castro for a while. There’s something funny about a tiny pink crab named Castro. Anyway, there was a vote for Otto, because it sounds like a crazy old man’s name (and he’s a hobbly crab?). But, as I love Harry Potter, Aberforth won out. (You know, Dumbledore’s even crazier brother.) All three names are a little nutty, to be honest. And in honor of Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, I’ve decided to combine and dub my crab Otto Aberforth Filius Castro. Yeah, I threw Filius in there just for fun.

And it wasn’t long before Aberforth was living up to his legacy-of-crazies name.

You must know, the first thing he does when I put him down anywhere is run.

And he’s fast.

More fast than I imagined a tiny little crab could be. Especially considering I could put Clementine down on the floor for an hour and she wouldn’t move. In fact, any time she senses I’m even looking in her direction, she pops back in her shell. Anyway - so considering he’s a quarter size crab, I thought I’d be safe to leave him in my room in order to take Clementine into the bathroom to lure her out of her hidey hole. But, when I came back, Aberforth was not where I left him. In fact, he was not even in the direction of where I left him. I called my brother in, and we searched… As a last resort, I looked in my closet.

At least he has good taste.

But that’s not all! Not 30 minutes later, I thought I could leave him on the floor of my bathroom while I went to get some filtered water. I even closed the door! Apparently he can fit under the crack, as he was nowhere to be found when I returned. I searched everywhere. I even put my boots in the middle of the bathroom floor just in case. Then, just as I resigned myself to having to tell my mother I’d lost a crab in her house and we’d probably find it dead in two weeks… my brother, who lives alllll the way down the hall, came up to me, dumped the crab in my hand and said, “Keep this thing in its cage.”

Oops.

How did he get all the way over there!!

It’s been five years since my last venture into pet ownership came to a sudden halt. You know, that time when I went on a vacation with extended family, and they all thought I’d taken my dog to be boarded, but really I took her to be put down; and then I let y’all talk bad about her the whole first part of that trip before I said anything? Yeah, that pet.

After that, I’ve been biding my time. Of course, after hearing about the untimely demise of my own dog, Mom immediately went out and found this thing:

What was she thinking with this hideous mop?? All she does allll daaaay long is sit around and look cute, and whine about how cute she is and how hard her life of table-food and filtered water is. Oh, and she’s spoiled. Have I mentioned that? Anyway, I’m still waiting for her to have some pops so I can have my own mini mop-head.

In the meantime, I have these: Land Hermit Crabs aka Clementine and Aberforth.

What possessed you? people ask me. And then they determine That’s so unlike you, and like you at the same time. You see, there’s always this place in an Earthbound store where they have a giant open-air habitat full of hermit crabs. For years I’ve wanted one. Last year, I even came really close! I did a lot of research and decided they were too much trouble for what I was prepared to do (you know, put out some wee pads, cuddle with a cute furball, and give it a stupid name like Lula Pearl).

But, apparently on August 2, 2008, I forgot why I didn’t get hermit crabs last year. Because I was in Earthbound with my friend Cici when this little girl handed me a crab in a little pink shell, and I took it home with me. After getting home and figuring out that this little guy wasn’t going to be the best candidate for the name Clementine, I went back and got another one.

That’s also how I got the band-aid. Girl crabs are crabby. And that’s not even a joke.