If you looked at the last decade, my home, outside of the city, had a whole army of pets. When I was born we had two dobermans. One was called Mumu, and if I look at my childhood snaps, it seemed I was deeply attached to her (when she died, I remember it was the first time I was explained what that meant), the other was Tan. He was one crazy mutt. My grandfather then went travelling and got us birds. Then one day he got us a parrot that would mumble something, which my brother drove mad. The parrot would sometimes sit on our shoulder and peck our ear lobes, but other times would rip apart the upholstery in the drawing room. The parrot then went so mad that it started mimicking birds that would come around the house in the mornings. We then got two two cats, one was called Cat Stevens, the other Sheru. I don't know about Sheru, but Cat Stevens disappeared for about a year or so, then returned with a litter of kittens and a really ferocious introverted tabby. Then our domestic help one day went to the market and got back with him a few chicks that were in red, blue, yellow and green. He thought they were cute. In a week, the colour had been washed away, and we left them in our garden. When they were mighty cackling hens, they started making a mess and I don't know where they went (we also noticed how they would eat Tan's droppings which was a bit sickening). We then got a stray looking dog (that had the features of a Labrador) from a very decent place. The dog had an unusual habit of opening the washing machine door and pulling the clothes out and dirty them in the mud and then tearing them. We called him Trusty. Trusty also had another habit, he would like to stick his leg out and trip people. He had free access to all our shut doors, because he could open them really well. Sometime later, a friend of ma's took him to keep at her farm.
Now we don't have pets now.
But yesterday Surd Man and Kake got me fish. (I forgot to mention but we also had gold fish, for a very brief time.) But personally, I have never handled fish. I know they are delicate. But I have always been fascinated, and I always fancied the idea of watching them swim around a fish bowl, I was pretty happy. I call them Rolling and Tumbling (from a song).
And my writing is continuing.