Over the past few weeks, I have talked to Pigs, Sheep, Chickens, Cows and a water skiing Squirrel.  You could say I have become a close friend of the animal race.  Well, as of today, I am now the proud owner of a Jack Russell Terrier named Terrance.  Here is a picture of him before he was placed in my custody.

Terrance was supposed to be taken care of my my 7 year old.  Elizabeth has quite the collection of Webkinz and just HAD to have this one.  She has like 8o of them and knows each of there names and when she got them.  She even has her own Hallmark card so she can get discounts and all sorts of reward points etc.   I can’t tell you how many times my home computer has crashed from her “taking care of them” online.  Anyway, I digress…..

On Monday night, she was given Terrance.  She was so excited and had to hold him and pet him and just love him.  She is quite the caretaker of her Webkinz and just wants to be a great mother to all of them.  But Monday night, there was a little accident.  And now, Terrance is not the same little Jack Russell that he once was.

Little Elizabeth was done playing with Terrance and decided to play with something else that caught her eye…the Wii.  She quickly went to the doorway that connects my living room to the kitchen to “toss” Terrance onto the kitchen table where his bag was.  She didn’t look 1st and just gave him a loving little toss up in the air…confident that he would hit the table softly and be ok.   Well, sadly, Terrance was not ok.  He caught on fire.

My daughter yelled right away for me to come out there and help her.  She said he was on fire and started to cry.  I jumped right up from my laptop and ran to the kitchen.  Sure enough, Terrance was on fire along with his plastic bag!  I guess when she tossed him to the table she forgot there was a small candle lit (you know, one of those silly ones that are supposed to smell like apple pie but smell more like old lady perfume) and Terrance ended up in it and somehow his plastic bag came along for the ride!

I sucked up a ton of air like I was the big bad wolf blowing the 3 little piggies house down and almost blew the whole thing out in 1 try.  I was able to put out the fire on Terrance and the plastic melting bag and get everything under control.  Thankfully I always paid attention to McGruff the crime dog growing up when he would visit me at Spaulding Elementary School in Townsend.  I don’t really know what that has to do with this, but I feel like giving him some credit.  Anyway…..

So at this point, my daughter is crying, the dog is torched on the side of his head and I am getting some odd contact high and a headache from the smell of the melted plastic bag.  I tried to calm her down and tell her it was OK, but she was very concerned for Terrance and felt like she hurt her Webkin and was to blame.  I told her it was not her fault and that he was OK.  She was not buying my reasoning and pointed out the burn on him and that he was clearly not OK.  She must have cried for 2 hours about it.  I felt so bad for her and Terrance.

After she calmed down, it turned out that while she did have some concern for her torched little Terrance, she really wanted to make sure his ID tag was in good shape so she could register him and play with him online.  Once she realized that was in great shape, she was much better.

So here we are on Wednesday and Terrance is here in my office.  I thought it would be good to get him out of the house so she didn’t have to look at him and feel bad anymore.  I have decided to take him in and let him live here in my office where he can get top notch care.  I have a nice refrigerator with plenty of spring water and diet coke for him to drink, a leather couch he can nap on (when I’m not that is), cool A/C to keep him comfortable and lots of people that come by that can keep him company.

So there you have it.  That is the story of Terrance and his rough week.  I’m sure this was not what he envisioned as he made his way from China and the factory he was born in, surviving potential Pirate attacks on the cargo vessel he was shipped here on and coming to live at my house, but it will be OK and he will still have a productive life here in my office and online with Elizabeth where he will be safe from fire and harm (well, as long as she remembers to feed the online version of Terrance…which I still do not fully understand).

Oh, and needless to say, no more candles on my kitchen table!