Charlie's Friends

Meet Bob, The Cat:

This was a Christmas present to Charlie a few years ago. Don't know why his name is Bob, it just is. He is an outside cat. Charlie always tries to sneak him in the house and no matter how many times I tell her that Bob is an outside cat, Bob is not house trained, Bob will scratch the furniture, Bob has that crazy look on his face and I don't know what he is capable of - she always tries. One of my favorite games is 'Kitty Chucking'. I throw Bob and Charlie jumps in the air to catch him. In an over enthusiastic throw Bob landed on the roof - months ago. It took Hurricane Ike to convince Bob to come down. Charlie is thrilled that Bob has come back since she has only one other friend:

Meet Barney the Dinosaur:

Barney, on the other hand is an indoor pet. I get a perverse satisfaction of watching Charlie chew on him. I blame the media and PBS. Charlie has had Barney since I wrapped him up two years ago at Christmas for Ryan as a joke - I had found it unpacking. As soon as he opened it, Charlie ran over, grabbed it out of Ryan's hands and ran off with it to cuddle somewhere. I often find her on Ryan's bed spooning with Barney - she is the weirdest dog we have had ... Ryan blames me.

The funny part of Charlies relationship with Barney is that she is so gentle with him. She chews on him, but very gently. The rest of her toys (except Bob) have been ripped apart and stuffing strewn about the house - it is kind of creepy. The only 'injury' Barney has is a hole in the knee where he was hit with an arrow.

Yeah, an arrow - before moving to Norway, Gary Ryan and his friend Jordan were playing target practice in the backyard with the crossbow Gary had made (just so you know, there was a field behind our house - so they were not going to kill anyone with a stray arrow). They were looking for a good target to use and Barney seemed a perfect choice to all of us. They strapped Barney up by his arms and legs and went to town (obviously very bad shots) until Jessie came outside and screamed, horrified that they were killing Barney (with that huge mouth he has - it looked less like a friendly smile strapped up there - rather like a scream of horror - or he was smiling and enjoying it, and that is just icky). We took him down and gave him back to her. I packed it up when we moved to Norway and there it stayed until I unpacked after moving into this house.

Oddly, Jessie didn't care about Charlie adopting Barney - I guess she was over him.