“Why mint a ‘trillion dollar’ coin? Wouldn’t a custom ‘trillion dollar’ poker chip do just as well? Or why not just float a ‘trillion dollar’ hot check post-dated a trillion years from now? Why complicate fraud?”
The first time I took her for a walk, when she was but barely weaned, she ate a bug. I regarded that as a salutary accomplishment for a young apex predator, but the lizard was a quantum beyond mere bugs: She saw it, captured it, conquered it and devoured it – very slowly.
My joke now, about food she likes, is that it’s made out of genuine lizard – worth the chewing. Everyone else Miss Chioux knows thinks that a girl dog is a girl, where I know all dogs are dogs. I can make them squeal simply by saying, “Remember: Nothing builds bones like bones.”
There’s more: Tuesday, late afternoon, I took Cleo over to our new place, to start getting her acclimated to it. All transitions are disruptive to toddlers, but gradual transitions become adventures. I had some of her toys there, and the house it empty for now – just another gym to Miss Chioux. The back yard is circumvallated – it has a block wall – so we played outside, too, with her dodge ball and with tennis balls.
But there was (is?) a rabbit trapped in the back yard. Cleo scared it up and the race was on. The bunny was fast, but Miss Chioux is, too. He managed to find a place to hide, but Cleo could not forget him. I took her inside, hoping the rabbit would find a chance to escape. No joy. When we went back out, she scared him up again. One, two, three times around the yard and she had him, pinned to the ground with a mouth full of fur. I pulled her off by her harness or that bunny would have been dinner – to a roly-poly little bloody-faced girl.
I took her back in to what will be my office, but she was crazed, yipping and barking, straining to get back to that rabbit. This went on for a while, and nothing from then on completely distracted her from her unfinished business out back.
The problem for me? I have been amazed at how blank Cleo’s slate is – how little she was prepared by instinct or race-memory for life outside the womb. But here is a case where her instincts told her precisely and perfectly what to do in order to have rabbit for dinner.
Play is combat-training. Empathy – figuring out what the other guy is going to do next – is combat-training. For a yearling dog, running game to ground is the best of both.
In other news:
Redfin.com: Housing Market Update: Homebuyers’ Average Monthly Mortgage Payment Rose $50 in the Last 6 Weeks.
Don Surber: Amazon leaving Seattle.
PJ Media: Moving on Up: LA and Seattle Homeless Will Be Relocated to Taxpayer-Funded Luxury Apartments.
Glenn Greenwald: Democrats and Media Do Not Want to Weaken Facebook, Just Commandeer its Power to Censor.
Kenny Xu: Salvation Army Imposes Racial Wokeness Within Church’s Ranks.
Christopher Rufo: Biden Criminalizes CRT Dissent: The administration has mobilized the FBI against parents who oppose critical race theory.
