Accidental animal crueltyI once invented a brilliant game - I'd sit at the top of the stairs and throw cat biscuits to the bottom. My cat would eat them, then I'd shake the box, and he would run up the stairs for more biscuits. Then - of course - I'd throw a biscuit back down to the bottom. I kept this going for about half an hour, amused at my little game, and all was fine until the cat vomited. I felt absolutely dreadful.
Have you accidentally been cruel to an animal?
This question has been revived from way, way, way back on the b3ta messageboard when it was all fields round here.
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rob, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 11:13)
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The worst taste in the worldAs a young boy of 9 or 10, I used to get the bus to my local school, for local people, in deepest Essex.
My brother then started at the same place, so we used to wait for the bus together, and the usual child-fighting took place.
Being deep in the countryside, there were fields, trees and hedges all around, so twigs, berries and stones were all available as handy ammo. This was great, until one day I came across the WMD of rural items, a ladybird. The little shite that I was, I flicked it at his face, when he wasn't looking, and the poor insect ended up in his mouth.
Now, in an act of desperation the tiny beetle exuded a single drop of yellow fluid onto his tongue, the split second before he managed to spit it out, swiftly followed by a truely epic volume of vomit.
It turns out that ladybirds can produce this "defence fluid" when they get pecked up by a hungry bird, and the taste is so foul that said bird will never, ever try and eat anything that is small, red and round ever again.
It's just bad luck that the human tongue is about 30 times more sensitive than that of a bird.
As for length, it was about 5mm, blood red, with a black and white tip.
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Cawl, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:19,
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