Webkinz, Wolves, and Chihuahuas, Oh My!

My kids have really gotten into this whole webkinz craze lately. In case you have been living in a cave and don't know what webkinz are, they are these stuffed animals that come with cards that have a log-on code. You log into Webkinz World with that code, and there is your pet! You can do jobs and play games to earn kinz cash that you can then use to buy food and other things for your pet. Kids can also connect with each other and give gifts to each other. My kids and my niece are connected to each other and do this all the time. Among the three of them, I would estimate that they have around 5,000 webkinz pets. Okay, so I exaggerate, but they have several pets, including various cats, dogs, a panda bear, a gorilla, and who knows what else. The room here often fills with the sounds of games such as Cash Cow and this other game where a little Chihuahua comes on and talks about his bean and his sombrero and his candy.

Speaking of Chihuahuas, are they really dogs? I mean, supposedly they are, but I saw one at Petsmart a couple of days ago being pushed around in the shopping cart by its owners. It had a little glittery collar on, and the owners were shopping for little sweaters for it. I assume it needed them because the poor thing was shivering. Either it was cold or scared or neurotic. Based on the few I've encountered in the past, I'm going with the latter.

It's just rather difficult to place the little rodent-like creatures in the Canine Category. When you consider that our present-day domestic canine companions are descendants of wolves, and then you look at a Chihuahua, it's hard to reconcile. They don't exactly look Lupine, you know. A Siberian Husky...now THERE is a dog that looks like it was descended from a wolf. Okay, okay, so I'm biased, but look at what I mean.

The picture on the far left is a grey wolf. The middle picture is Sitka, one of my Siberian Huskies. You can definitely see some similarities there. Furthermore, Huskies exhibit a lot of wolf-like behaviours, particularly in their pack structure. I won't go into boring details here. But believe me, they are "wolf lites." And to the far right, we have the Chihuahua. Do you see the wolf in it? Other than a long snout, I don't.

Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against Chihuahuas. I love the Taco Bell dog. I don't like Taco Bell, but I love the Taco Bell dog. If I could find one that speaks Spanish like that, I'd even consider getting a Chihuahua, but I'm afraid my Huskies would just consider it a snack.

My grandfather actually raised the things after he retired from the Army. Imagine this big military man, retired Lt. Col., Army surgeon, going ga-ga over a pack of Chihuahuas. It defies logic. My sister in Kentucky, Becky, has a teacup Chihuahua named Sauza. As if a regular Chihuahua isn't small enough, this little pooch would nearly fit into my cell phone holder! Sauza has gotten lost a few times, and I can see why. She's even smaller than my kids' Guinea Pigs! But she is an amusing little thing. Becky can tell her to "Praise Jesus!" and Sauza, as well as Becky's other dog, a Yorkie-Poo named Sadie, will hop up on her back legs, front paws reaching to the sky, and the two dogs will dance around in circles! Charismatic canines...I'm sure some would say I'm going to hell on a bobsled, but it makes me laugh. Of course, those same people probably think I'm going to hell on a bobsled because I'm a heathen Catholic...

In the meantime, my howling honeys call to me. Time to feed the wild bunch.