Is it still a pet if you cannot pet it?

Some people, when they find out we have no pets, feel sorry for us. They extol the virtues of the unconditional love that pets provide. They speak of the stress relief just from petting the dog or cat, the joys of teaching their parrot to speak, and so on. You know, the joys of pet ownership.

In kindness, I do not lash out at these slavemasters. Perhaps that was a bit over the top. We have had pets in the past. I had a dog as a youngster. My first wife (She Who Must Not Be Mentioned) and I had a dog. Faye had a cat when we first started seeing each other. I added another and then one more when her first cat ran away in the 6 years we danced around our inevitable marriage.

We kept those two when we moved, first to Manassas and then to Jacksonville where we added one more. The Unholy Three (as we affectionately called them) stayed with us until their deaths many years ago. We found that we had more freedom without pets. Plus, there were no unpleasant surprises awaiting us if we stayed away more than a day. We didn't have to find someone to look after the cats if we went off for more than a day or two. We got used to that freedom.

But we do have a pet. Meet Ms Lizard.

She's a beauty, isn't she? The real beauty is that she will never cost me a cent for food or vet care. She's about 8 inches long if you include her tail. She lives on our back porch. She is the one I spoke of in Strange and exotic wildlife [link], she was eventually caught (by me, the ladies would not touch her) when she became accidentally trapped in the shower stall. I put her on the back porch and she has made it her home, as Chester [link]had done before he wandered out under the screen door and never came back after a year with us. Chester, as it turns out, was really Charlene.

I know that Ms Lizard is a female. I know this because I finally did some research on lizards native to Florida. Ms Lizard, like her predecessor, is of the Green Anole family [link]. The females are not like the males who change from bright green to dull brown and back; their change is more subtle, more suggestion than actual change, when she goes "green" from her predominant brown

When I was a youngster, growing up in Dade County, it seemed the males were the more prevalent of the species. I would see them most everywhere. Now, they seem very rare.

We had Chester/Charlene stay with us for a year. I wonder how long Ms Lizard will stay?