A Terrific Tortoise

Introduction

It’s me, Buster, the Chihuahua again.

For those of you who don’t know me I’m a four year old short haired Chihuahua who lives with my owners, John and Belinda, in Kent.

I am forced to share my life with three horrible cats, an aggressive rabbit and a tortoise.

Today I want to tell you a little bit about the tortoise that lives in our house.

I can’t tell you his name because after two years I’m not even sure if he has a name.

He’s a tortoise so it’s not like he comes when he’s called so I’ve never heard John or Belinda call him anything but “the tortoise”.

The tortoise came to live with us two years ago when John’s friend relocated to another country and couldn’t take it with him. 

I have no idea how old it is but apparently quite a bit older than I am and it will live long after I’m gone. 

Chihuahuas can often live until they are fifteen years old but tortoises can live to be one hundred. 

It will even outlive John and Belinda and then I don’t know what will happen to it.

Play Time

Play time for me means running and jumping and fetching things.  Play time for the tortoise means doing exactly what he does all the rest of the time:  meandering slowly about, plodding along looking for I don’t know what.  I think he might just be looking for somewhere to sleep because that’s all I ever see him doing.

The cats sleep a lot too, but when they are not sleeping they do have moments of activity.  The tortoise’s activity level is so slow that you can hardly even count it as activity.  It’s not too surprising that they live so long:  they never move fast enough to wear out any part of their body.

Meal Time

Feeding time for the tortoise is one of the highlights of my day.  It eats a lot of fruits and vegetables and sometimes even a few pieces of my dog food which John and Belinda put in water to make it soft.  I don’t mind sharing a few pieces of food with the tortoise.  There are some things I won’t share, but I don’t have to worry because the tortoise probably isn’t interested in wearing my Chihuahua clothes or collars anyway.

When the tortoise eats it acts like it hasn’t seen food in a very long time even though it just ate the day before.  It stretches out its neck and takes the most massive bite of food.  It’s quite messy and gets bits of banana and apple all over its face.  I find its interest in food fascinating.  I’m glad it doesn’t like to eat little dogs because the way it attacks its food is kind of frightening.

Tortoises are Terrific

The absolute very best thing about the tortoise is that it’s slower than me.  I can run circles around it, run in and out when it’s eating, even touch its shell and it can’t move fast enough to do anything.  I don’t spend all my days harassing the tortoise but it’s good to know that if I need to get away I can. 

The next best thing about the tortoise is that it isn’t very affectionate.  I never have to compete for John and Belinda’s attention with the tortoise.  It spends a lot of its time in its enclosure and doesn’t want to sit on their laps while watching television.  It doesn’t chase me, compete for affection, try to swat me or get into mischief for which I get blamed.  Tortoises are pretty terrific.