When putting the dog into her crate for the night, I give her pieces of meat we cut from left overs and freeze.
“Penny! I have a cookie, freshly frozen for your dining pleasure!”
As a new member, I’m not sure I want to publicise the extent of my craziness, but I argue with my cat. She’s a Maine Coon, and quite vocal, so when she wants her breakfast, she yells at me, and keeps yelling. I go “I’m coming, can’t you see me coming? Stop yelling at me. I’ve got your kibble here, all ready to put in your dish, you can stop all the noise”, stuff like that. I wouldn’t want it on youtube, let’s put it that way. 
Publicising the crazy is a perfect way to find out if you fit in. I feel like you do!
Whenever I leave to go to the animal shelter to volunteer, I say to my dogs, “Ok, so I’m off to the shelter. Be back this afternoon.” They always look at me like I just threw away their favorite toy. So I repond, “Look, these dogs have NOTHING. You have soft beds and people to do your bidding. You barely lift a paw around here and these dogs are dying for attention. Suck it up!” They continue to look at me as if I just threw away their favorite toy, but whatever! They’re so spoiled.
The calico complains quite vocally about the status of the food bowl. When I know it’s full, I tell her, “I’m already checked. You are all set for cat food!”
Otherwise, I say, “We’ll go see!” and follow her, or carry her to the food bowl and refill it.
The dogs’ last outside visit each night is done to a fine rendition of a song we call “Last Chance to Potty Dance” sung to the tune of Last Dance by Donna Summer.
When they all want to eat but it’s too early, I tell them, “It’s not time yet.” That usually buys me a few minutes until the next set of pitiful looks.
When they are all done getting treats after whatever I tell them, “We’re done here, that’s the whole show.” and I do the ASL sign for done.
They also know ASL for “wait.” That’s the first sign my hard-of-hearing grandson and I learned together, and the dogs learned it with us, so we use wait instead of stay.
My dogs have spotty recall with the word come, but if you holler “Inside,” four out of five of them will come running. The beagle will come if his nose has not otherwise engaged him.
When I leave for the day, I tell them, “See you soon.” They all run to the back gate to make sure I leave. If I don’t, they start howling, a term I use loosely, given that two of the five sound like they are caught in a leg trap when they “sing.”
When I come home, they all mob that same back gate to watch me and I tell them to “Meet me at the door.” They all run to the back door and jockey for position on the deck waiting to be let in.
And, of course, I just plain talk to them all the time about whatever. They pretend to be interested if they think it will result in a treat or skritches.
My spoiled diva cat thinks his wet food is unfit for further consumption the instant he walks away from it. He then whines about it. So my constant refrain is ‘Eat what’s down Maxie, there’s nothing wrong with it. Eat what’s down!’ This sometimes metamorphosis to ‘Eat it! Just Eat It!’ to the tune of Beat It.
(Occasionally I realise I have been saying this for several hours so then I do change the bowl).
Every time I have to go away, I explain to my cat that I’ll be gone “a night and a day and a night and a day” or however many light cycles it will be.
We have conversations/arguments where I voice both sides, where he tells me about how terrified he was about some everyday thing (he’s skittish), or he brags about his giant moobs.
I tell the Siamese how beautiful, elegant and svelte they are. How soft their velvet brown ears are (no touching). How their blue eyes are sparkling and intelligent
It’s in their contract that I perform this ritual several times a day.
They like to sit there and look bored while I make a fool of myself. I swear sometimes I see them roll their eyes.
Yes, once there is a trace of cat spit in the food dish, whether the sniffing cat’s or another, that food is totally not worthy of consumption, so we must bitch for food please.
I sing “Black girls are so sexy” from Hair to the coal black devil rescue to make up for naming her Little Shit.
When I picked up Rocco, our African Grey, from the bird-sitter after a weeks vacation, she asked who “Buddy” was. She told me that Rocco would sit around saying, “Hey, Buddy” all the time.
Well, “Buddy” is what I call Rocco. When I’m ready to leave for work, it’s, “Hey, Buddy. Let’s go to work”. At bedtime it’s, “Hey, Buddy, time for sleep”. Etc.
It’s weird. He never says “Buddy” at home, but as soon as I was gone for a bit, he was calling for me.
Be very good boys, no naughty stuff, Mama has to go, I’ll be right back!
Go poop and get a delicious treat!
Be very good boys, listen to Mama and come when you’re called.
They both get a Pepcid every morning (for sour stomachs) disguised in a glob of peanut butter folded in a slice of pepperoni. So I sing the song - Who wants peanut butter medicine? Peanut butter medicine for my boys.
Let’s do cuddle, cuddles on the couch.
Good morning, handsomes!
The French mastiff/boxer’s name is Luca and is called a myriad of nicknames - Big Lou, LuLu, Lulabelle and sometimes just Luke. We had new neighbors (a young couple) move in last year. The guys name is Luke. One evening after I let the dogs out for the last time, I was calling them to come in. I yelled (loudly) a couple of times - Come Luke, come now!! :smack:
When my cat gets annoyed at me for stopping rubbing his belly in the morning when I leave for work, I tell him, “Well, someone around here has to earn the cat food! It’s certainly not you!”
And when he’s yowling through the window at The Other Cat who keeps coming into our yard, I encourage him, “Yeah, tell That Other Cat how much we hate him! He really should know by now!”
Gods, do we really hate that guy.
That is just ‘too’ sweet. Those Grey’s are smart, I hear.
To Luna the pit bull: “Who’s the best pibble ever? YOU are!”
To Ginny the less-well-behaved pit bull mix: “Who’s an adequate pibble sometimes? YOU are!”
“Shut yer Bark-Holes!”
Having no pets around I rarely say anything to them, except to approximate a “hiss” at the black cat who uses my yard as its personal highway a lot of nights when I’m sitting on the front porch watching the world go by.
My next door neighbor, a retired fire fighter, regularly hollers vituperation, calamity, and condemnation at his animals. His cussing isn’t terribly original, but I suppose it’s adequate for the need to hand. (I don’t care for that kind of language, but since he sometimes also uses my yard as his own personal highway while searching for the black cat, and he’s always wearing his M1911 on his side, I just kind of let it go. Of course, I’m always wearing my M&P9 when I’m out there, and I really don’t want any confrontation with the old dudemar.)
I will steal this. Yes. I will.
“Stop wiping your butt on the carpet!” An oft repeated phrase aimed at the dog, despite frequent evaluations/interventions related to anal glands, etc.
“Slurmy, stop humping the cat!” His name is Stormy, but that doesn’t matter.
“Wowbagger, you of all creatures should NOT be a knee-biter!” Said to the cat, who sometimes is a complete knee-biter.
To my chihuahua, when I leave for work: “Take care of things. You’re in charge til I get back!” This is while he’s sitting on my wife’s lap.
I’ve posted before about how the cocker spaniel will eat anything and the Shih tzu can be a little food snob. Every night, to get him to eat his dinner we have to constantly compliment him. He will take a few bites, look at one of us, and we will say something like, you are going to be the biggest Shih tzu in the neighborhood. A few more bites, same thing, the lady Shih tzus are going to love you. This crazy shit goes on until he finishes. Meanwhile the cocker was done 15 minutes ago. If anyone ever had to come feed them for us I would need to leave them a list of his favorite compliments.