My maltese dog, Dylan, has a thing for brown stuffed lions.
He has a large - larger than him - toy lion that we won at a fairground, which is his ‘special friend’ for intimate ‘play time’. Then he has one half the size which he cuddles and nuzzles. And then a tiny one he carries around and plays tug of war with.
He has plenty of other toys of various descriptions. But nothing beats a lion.
Bubba (the cat I had from when he was probably around 4 weeks old until he passed at just shy of 19) was chock full of quirks. Among them was a compulsion that bordered on fetishism to wash others. It was just him and me for his first 5 years so I was the one who “benefited” from this. I’d be woken up at least once a day from his washing my cheeks, my eyelids, or the inside of my ears. Eventually I got so used to it that I’d wake up just enough to roll over and whine “QUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!” at him and go back to sleep.He had many other quirks as well but this post would be way too long to list more.
Our Cardigan Corgi, Wally, gets under my chair and bumps it with his butt to get my attention for assorted things. He does this only to me, despite him very much considering Duncan to be his human with me being a somewhat distant second place.
I had a cat named Bogie who loved gnawing things. His favorites were the corners of furniture and emery boards. If I didn’t hide them and hide them well, he’d steal my emery boards and gnaw the roughness off them until they were just plain and soft.
I’m really sorry to hear about Badger. Going thru the same thing, although I know it’s small comfort. I’m just happy I got to spend those years with my best friend. We’d just finished a walk at his favorite park and I was starting dinner back at home. He suddenly siezed, and fell over. I scooped him up and ran for the car, but by the time I got there he was gone. Just gone. I spent a few days unable to walk past his bowls and bed. I finally got enough courage to clean everything and put it all away, and it’s amazing how empty the house feels now.
RIP Badger. You look like a fine and faithful dog, who was loved greatly and will be missed greatly. You had a good run on Earth.
Oh, no, I’m so sorry about Badger.
blackie our first rescue cat … hated my glasses would knock them off and would hide them all over the house … she also hated when I shaved …
We’ve had multiple pointers (both German Short Hair and Wirehaired) and they have all been fast, but our current dog Benny, seems particularly fast. Now, thanks to the marvels of GPS collars, we can see actual speeds and he often hits 42 MPH, and he can keep that up if he is in pursuit of something (typically birds that are taunting him). When we first saw that speed we thought it must not be accurate but then we did some reading and found Greyhounds hit 45 so those speeds are possible by dogs.
Benny is also the only pointer we’ve had that doesn’t get tired, ever. We do 10 mile hikes and he does 30 miles (again, GPS collar) and never stops. When we stop for lunch, he’ll eat a quick snack and then when he realizes he isn’t getting any more food he is off again. Other pointers would lay down for a few minutes. He’s had 30 mile days and then when we get to our camping spot, we’ll put a lighted harness on him so we can see him as he is out exploring while we sit around the campfire.
Rocco., our African Grey Parrot will, once his crop is full, feed Loki, one of our dogs. Rocco will not feed any other dog, just Loki.
I had a great horse named Dare who was a pretty laid back, cheerful guy until it came to white lines on the ground, like painted parking lot lines. He wouldn’t be a jerk or freak out, but he was very firm about not walking over them. NOPE. White jump poles on the ground were no problem. I had him for 15 years and was never able to get him over it. Fortunately, we didn’t run into too many.
Another one of my horses, Julie, was terrified of the 6" drain in the bathing area. She was another otherwise good-minded horse. Weirdos! 
Kimba, a huge (and all muscle) lynx point who passed away a few years ago, apparently could count up to fourteen, knowing which days I was getting up early to go to work on a 9-hour schedule with alternate Fridays off (and 8-hour days for the Friday on).
One week, the Fourth of July was Wednesday, which puzzled him a bit. Thursday was normal, and Friday was my day off. Saturday, I got thirsty and shambled out to the kitchen for some Gatorade at about the time I’d normally get up on a workday, then went back to bed. The poor cat looked like the world had gone completely mad…
Our current lynx point Cocoa (avatar pic) wants to be a shoulder cat. However, he’s much too large to fit on a shoulder (not quite as big as Kimba was, but larger than average). He insists on trying, though.
Bear the Siamese, could do the shoulder ride. He just won’t. He gets himself perched (somehow) on the edge of the pantry door often. Watching over proceedings in the kitchen. He used to lightly land on my neck and shoulder if I got close. As soon as I moved he was off again.
I thought walking around with a cat on my shoulder would be so cool. Alas.
One day, when I was a kid, my family and I returned from a day trip and found ourselves locked out of our house. We checked all the windows, and doors over and over, trying to find some way to gain entry back into our domicile. We failed miserably.
Did we call a locksmith? No. Did we call the Ghostbusters? Nada. Did we call the Maytag repairman? Negative.
We called Tibby (specifically, Tibby II, our orange Manx cat from a long line of family Tibbies).
Before throwing a rock through a bedroom window, I said to my dad, “lemmy try one more thing before you throw that rock, pops.”
I found a twig and took it to the back sliding glass door. The factory-installed lock on the door was broken, but we used a thick dowel wedged into the bottom door rail to lock it.
I tapped the glass door, gaining the attention of Mr. Tibbs, then brushed the twig seductively back and forth across the glass. Tibberto began batting at the twig, and after about 5 minutes, he knocked the dowel out of the rail. We got back in.
My family hailed me the hero of the day. I accepted the plaudits immodestly. But, I gave Tibberino an extra large bowl of cat chow that evening, and a few extra scritches, because I knew who the real hero was that day.
My dog comes to work with me a few times a week. She’s an old lady and spends most of her time napping. Everyone loves her and looks after her while she’s there.
She clearly prefers to have a blanket with her in her bed- she’ll sometimes bark if there’s no blanket, will jump eagerly in as soon as we put a blanket down, etc. She’s not a blanket burrower and won’t generally go under blankets herself, but she does seem to like it if someone puts one over her.
The funny thing is, she’ll just walk around with that blanket draped over her back all day. We take it off when we take her outside, but as soon as she’s back in, she stands and waits patiently for someone to put it back on her.
I don’t seem to have a picture at hand of her standing or walking with it, but here she is on her bed(s) with her blanket over her
Another funny thing is that, because she’s elderly and slender (not underweight, but lots of people have fat dogs and think dogs are supposed to be fat) and has benign growths on her head, people frequently come in and make “oh, poor thing! Is she abused? What’s wrong with her?” type comments. It’s an animal shelter and people love the tragic drama that comes with an abused dog, so it always comes with a hopeful note.
Yeah. Sooooooo abused. You can see what a sad and deprived life she leads. Justice for Helena. Call the ASPCA. In the aaaaaaarrrrrms of the aaaaaaaangels…
She won’t let a male sniff her ass for all the bacon in the world. Shuts that shit down.
Female dogs? Far more receptive.
As far as people are concerned, Luna always prefers females. Even over me.
I mean, Luna’s fixed, so it doesn’t matter and I’m sure I’m reading into things, but if I ever had a homosexual animal, this is the one. She is still, simply, the most amazing dog I’ve ever had.
Obligatory picture:
My cat Nelson insists on having a dining companion. He’ll meow at me until I follow him to his food dish, and then he’ll happily eat his food while I stand there and watch. He doesn’t seem to be asking for more food; there’s already food in his dish and like I said he happily eats it. He just wants me to be in the room with him when he eats.
Nelson will sit in front of the closet door and demand that I open it so he can go in. When I do he goes in and sniffs around for a minute or so and then goes back out. He insists on doing regular closet inspections.
I was feeding my gf’s horses tonight and I realized that Jake is unique. He’s a beautiful Tennessee Walker gelding.
When you dump grain/feed into a horse’s feed dish, it dives right in. Not Jake. He comes over to the doorway, requesting a nose rub. Only then does he eat. My gf trained him to do this (she’s had him 18 years).
It’s kinda a pain in the ass, though. When I feed them it’s as a favor, because she can’t. I wanna dump feed and leave, but I have to rub Jake’s nose and talk to him. Then I have to wash my hands. Pet sitters also have to do the extra stuff.
If I unwisely open the closet doors while Linden and Poe are around they are in before I can catch them. They also do this with the unused bathroom I’m slowly updating. I think they’re convinced the doors hide Cat Narnia behind them.
I’ve had social eater cats. At least one insisted on being petting while he was at his dish before he’d start eating, at least if I was available. I assume he ate on his own if I was asleep or not home. 
My current two cats both dive into the closet to check things out if I open the door. DH and I have to communicate about making sure the closet is empty of cats before closing it again.
Kind of sounds like Jake’s a little lonely for human company and affection.
My cat Lucky is the smartest cat ever in terms of devising ways to escape outside (we try to keep him indoors but he was born a stray and thus born free and wants to live it up).
When I let my dog out in the backyard to use the restroom my cat will literally hide under my dog and match his movements to conceal his own to allow himself to go outside.
He has everyone in the houses work schedules down to a science, so when you come home he’s already prepping his escape. He will literally hide behind something fully concealed, then when he hears the door open he will make a mad rush for the door to escape. He will literally peak around corners and hide again to keep visual on the door if it’s just been open a crack to wait for his opportunity. Once he even figured out how to open a window that was a crack open by slowing pulling it to the side with his paws and jumping out onto a nearby roof to escape that way.
Bubba had a habit of jumping up on the open bathroom door and just balancing on the top. He’d sit there for a few minutes, then want down. This would have been fine but he insisted that I come, reach up, and get him down. He’d meow loudly and insistently until I did. Sometimes he’d leap right back up again after a couple of minutes and the fun would start all over again.
He also liked to leap up on top of shelf inside the closet and run back and forth. It made a tremendous racket and sounded like cops banging on the front door or a herd of rabid buffalo on a rampage. I’d wake up with my heart pounding. As you might guess, I really hated when he did that. I tried closing the closet door but he’d work at it until he pulled it open enough to get in.