The Newest Member of the Family

Meet the newest member of our family, Maximus. Maximus is my son’s puppy, a stuffed one at that, and we are very excited to welcome him into our home.

To understand my excitement, you have to know a little more about me. You see, I’m not much of an animal person. It’s not that I don’t like them, I just don’t like them in my house. Or, as my grandfather, a butcher for 50 years, would have said: “I like animals, stuffed”.  I have enough trouble taking care of myself, let alone something that can’t do much of anything for themselves – ever.

We have a cat, and by “we” I mean my wife had a cat when we met, so now “we” have a cat. He is cool, though, and over the years my wife and I have been together we have come to an understanding. He’s no longer allowed in the bedroom and in exchange I make sure he gets fed twice a day and has clean water.

Just so you don’t think that I’m some big meanie I’m very allergic to him and when my wife and I were first dating I had to take drugs before I got to her house. It was so bad at times that I strongly considered buying stock in the manufacturer of Claritin. Having dinner and a movie in wasn’t a whole lot of fun when your eye that isn’t swollen is watering like crazy and you can’t breathe. And I like being able to breathe.

Anyway, so, about two weeks ago I get a flyer in the mail from Build-A-Bear offering a free birthday animal. I thought it was very cool that they would send my little man a gift card for his first birthday, until my wife pointed out that they actually sent it to me. While my birthday is shortly after his, I was at a loss as to why they would send it to me considering it’s been several years since I made a bear for my godson. Regardless, I thought it would be fun to take him there and make him a bear for his birthday.

Last weekend my wife was in the middle of a five day stretch of second shift at the hospital, so I recruited Grammie (my mother) to join us and we made the trip up to the mall to see what we could find for him. I’m not sure if they were giving stuff away at the mall we went to, but it was crazy busy. I’m pretty sure I remember reading something about the economy being bad and these people obviously did not get that memo.

In any event we got to the store and immediately started showing him different animal options to see which one he would pick. We showed him two animals the first go around and let him hold onto whatever one captured his interest the most. Then like some deranged scientific experiment we would introduce a different animal to see if he would keep what he was already holding or choose to exchange that animal for the new one. He seemed to be quite decisive (or he just liked playing with the tag) and the first animal he chose was the one we ended up turning into Maximus.

Now, you are probably wondering where we got the name Maximus. If you answered the movie Gladiator, you would be partly correct. Once we had the 18 week ultrasound and found out we were having a boy, I immediately offered up the name Maximus as my pick. I thought it would be cool and that we could call him Max for short – don’t judge, besides they would have been my therapy bills, not yours. Unfortunately, this grand revelation was not met with great – ok, any – enthusiasm by my wife. In her own mind she probably wondered how she could have married, and now be having a child with, such a lunatic.

However, my wife, being the calm and rational one, kindly informed me that when the cat is no longer with us and we got a dog I could name him Maximus. My response to that was great disappointment at her lack of vision, and I kindly informed her that we would never be getting a dog if I had anything to say about it. The discussion that ensued obviously put into question the degree to which I may have a choice about pet options in our household. Still, the cat is healthy and will most likely be around for a while, so that was a conversation for another day.

After little man made his selection and we made our way about Build-A-Bear to bring his puppy to life it was time to create the birth certificate. Seizing my grand opportunity, I named the stuffed pooch and presented him to my son who pretty much had lost interest at that point.

Later that night when my wife got home from work I showed her the puppy – who was intentionally dressed in overalls because she loves putting little man in them. Her response when she saw the birth certificate? What are we going to name the dog when we get one if this is Maximus? Ugh. Somehow I just don’t think I’m going to win this one and now I’ve gone and wasted the coolest name ever.

Tagged as: animals, Birth certificate, Birthday, Build-A-Bear Workshop, cats, dogs, Gift card, Holidays, pets, Recreation, Shift work, Ultrasound