The Last of Animal Stories

At one point we had a parakeet, and Dorothy said that it will learn to speak. We tried saying a phrase repeatedly like," Pretty bird," over and over again. No luck. It must have been a stupid bird.
Then we brought home, a baby alligator about 6 inches long in a plastic basin. Our children tried feeding it raw ground beef, but it didn't eat it. Then maybe a dead fly. It didn't like that either. I don't think that it ate any thing we gave it. Oh by the way, Dorothy named it Oscar. It didn't live very long. However after it died, one of my boys operated on it to get some alligator skin.
Then,of course, every home with children had to have an aquarium with tropical fish. We got about a 10 gallon tank with all the trimmings including an air pump. I believe that my son, Roger, was the main care taker, and then later Rick took over. Now the usual tropical fish like guppies, sword fish, angel fish, and other exotic names. They were doing a good job, because the fish were thriving, and the aquarium looked nice.
We had this aquarium in our rec room which was the lowest level of our home. Because we were on a hill, this room had patio doors leading to our back yard at ground level. Also in this room was a full size pool table. Well young teen-agers playing pool can get to be a little rough. Yes, a pool ball went into the side of the aquarium and broke it. Can you imagine the mess? Earlier I mention the patio doors leading outside, well I am sure the water had a way out. By the time Dorothy and I returned home, everything was cleaned up.
Another time we had two chameleons, and their names were Cham and Leon. Normally they are unable to drink water, but they get their water through their skin. Again Roger worked out a system to get water to them. He took copper wire which has insulation on it. He then pulled the wire out, leaving the insulation as a hollow tube. Now he worked out siphon system to allow water to drip slowly. Then the chameleons could keep their skin moist.