Enslaved by Ducks Read Online Free PDF Page A

bandages.
    Binky gave us our first jolt of pet destructiveness. Though his widely scattered poop pellets were inoffensive as such materials go, they presented us with an ongoing maintenance problem. Rabbits, we’d been told, were easy to litter train. And it’s true. They gravitate naturally toward a litter box, mysteriously divining its purpose the first time they hop inside. Just as instinctively, they are also keenly set on establishing a presence throughout their territory. Chin-rubbing is one method. Glands on the front of their heads deposit their scent on whatever coffee table, coat stand, chair leg, or human foot they rub against. But when a rabbit, especially a male, is serious about letting others know which lands he claims as his own, bodily functions are most effective. We learned this with Binky, and the lesson was magnified with a later rabbit population in which three males vied to plant their flag in shared territory.
    More worrisome, we found, was the front end of a rabbit. Rabbits’ teeth grow continuously. Unchecked, the lower incisors rise up in werewolf fashion, while the upper teeth can curve inward until they eventually penetrate the roof of the mouth. Usually, the act of eating grinds down the teeth, and excess length is kept in check by a rabbit’s love of chewing any object within reach. To that end, Binky gnawed at our woodwork. He pulled out our living room carpetfibers. He made hors d’oeuvres out of the dust jackets to
Flying Saucers from Mars, Flying Saucers and the Three Men
, and
They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers
, three classics of modern science I kept on the bottom shelf of an upstairs bookcase. He decimated shoes, speaker cables, antenna feeds, chair legs, phone lines, computer interconnects, area rugs, record-album jackets, litter boxes, wicker baskets, magazines, and the ribbon cable from our satellite dish.
    If an irreplaceable possession was challenging enough to warrant several sessions of intensive gnawing, it would turn into a project with Binky. The degree to which we opposed a project defined his enthusiasm for it. To thwart his will was to energize him. As soon as we’d release him from his cage, he would make a bunny-line for his work site and eagerly resume his labors where he’d left off. Reducing a reference book to paper pulp or chewing the Egyptian motifs off a decorative pillow were favored projects. But his appetite for this line of work paled next to his obsession with gaining access to a hiding place once I had blocked its entrance. One of these was the space between the headboard shelf of our platform bed and the wall it nearly touched. Ensconced in this dark recess, Binky was virtually unreachable. Assuming we even knew he was huddled there, the only way of rousting him was to thrust a cardboard wrapping-paper tube down the crack between bed and wall and blindly whisk it back and forth.
    I first tried preventing access to this miserable lair by placing a small suitcase on the floor next to the bed, but he easily nosed it aside. When I wedged it in firmly with the help of a spare blanket, he scuttled over the roadblock. I finally had to cobble together a wall of blankets and boxes arranged around a heavy cushion. Though he was unable to surmount the obstruction, he would not be dissuaded. Day after day he would bolt from his cage and scurrydirectly to the bedroom, where he’d rake his front paws furiously against the pile until Linda or I finally pulled him away and shut the bedroom door. That only turned his attention to the outside of the door, the sound of his clawing reaching us in the living room.
    When you match wits with a rabbit, you cannot win. If the rabbit bests you, you’re a fool. If you best the rabbit, you’re a fool who’s bested a rabbit. This truism sunk in the day I forgot to close the basement door and Binky found the most vexing hiding place of his career. I scoured the usual places for him: behind the washing machine, between the