We gratefully acknowledge the original 'Disapproving Rabbits' website, that inspired this site, and its creators, Sharon, Bill, Cinnamon, and Dougal. Without you, we would not be here. We Approve Of You!
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Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Monday, May 30, 2016
Sunday, May 29, 2016
Saturday, May 28, 2016
The Disapprovers - The Hoist Exercise
Last Week on the Disapprovers:
The crew welcomes a new bunneh crew member named Pancake. They get to know her better when Molly proposes a night of playing bridge. Pancake opens up about her past, and the disapprovers include her in their plans for the bust.
We started making our final preparations for the bust.
Molly suggested we explore and get used to the lab room, utilizing Singularia's "preview" mode again. Zeus and Frankie went on one night and returned sick to their stomachs. It was so bad that they put a remote port out in the yard, in the middle of a bitterly cold and rainy night, and smoked a stogie. That made their guts even sicker, but it took their minds off what they saw in the lab. Molly led the rest of us on the preview expedition, and we didn't fare any better than the ratties. Nonetheless, we repeated the exercise couple more times.
Molly suggested we explore and get used to the lab room, utilizing Singularia's "preview" mode again. Zeus and Frankie went on one night and returned sick to their stomachs. It was so bad that they put a remote port out in the yard, in the middle of a bitterly cold and rainy night, and smoked a stogie. That made their guts even sicker, but it took their minds off what they saw in the lab. Molly led the rest of us on the preview expedition, and we didn't fare any better than the ratties. Nonetheless, we repeated the exercise couple more times.
Pancake thought it would be a good idea to make a simple harness and pulley system for lowering the critters from the cages to the floor. Jumping from the height of several feet is out of the question for lagomorphs or ratties. She and Zeus made a prototype of the harness, and we wanted to test it on Abby, but we had a hard time finding a suitable place in the house for practice. Molly proposed going to the lab itself to rehearse on an empty cage, if there was one. Oh, that was so tempting. We kept staring at the surveillance feed as if we were looking for a sign that said, "Come on down and give it a try!" In the end, we didn't. Zeus liberated us from the bonds of fear, uncertainty, and temptation by voting against it.
We looked around the basement and thought one of the wire shelving units would do the job. It was five feet high, and that would be enough for us. Abby divided us into teams of two ratties and a bunn. Ratties would climb to the top of the cage, open it, hook up the pulley to the structure and secure the harness around the critter. We knew that at least some of the bunns were in awful shape, so Abby played one in distress.
We had to get her up on the shelve. Izzy and Mila climbed with the line and secured it. We put Abby in the harness and tried to hoist her up. It took Pancake, Molly, and me to raise her. We held the line tight until Izzy and Mila were able to help Abby get on the shelf.
She laid on her side and pretended to be unresponsive and then resisted having the harness secured around her. Well, we had already seen how we would have to change the harness. It took way too long to get it around her. We also had to replace the hook at the end of the line with a carabiner because it almost came off, and it scared the pellet out of me. Zeus had a couple of them on his vest (we'd suited up for this, gloves and all, to keep the EBA practice as realistic as we could) so we replaced them right then and there. We added another carabiner at the bottom of the structure. Feeding the line through the carabiner, one bunneh could slowly release the line and control how fast the harnessed bunneh came down. I braced myself with one foot on the shelf and gripped the line tight. Pancake and Molly stood by, paws ready to help. Abby slowly swung away from the cage and let Izzy and Mila gently push her off. She was a big bunn. I felt tension on the line, and I held it even more tightly. Molly and Pancake flinched and gripped the line. I had a good grip though and started releasing the line through my gloved paws. Once I felt more confident that I could hold it, I released it a bit more quickly, and Abby was on the ground. Izzy unhooked the top-end carabiner and dropped it.
We timed how long it took to get a critter the size of Abby lowered to the ground. When we did the math, it became clear that we would have to have at least two setups, and we would need to work on a minimum of two critters at the same time. In the best case scenario, we were looking at a solid night of hard work. We would also need a cart or a board to transport the ones who had difficulty walking to the port. One or two of our old roll-boards we used for exploring the artery would do. The tricky part was we couldn't rush any of the little steps making up the rescue of one critter.
For the sake of practice, we all "took a ride" in the harness. That was scary. I don't like heights, so stepping close to the edge of the cage and trusting that Abby would hold the line took all the trust I could muster. Izzy got an idea to ease my anxiety. She got on top of me while I was harnessed and rubbed the top of my head with one paw while holding onto the line with the other. You know, that helped. I closed my eyes, relaxed, and gritted my teeth. We were on the ground directly.
The remaining big unknown was the reaction of every critter we would try to evacuate. They would have no idea what to expect. Could we just use a bullhorn to make an announcement once we were there? We had plenty to sleep on.
Disaster struck the next day. Our hoomins found Mila unresponsive. They suspected a stroke. All our ratties were frantic, and our hearts broke. Again, losing Mila made it clear that we've bonded over the course of our adventure. I wondered whether we could even hope to keep up the pace in this gut-wrenching race against time. Did we have any options other than to press on?
Credits:
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
Visit our About the Disapprovers page
to learn more about the cast members and catch up on older episodes!
Friday, May 27, 2016
Thursday, May 26, 2016
Wednesday, May 25, 2016
Tuesday, May 24, 2016
Camilla
Bailey kitty is eating my breakfast again mom!
- Thank you, Mellissa!
PS: Follow Camilla and Sweeney on FB at
https://www.facebook.com/Collected-moments-Bunnies-447426932128463/
Monday, May 23, 2016
Sunday, May 22, 2016
Mr. Bun Update
Greetings, Everybunn!
Treats, snurgles, and a clean bum, that' the extent of today's report. For today and the upcoming week forecast calls for more of the same. We're celebrating five months of this new, cleaner, and healthier routine. I know you keep your paws crossed for us, and we thank you!
- Mr. Bun
Saturday, May 21, 2016
The Disapprovers - The Fed Connection
Last Week on the Disapprovers:
The crew has a new bunneh crew member named Pancake. They get to know her better when Molly proposes a night of playing bridge. Pancake opens up about her past, and the disapprovers include her in their plans for the bust.
We decided that Pancake, along with Izzy, Mila, Molly, Bruno, and myself, would go on the stakeout at the doctor's house. We would visit strictly in "preview" mode and never leave the safety of Singularia. Zeus wanted Bruno to get some exposure to Singularia. Well, we had to give Bruno some prep. Abby got close to him, telescoped, and put her paw around his neck. "Bruno, when you regain your vision in Singularia, you will see a big, glowing tumbleweed. It will remind you of a big ball of yarn. Ignore it! You must ignore it and let it be. We have no idea what would happen if you tried to touch it or even get close to it. Got it?" Bruno nodded agreeably. Frankie got up and chimed in, "You see, Bruno, we don't want you to lose your mind in there. Because we have no idea if we'll ever be able to find it. You see, we suspect there's no convection in Singularia. We're not even sure if there's gravity. So if your mind gets lost, it just might dissolve, or float away, or sink. We don't want that kind of excitement, do we, Bruno?" Bruno arched and hissed, "I used up one of my lives to save your hairless tail, you ungrateful little ..." Molly jumped, put her paw to his mouf, and rubbed his head. "Let it go, Bruno; let it go." Frankie put up his paws in a peace offering and backed away apologetically, with a grin, of course.
We snooped around the doctor's house all day long and stuck our noses into every nook and cranny we could. Bruno did his best to blow our cover by harassing the old golden retriever that was napping in one of the hallways of the posh mansion. At least these hoomins took good care of the old dog. Could that cancel out any of the other things they were committing? Of course, the poor old beast couldn't see us, but he sensed something that he couldn't explain, and it drove him a little mad. I felt sorry for him, so I got onto Bruno to cut it out.
As we wandered around the house, we noticed an awful, semi-industrial noise coming from one of the bedrooms upstairs. Although the sound was muffled by the distance, it was still distinct, like an old steam engine towing its girth uphill. When we climbed the stairs and got closer to the source of the rumble, we recognized the pool person (I thought it was the pool-dude) fervently engaged in "other duties as seduced" by the missus. I made a note to myself to get some welding goggles because this can't be good for my eyes.
We discovered where they kept all of the networking hardware, and Zeus was delighted. Unfortunately, we didn't observe the missus doing any work, which meant another trip to the place would be required. Zeus wanted to plant a keylogger on the lady's laptop. We discussed the possibility of putting a video cam or two in that little office but decided against it. Why bother with the cam if one of us could play a "fly on the wall" over there? Watching what happens on the laptop warranted some close and personal scrutiny. On the other hand, having a video peek at the rest of the house could be useful. We were interested in general information that an occasional gander from the safety and comfort of our pad could provide.
Zeus got all he needed when he and Frankie re-visited the house in person. They almost got caught, though. While Zeus was messing with the laptop, they heard and felt the thumps and vibrations of very stompy and hurried footsteps approaching the office. They scrambled and hid under the desk, barely avoiding being blinded. The missus must have forgotten something and frantically rummaged in her purse as she searched for it. When she found what she needed, she fled in a hurry and resumed the judo or wrestling rumble with the pool-dude. Zeus says he'll never be able to unsee some things now and demanded compensation or at least a hazard duty bonus. Later, Molly offered him a piece of her carrot. He took it.
They did tap the network, though, so the hunt was a success. A few days later the payoff started to trickle in. The missus was heavily involved in selling materials used in cosmetics production to a company in the Far East. She seemed to have a very close working relationship with the prime minister and a high-ranking party official of an emerging superpower. Our "doctor" and his wife appeared to have the majority stake in the cosmetics company itself. That outfit, in turn, was getting all its products tested in the doctor's lab. The company sold cosmetics via the classic pyramid scheme. If that wasn't enough, the chairman of the Means and Ways Committee in our government had a substantial stake in the business, and his re-election campaign's coffers were very well funded. He was friends with both the foreign prime minister and our dear "doctor."
As juicy as this was, the best was yet to come. When Zeus analyzed the network traffic coming in and going out of the office, he discovered that someone else was watching the communications. It turned out the feds were watching. Was that a good or a bad thing, we wondered? Eventually, we learned that the feds were watching everything, but they were not doing anything with it. They were just sitting on it, and that's been going on for a very, very long time. Why?!? They had enough material to put the entire circle to work in a license plate factory for decades. We concluded that was a good thing because now we had the means of forcing the feds' hand. If the feds refused to act on the information they gathered, some news organization would have enough material to win any journalism prize they dreamed of. We planned to play a couple of the news outfits against one another. That way, one would try to beat the other to the presses.
Thus, we had the second major piece of the project in place. Next, we had to prep for the bust itself.
Credits:
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
Visit our About the Disapprovers page
to learn more about the cast members and catch up on older episodes!
Friday, May 20, 2016
Thursday, May 19, 2016
Penny
Um, yes, I do expect my weight worth of treats.
- Thank you, Renee!
PS: Follow Penny and her friends on FB at Dolly Family - Binky Free Dolly, Cleo & Suzy
Wednesday, May 18, 2016
Lulu Karasek
No to corn chips?! While you eat them? So unfair!
- Thank you, Jim!
PS: Follow Lulu on FB at Little Bunny LuLu Karasek
and on Lulu's blog at Little Bunny Lulu and Friends
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
Finn, aka "Da Punk"
Yes, from here I do feel like I iz "da king of the world", and who are you?!?
- Thank you, Rondi!
PS: Follow Mango and Da Punk on their FB page at https://www.facebook.com/mangobun
Monday, May 16, 2016
Clover
You like the couch, ha. I chined it. It supersedes everything else you did it to it.
- Thank you, Ken and Kaci!
PS: Ken rescued Clover about 10 days ago running around on the street they live on. How Clover got on the run is unknown. Thus, Clover is becoming the newest member of the Dessert Warren!
Thank you for giving bunn a chance!
Sunday, May 15, 2016
Mr. Bun Update
"Keep still my duff, hoomin!"
Greetings, Everybunn!
Nice and easy week. Lot's of snorgles and head-rubs. Hoomin worked late a lot this week and one night came home really late. He said he won't do that ever again. He missed me too much. Today we doing a quick bum baf and a movie. Well, those seem all the same to me, but as long as the head-rubs keep coming, I don't mind.
- Mr. Bun
Saturday, May 14, 2016
The Disapprovers - Pancake
Last Week on the Disapprovers:
Zeus and Frankie go a stakeout to the lab and keep a close eye on the activities of the laboratory's systems administrator. They discover possible means or pressuring the admin into full cooperation with their plans.
Once Zeus and Frankie returned, we focused on the next big part of the operation, trying to learn more about the private lives of Doctor Mangler and his cohorts. That's what Zeus called him; his words, not mine. We were coming up empty-pawed on the guy. Everything we found was squeaky clean and boring. There were few, work-related posts and connections. It seemed he was really averse to social media, didn't know how to use it, or was plain scared of the computer. That got me thinking. Maybe he wasn't averse or scared of it. Maybe he was treating it with the respect that it deserved. Well, to be honest, I was hoping this lack of a trail would point to his ineptitude. That's what I wanted to confirm with the outing to the doctor's house. It would keep things simple. I volunteered to go with Zeus or Abby. Yeah, Abby and I could handle this on our own.
At first, Zeus was suspicious of my resolve to lead the way on this. He sensed my trepidation. "Neh, Toes, I don't think so. You're up to something. Who's going to go with you?" "Abby," I said curtly.
"Right." said Zeus, and he continued, "Abby, I'm not sure about Toes. I think he's trying to short-circuit something. We need to turn that place upside down if we have to. Remember? How about you two take Bruno with you; he needs an introduction to Singularia anyway." "Why do we need Bruno?" I tried to protest. "Bruno it is, then!" said Zeus.
Just then, Molly hopped over. Somebunny followed her. "Pancake, meet Abby, Zeus, and Mr. Toes. Over there are Frankie, Freddie, Izzy, and Mila. Pancake ... Pancake arrived from a rescue," said Molly.
Abby was first to hop over and extend her paw. We all greeted her, a bit tentatively but with enough courtesy to pass for friendly.
"Hello, Everybunny," said Pancake. "I feel like I interrupted something. Maybe I should come back some other time." "No, not at all. We were just talking about playing bridge. Would you care to join?" asked Molly.
Bridge? What is bridge?
"Sure, I have no idea what 'bridge' is, but if you don't mind teaching me, I would love to join," said Pancake. Of course, Zeus came up with a 52-card deck, and Molly proceeded to give us, I mean Pancake, a lesson on playing bridge. I followed along and tried to look as serious as I could. I mean, this is serious stuff, isn't it? I wondered how Molly knew about bridge? Why bridge and not poker or something? She told me later that back in the WWII days, bridge was the favorite game of the Royal Air Force fighter pilots. As a strategy game, it helped them keep their wits sharp. It had to help them bond, as well. They played paired up against other pairs; in the air, they depended on one another. She discovered it out of sheer historical curiosity.
That's all we did that night. We played and tried to learn about Pancake.
It dawned on me what a genius Molly was. Of course, we had to try to find out what kind of team player Pancake would be. As the night went on, we got know her a lot better, and we grew to like her.
She shared about how her hoomin had died in a car crash. He was pulling out of his apartment complex, trying to make a left turn, and got hit by an SUV. Well, I thought that was extremely unfortunate but not unique. Things like that happen to humans, don't they? She said he was a Vietnam combat vet and told her stories about humans' getting hurt in the jungle, badly hurt. If they made it into the medical helicopter, they would be well, most of the time anyway. Except that one time when she told us the humans carried one of them all night long and put him on the chopper only to find out later that he didn't make it. She started crying. She said, "I don't even know if they sent out a chopper to pick up my human or not."
We sat with her quietly for a long time. I felt a little stupid after that for thinking that what we were doing was the be-all-and-end-all of everything, forgetting that life goes on for every bunny trying to muddle through it as best as he or she can. Here, Pancake was left without her human, and her world was turned upside down. She was a reminder to me to keep things in perspective. She told us how she and her human brainstormed together when working on art projects. They worked on illustrations and graphite drawings, paintings, posters, and such. She liked metalworking and was fascinated by welding and architectural design. My eyebrows stayed raised up all night long. Zeus said that he'd be happy to help her with that if she likes. He said, "Things can be arranged."
So much for my paranoia of the imagined importance of our secrets. We had a new team member, and we were glad. At first, I thought of her as an intruder, a usurper, trying to move in on Suzy's place while her pad was still warm. I was mad at our hoomins for bringing her in so soon. But she was no usurper nor an intruder. She was scared, suddenly orphaned, and left alone; a grieving bunneh that could use a forever home. She had no idea who Suzy was or what we were up to. She deserved to be loved and cared for; maybe she was worried about the "U" word while in the shelter? I didn't know. Then, counting breaths would have a whole new meaning for her, wouldn't it, and not knowing which breath could be the last one.
Funny, a night of playing bridge can wear you out. None of us except Molly had any idea about bridge. Pancake knew it, and she took it in stride and never let us know that.
Credits:
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
- Renee: taking care of critters, photography
- Mr. Bun, Ijon Thichy The Nth: story
- Mrs. Angie: editing
Follow Pancake, Molly, Abby, Mr. Toes, Frankie, Freddie, Mila, Izzie, Zeus and Bruno on FB
On Instagram @dollyalittledisabledrabbit
Visit our About the Disapprovers page
to learn more about the cast members and catch up on older episodes!
Friday, May 13, 2016
Mango
Right, your plans for the weekend. I got them right here!
- Thank you, Rondi!
PS: Follow Mango on FB!
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