Last episodes of "American Stuffers"

Yes. It is with a heavy heart and a hanging head that I admit that today I actually watched the American Stuffers episodes on Animal Planet.

You have to understand, though. The satellite signals on the movie channels were spotty and there was nothing on network television worth watching. Plus -- and honestly, no disrespect to the Ross Family and their employees -- but the show is just like a really bad car wreck. You know you shouldn't look but once you do you just can't turn away from it.

I didn't watch all of the episodes today. I watched "The Dog Named Precious," "The Cat Without a Nose," "The Hairless Dog," and "A Tornado Hits Romance." I will say that I'm very glad Daniel was able to put the cat's nose back on before its owner came to pick it up (and no one noticed the problem). The skin coming off of the Chinese Crested (which the owner proudly stated she'd paid $250 as a puppy) though was a close one. And her having the dog's testicles removed to have sperm harvested by a company in Washington just had me rolling on the floor. Yeah, I'm not a biology major, but I can't imagine them living in there for very long, much less long enough to ship them to Washington from Texas (where they drove from to get the dog freeze-dried).

The pet chicken being freeze-dried, though, had me baffled. I know people keep chickens as pets. I have friends that have had good and bad things come from doing that. But if the chicken dies on its own, I'd be thinking about disposing of it correctly, not how it's going to look in the center of the dinner table as a centerpiece. Okay, the lady with the chicken actually said she was going to decorate her chicken coops with all of her pet chickens after they die and she has them freeze-dried. And she named all of them after characters from Jersey Shore. So, take from that what you want.

I can say that I was moved by the lady who had her Yorkie for 14 years and met the crew from Xtreme Taxidermy at the Big Buck Classic Hunters' Convention (where most of the other attendees were grossed-out by the pets on display). She'd had a lot of loss in her life and having her dog preserved as a way to help her cope may not be for me but I sure hope it helps her. Plus, she wants the dog buried with her when she passes away. Sadly, the dog will look better longer than she will, but at least they'll be together.

And I also have to admit that the story about the dog that had been skinned by another taxidermist and left the crew of the shop with a puzzle on how to make him look good again was interesting. Mostly because they were very careful to not tell the lady who brought in the dog how badly butchered the job the previous taxidermist did. I was glad to see that they were able to take that idiot's mistakes and fix it so the lady was happy. Now I just hope she doesn't watch the episode and see exactly what was done to her dog.

So, yeah, I let the redneck in me have a few laughs and sat agog at some of the things said/done on the show. There aren't any future episodes coming (it was cancelled), but Romance, Arkansas isn't too terribly far from my family's old stomping grounds. I'm pretty sure I could find it if I felt the need.