Around this time last month, I spent a week petsitting Bullet, Kaya, and Drake. Erin had another trip that she had to go on, so I came back to her house to take care of the dogs and cat again for another week.

Although I wouldn’t say the dogs have separation anxiety, Kaya still gets pretty sad when her parents leave. For the first several hours, she insists on sit­ting by the door awaiting their return.

Drake, on the other hand, as a fairly normal and independent cat, has full faith that they will eventually return. He instead decided to use the cat door to go out onto the covered balcony and take a nap outdoors.

Kaya noticed Drake and wanted to join him, so she went outside as well. She wanted to sunbathe, but managed to only get half her body in the sun, prob­a­bly because she got blinded by the sun and couldn’t see where she was.

I set up my computer workstation upstairs on a table near the living room, and Bullet decided to set up shop there as well. He spent a lot of time laying next to my chair and at my feet, making sure that I wouldn’t go anywhere without him.

On one of the days, I went into the guest room to change into my exercise shorts so I could take the dogs for a walk. Apparently Drake was sleeping on the bed, and he did not appreciate the interruption.

Hello Bullet.

While Drake was away using the litter box, Bullet swept in and took his spot at the base of the bed in the guest room. Drake was not very happy when he returned.

One of Drake’s favorite activities is sunbathing. However, when he is upstairs and far away from the balcony, but needs sun now, we have to make do with what’s available. Here is Drake using some of the natural light shining in during the morning and sticking his head into the sun strip.

Because this is my second time petsitting, the dogs are much more comfortable with me now than they were last time. They like to spend a lot of time around the guest room where I sleep, and when I got out of the shower one day, I noticed that they had repossessed my pillow.

Hello Drake.

I went to snap a photo of Kaya out on the patio, but when I kneeled down, she got up to walk over to me; I captured the photograph as she was getting up, and found it hilarious that she looks like an alpaca in this picture.

We have tentative plans for me to petsit again in September, so more photos to come soon…

Almost a year ago, I blogged about meeting Erin Krell’s pets for the first time—Bullet and Kaya the Alaskan Klee Kais, and Drake the domestic longhair. I’ve obviously visited them many times since then, but recently for a week, I petsit them while Erin went on vacation with her husband.

This was the first time I had lived with animals ever since moving out from my previous living situation with a roommate who had three cats. It can ob­vi­ously get pretty distracting, but it was nice having them around, and usually, it was a healthy type of distraction—they would prompt me to get off my computer for a bit and move around with them.

The day before I took over petsitting for a week, Erin, her husband, and I went to pick up some burgers and a fish sandwich from a restaurant and brought the dogs along. Here are Bullet and Kaya patiently awaiting their parents’ return.

The dogs enjoyed spending time outside, which was useful for me to go out and get some fresh air. We went on walks every day except for one day when it rained all day, and I took them out to the backyard an additional four times per day so they could go to the bathroom.

One convenient part about their house was that the exercise room had a direct view of the backyard, so the dogs were able to sunbathe, while I would be indoors lifting weights and keeping an eye on them to make sure they weren’t doing anything too wild.

Drake, as you’d expect from a fairly normal cat, was very independent. He would roam around the house at his leisure, then make his way downstairs when his internal clock told him it’s time for his next meal. After eating, he would make his way back upstairs to a comfortable spot and clean himself up.

Here is Bullet staring deep into my soul and trying to figure out why I won’t give him another treat, even though it’s already been AN ENTIRE 12 MI­NUTES since his last treat.

Kaya had a little bit of separation anxiety, laid by the front door a lot, and slept in Erin and her husband’s bed for a while. However, at some point, I think she realized that her parents were on vacation and hadn’t just gotten lost coming back from the grocery store, so she curled up in a ball and slept overnight next to me in the guest room for the second half of the week.

Here is Bullet, exhausted after a session of fetch. And by a session of fetch, I mean me fetching the toy, and Bullet running back and forth giving e­mo­tion­al support.

Bullet is probably one of the smartest and most intuitive dogs I’ve ever met, but even the smartest dogs sometimes have internal clock errors. Here is Bul­let miscalculating the time and asking for his dinner half an hour too early.

Here is Drake after dinner one day, forgetting to retract his tongue back into his mouth after finishing grooming himself.

And for some bonus photos, here is Kaya sitting below Erin’s desk while she works, which I took a few weeks ago…

… as well as Drake staring off into the distance, looking like a wise old man, probably solving integral calculus and differential equations in his head.