life & style // no. 12 theotherpress.ca

Pet popularity rises during pandemic

» New safety guidelines affect animal adoptions at shelters

Cheryl Minns
Senior Columnist

 

hysically distancing yourself from

others—be it six feet apart or full
isolation—can certainly get lonely without
some kind of interaction. Perhaps this is
why (among other reasons) people are
now opening their homes to rescue pets—
making a new friend for life and freeing up
shelter space for another animal in need.

“There are a lot of people saying that

this is an opportunity to bring an animal
into their home because they've got the
time,” said Nicole McBain, manager of

 

the Burnaby SPCA, to the Other Press in
a phone interview. “It’s been really great
community support.”

Although new physical distancing and
cleaning protocols mean BC SPCA shelters
are closed to the public for casual viewings,
the shelters are working within these new
limits to accommodate the people who
want to adopt.

“We're directing everyone to our
website where we have a new online
application for dogs and cats that can be
filled out directly on the website, which
is great,” McBain said. “Everything is by
appointment only. We're spacing them

Illustration by Athena Little

out to make sure that we don’t have
overlapping visitors coming in.”

Like the BC SPCA, the New
Westminster Animal Shelter has changed
its adoption procedure due to the new
protocols and being closed to the public.
The old procedure allowed the public to
visit the shelter and see the animals, find
a pet they would like to adopt, submit an
application, wait a few days for approval,
then return to pick up their pet. Now the
shelter has streamlined the process to avoid
having people make multiple trips. Instead,
they ask people to review the adoptable
animals online, submit an application for
their desired pet, wait to be approved, and
then arrange to meet the animal in person.

“We schedule a time for them to come
meet the pet and, if the meeting goes well,
we can send them home the same day. We
can do that with our cats and our small
animals—rabbits, guinea pigs, and such,”
said Margie Fox, an animal service officer at
the New Westminster Animal Shelter.

However, this new procedure has
affected the adoption possibilities of
a certain type of popular pet at New
Westminster Animal Shelter.

“Unfortunately, we can't do the meet
and greets with dogs and adhere to the
physical distancing requirements. We'll
gladly talk to people on the phone about
the dogs we have for adoption and take
applications and review them, but we'll
have to postpone any meetings. The dogs
we have are probably going to be with us
until we can reopen to the general public,”
Fox said.

On March 23 to 27, the BC SPCA ran
an adoption promotion which offered 50

percent off adoption fees. According to the
BC SPCA website, the promotion resulted
ina variety of animals finding new homes.
Adopted pets included the usual cats and
dogs, and birds, small animals, and even
some farm animals—including mini-horses.

“Over 300 animals around the
province found their home in just one
week,” McBain said.

The community’s outpouring of
support for local shelters is surely a
welcomed surprise, considering some
groups fear that pets may potentially play a
role in spreading COVID-19.

“T think there has been some concern,
but it hasn't been as prevalent as we were
anticipating,” McBain said.

According to the BC Centre for
Disease Control website, there isn’t
any evidence at this time that shows
domestic animals or livestock can get sick
from COVID-19 or spread it to humans.
However, the centre also states that the
situation is constantly changing and new
information on this issue could come to
light in the future.

For those interested in adopting
a pet, check out spca.be.ca for the BC
SPCA and local city shelters for online
listings of adoptable animals and adoption
applications.

For anyone wanting to support shelters
and the animals in their care, many shelters
have a donation option on their websites
where people can send financial support.

“We are always very grateful for
monetary donations because they go right
to the veterinary costs that are above and
beyond the basic care,’ Fox said.

A losing battle against online classes

>» Can we get back in the classroom or nah?

Matthew Fraser

is—I have shit to catch up on.

probably (albeit inadvertently)

Opinions Editor

 

y consciousness floats

somewhere between wakeful
boredom and whatever dream I
was in the night before. I'll lay here,
conscious of the impending alarm
notes but uncaring; the sun shines
on to the foot of my bed and the
ambience paints the inside of my
eyelids. It could be 10 minutes, or it
might be three hours, but I’m not
moving.

The sound “Bach Cello Suite
No.1 Prelude” wafts from my phone
speaker and calls me to turn it off; I
drag the plastic contraption into bed
with me like my body heat would
console it. Doesn’t happen, 10:05 am
hits and it starts again. Out of bed,
naked and cold, across the short floor
that divides my studio apartment—I
turn on the kettle. The joys of living
alone. Now that the ‘Rona has us all
on lockdown, every day is a school
day. The first week of shutdown saw
me do nothing followed by nothing
at all. The second week saw the
dawning of my responsibilities and
now—God alone knowing what day it

Pants (no underwear because
commando is for freedom’s sake),
housecoat over my bare chest, and I
sit down with my tea for an absorbing
day in front of my computer shoving
PowerPoint slides into my central
processing apparatus. Some slides
about fiscal policy sit in front of me,
rendered by a 1080p screen. The
self-study online textbook could bore
me to death if the pain in my spine
from sitting too long didn’t cause me
to twitch.

It’s linguistics now and I would
consider fighting someone to hear
the drone of a human voice over the
even silence of a computer screen.
The mind wanders and fixates on the
endless abyss of meme recollection.
Black screen; it’s been at least four
minutes and the screensaver has
leapt into action. I think I was
absorbed by the swirl of a long-lost
paint stroke during the creation
of my white walls. My green tea is
probably getting cold, my keyboard
and mouse batteries are probably
going to die from being left on for
so long, and I’m sure that if a power
outage struck right now, it would

help my education.

I have endless envy for the
people who can self-study their
way to a degree. What type of
self-motivated monster can
crush PowerPoints and dry policy
descriptions so ravenously as to
be awarded a degree at the end?
Teachers should thank people
like me for preventing their job
obsolescence. If 16-year-old me
could see today's me begging for
aclassroom, he would be shocked
into sickness and consternation.

Kendrick Lamar once told
me (not directly) “ADHD crazy.”
He was not wrong. “Maybe if I
throw on an album it'll break this
boredom.” J like lying to myself.
Santana’s “Abraxas” nears its end
and my fiscal policy slides beckon
witha sneer.

Once again, I am asking for
your attention. Cursing in every
single language I know, I blink
to clear the glaze from my eyes
and hope that the dryness doesn’t
cause my eyeballs to fall from
their sockets. Being bored to tears
might help.

 

Photo by Billy Bui