It’s common knowledge that cephalopods are fucking rad.

Most of them are gelatinous in form, have suckers, squirt ink out of orifices, have technicolor skin bits and, most importantly, possess sharp beaks.  Beaks, for fucks sake!  And they aren’t birds!  Or teenagers squishing their lips together for pictures on Facebook!  Or that preternatural abomination known as a platypus!

Basically, I want one.  I want an octopus.  I told my boss, JMad, that an octopus has the same level of intelligence as the average house cat.  And that I wanted an octopus for a pet.  And I believe his response was something like, “Look at how I’m uploading these pictures on eBay” and I was all, “you are a bastard that doesn’t understand the bond that could be, should be made between woman and cephalopod” but instead I said, “okay, I’m looking.”

So, I’ve compiled this pro and con list in regards to whether or not I should purchase an octopus, name it Mittens (to make mockery of felines), dress it up in Christmas sweaters knit not of yarn, but of seaweed, and take pictures of it with captions over its beak like “I CAN HAZ SEABURGER?”:

PROS

– The plural of octopus is octopi and that word is innately badass and that badassery would inevitably rub off on me due to the way that nomenclature spreads its blessings through osmosis.  Particularly through the secretions of watery lifeforms.  Come on, guys.  This is known.  Perhaps I should get more than one octopus.

– If they have beaks that are oddly reminiscent of parrot beaks, then it stands to reason that they might be trainable in the art of mimicry.  Perhaps Mittens could be taught to say “Mittens wants a sea cumber” at dinner parties and everyone would be like, “Oh, that Mittens with his words that are all meaningless to him because he can’t possibly understand what they symbolize” and then carry on eating their creme brulee or whatever the hell I fixed them to eat.  Unless, of course, Mittens refuses to come out of his hidyhole and speak.  Then the sounds would be garbled under the water.  Note to self: You are assuming that cephlapods have vocal cords.  This assumption is stupid.

– Octopi can change colors so Mittens would match every ensemble I ever wear.  Mittens would leave a sheen of slime on me, and perhaps raised welts from his suckers on my skin, but we’d at least go together because Mittens would see all my outfits as opportunities for learning to adapt and use camouflage because Mittens will be a goddamned optimist.

– The only hard part on Mittens’s body would be the beak.  That means he could fit through a hole just big enough in diameter to accommodate his sharp mouth-bit.  So if the Pocky Lips comes, and I’m trapped in a room with Mittens, and zombies and werewolves riding Velociraptors have me under house arrest, I could bore a small hole in the wall and send Mittens out with a missive for help.  Or beseech him to bring back saltines and prunes.  Or he’d kill off the undead scourge with sleeper holds so tight they’d pop off heads, taking them out eight at a time.

– Octopus tentacles can open up jars!  Indeed they can.  So if I needed a jar of mayo opened, I could hand it off to Mittens and bingo! the jar is opened.  I was thinking this might be a con, but then I figured as long as I kept my jars of kalamata olives out of the octopus tank I have little to worry about.

CONS

– They aren’t a very long-lived species, those octopi.  Their lifespan is anywhere from 6 months to 5 years.  Just as I’ll be getting to know Mittens, forcing him to take walks on the hot asphalt with me in mid-July, putting saran wrap booties on the tips of his eight legs, he might just up and die, for no apparent reason.  Certainly not due to abuse or torture.  Just because the universe wants to take away everything that I love.

– In my last post in the ECro Does Wrong category (see August August Archives), I mentioned the Alien Facehuggers.  And this theme is apparently lodged in my mental parts for the time being.  Well, I’m assuming that since octopi are great escape artistes, then Mittens could come into my bedroom uninvited.  At night.  And if he has the intelligence of a cat, he might also have the vengeful, “where the fuck is my moist catfood I’m gonna put a claw in your tearduct, bitch” attitude as well.  So if Mittens gets mad at me, he might go all Facehugger and use his beak to snap off the tip of my nose and carry it away on his undulating tentacles, leaving a moist trail of wet on my coverlet and a new cavity in my face spurting forth blood.  Huh.

– Because I will love Mittens so much, I will understandably be concerned about someone raping him.  I don’t know what this says about my mindset, that I naturally worry about people raping my pets, but I’m not the one being scrutinized here, by…me.  Mittens will be all soft and squishy with a big, gaping hole right in his pliant center.  Sure, it’s capped with a beak, but some men will put their dicks in anything.  And if Mittens gets raped, I’ll have to sit him down next to me on a melamine plate and talk to him about the way he dresses and how he waves his tentacles at anything this looks his way and to stop being a total slut and get him to understand that it’s his fault.  And if he does understand that he needs to take blame as the victim, he may retaliate.  Please see the above listed con.

I can come up with more reasons for and against getting Mittens, but at the end of the day, and the end of this post, the reality is that I just want a fucking octopus and so I’m gonna find me a Mittens to love.  I went inside to get a drink of water half-way through writing this post and asked my husband, ASup, if I could have an octopus.  His response was, “okay.”  No questions about why, where I would keep it, what brand of crack I’d just smoked.  No, just the kind of blanket support a husband gives a wife that has eccentric tastes.  Because he probably figures if he says “no” then I’ll press him for a wolverine.  Or a rabid possum.

You’re all invited over to welcome Mittens home once I purchase him.  We shall have an Octopus shower, replete with corny games where we guess what Mittens’s skin color turns when we scare him with various objects.  I’ll have briny punch and you’ll bring cards of congratulations with the word baby crossed out and replaced with octopus and gifts of glowstones to add to his aquarium tank.

But until then, please enjoy this fine Youtube video of an octopus escaping a fishing boat.*  He’s like a freakish amalgamation of chicken livers and turkey kidneys held together with the stealth of James Bond.  That might explain the accompanying music.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfuOn3rxdy8

*But read all my other blog posts before you watch the video.  Then come back to this post and reread it and skip the asterisk that tells you to read all the other blog posts and go ahead and follow the link to the video.