My parents thought pets in the suburbs was cruel, so I never had any – except for the turtle trauma.

My ex-wife the veterinarian did a few cool things, in addition to the four daughters, and one was to surprise me with two kittens from the vet college at the University of Guelph. I named them Clark and Kent. I’ve hung out with dogs and cats ever since.

Our two current cats came from a veterinarian in Walkerton, Ontario, in 2003, and have survived the moving around to Kansas. There were three kittens, but the one named Lucky wasn’t so lucky (Lucky’s on the left, the two black ones are still with us). I was reminded of that when my friend Jim, the former dairy farmer in Walkerton, e-mailed me yesterday.

The other cool thing I got to see via the ex-wife was the two-headed calf that was delivered to the vet college while still alive in 1986. And it’s happened again in Egypt, where a farmer says his cow has given birth to a two-headed calf that he calls a "divine miracle."

The veterinarian informed the farmer that the calf, which was born this week, is now in stable condition and is expected to survive. The calf in Guelph didn’t last long.