I received a challenge this week to write about my husband.

“But I can’t write about Geoff,” I said. “He’s too perfect. I don’t want women chasing him all over town.”

My challenger (who knows Geoff) gave me a cynical look. 

“I’m sure he has a quirk or two you could write about,” said Ric.

And that’s when I sinned. A sin of omission.

“Nope,” I said. “He’s perfect.” 

Accidentally omitting “-ly weird.”

I arrived home shortly after my conversation with Ric and was greeted at the door by my silver-haired, dignified husband. In boxer shorts. And an Underdog t-shirt. He was holding a plastic mixing spoon like a microphone and singing, “Say goodbye to conventional ways. You can’t escape the hours, you lose track of the days. Something, something, something. Everybody wants you.” 

OK, so maybe Geoff does have a few qualities some might view as weird, but his quirks and mine align rather nicely. I have an affinity for unique perspectives (his specialty), and enjoy knowing that life with him will never be dull. He’s endlessly entertaining, even when deeply asleep. 

A little over a year ago, Geoff began to walk in his sleep. It doesn’t happen that often (maybe once a month) and while I’m not sure if there’s a connection, each episode has occurred on a full moon. So in tune is my man with nature that he, like the tide, is controlled by the moon. 

After each sleepwalking incident, he has little or no recollection of having been up, but his nighttime meanderings aren’t quiet at all. I often wake to hear cabinets being open and shut, things banging together, the sound of feet clomping up and down squeaky stairs. Nor are Geoff’s full moon fooleries evidence free. My Nightstalker has a habit of leaving doors open and of viewing bathmats as a suitable bed.

For a while, Geoff was alarmed by his increasingly peculiar actions during his nocturnal strolls. And for that, Celeste and I share some blame. Rather than simply leaving doors open and sleeping on bathmats, we decided it would be fun to make him believe he stacked cans in his sleep. We’d get up early and build big towers of canned peas and creamed corn, labels neatly aligned, smack dab in the center of our kitchen floor.

It was worth the lost sleep.

(Yeah, honey. That really wasn’t you.)

Geoff is a fan of the television show, Boston Legal, particularly the Denny Crane character, who blames his bizarre behavior on Mad Cow disease. Celeste and I try to keep that in mind when Geoff randomly responds to a simple question with an answer so bizarre it has us scratching our heads. 

Example: “Hey, Geoff. Have you seen the remote?”

Geoff: “Blank Frank is the messenger of your doom and your destruction!”

Then he’ll blink blankly at us a few times, say, “Mad cow,” and walk away.

He says that by doing this often enough, we’ll never know if Alzheimer’s has actually set in, so he’ll thus be protected from ever being shipped off.

The thing is, I realize ours is not the average home. There’s the rat-loving dog. The cats that dine in a highchair. The daughter whose apparent goal is to trigger a cardiac event by hiding in places too small for grown ups to anticipate a person might be. 

And then there’s me. Who see it as perfect. 

Geoff asked, “If odd behavior is the norm, is it still odd?”

And I responded, “Say goodbye to conventional ways. You can’t escape the hours, you lose track of the days. Something, something, something. Everybody wants you.”

I was taken to task in Reader’s Voice recently . . .

Karin Fuller should research birds before she writes an article about birdhouses in her column. Only very few small species of birds use birdhouses. The reason the holes are small is to keep those small birds safe and larger predatory animals and other birds out. 

I get so frustrated by people who jump to conclusions and accuse me of not researching. If they had kept reading just a few lines further, they’d have seen . . .

When it came time to decide what size hole to cut in our birdhouse, I went online to look for information. I found a chart listing hole dimensions and house hanging heights for a large variety of birds. Doves weren’t on the list. Turns out they prefer open-ended nesting shelves.

Fortunately, nice readers outnumber the grumps. Lisa McCracken from the Charleston Town Center Mall sent over a copy of a great picture taken in 1915 at the Bellevue Heights School in Syracuse. The photo appeared in Country Journal, courtesy of H. D. Daboll (the boy kneeling at the far right of the front row).

It’s been a year since we moved, but we still have much left to unpack. I spent most of the past few weekends sorting through boxes in our garage, dividing the contents into cartons marked Keep, Sell, Donate, and Trash. The collars were in the last box I opened. 

The raggedy blue collar with a bell was worn by Gypsy, our first shelter cat, when we brought her home four years ago. She’s long since outgrown it. 

The thick red collar had belonged to Jade, the most gorgeous (and only slow-witted) German shepherd I’ve ever known. She’s been gone 15 years.  

There was the expensive training collar meant to help when walking bull-headed dogs, the collar with flashing lights for walking dogs in the dark, and a leash that says, “Which one of us is a bitch?” (Both my dogs are males.) 

Each triggered memories of the animal who once wore it, and I remember how some of our dogs would seem upset when their collar was off, then proud when it was put back on. Perhaps to them, it was the equivalent of a wedding ring, of knowing they belonged to someone. 

Still, I wasn’t sure what to do with my collection of collars, so I slid them onto a shelf in my undecided zone. 

And then I got an email from Nicky Walters, news reporter for WOWK-TV. 

Walters, a board member of the Charleston/Kanawha Humane Association, is in charge of the shelter’s observance of National Homeless Animals Day on August 16. In order to raise public awareness of how many of the animals at the shelter end up not getting homes, she’s attempting to collect one collar for every animal euthanized at the Kanawha shelter when it wasn’t adopted.

In other words, she needs to collect 6,553 collars.

Walters plans to make a chain of those collars, hoping the visual impact will help open the public’s eyes to the large number of animals put down every year.

I called Donna Clark, head of the Kanawha-Charleston Animal Shelter, to talk about the project, and mentioned I was stunned by how many animals end up being put down.

“During cat season, we’re inundated with kittens,” said Clark. “Some people bring in 10 or 20 at a time, packed in one box. It’s not unusual for us to have to put 70 or 80 cats and kittens down in one day. The odds of a kitten at the shelter finding a home this time of year isn’t good.”

A large number of the animals taken to the shelter are owner surrenders, and Clark said their reasons for dropping off the animals seldom vary.

“So many of them say it’s because they’re moving,” said Clark. “I always want to ask, ‘Do you give your kids away when you move?’ Or they’ll say someone left a box of kittens on their porch or the pups just showed up in their yard. No one wants to own up to having never bothered to get their pet fixed, and they think because the pups are so cute, they won’t have any trouble finding a home.

“The only dogs that fare pretty well at the shelter are the small breeds. Bigger dogs don’t stand much of a chance.”

Clark believes the chain of empty collars is an excellent idea, and likes that the shelter can make use of the collars once the event is past.

To aid in their collection effort, a barrel has been placed in the lobby of Charleston Newspapers. Those wanting to help can leave collars, new or used, in the barrel. Since the shelter needs other items, donations of cat litter, puppy and kitten food, old blankets and towels, bleach, and paper towels can be left in the barrel as well. Donations can also be taken directly to the shelter on Greenbrier Street in Charleston.

Walters is in charge of the Kanawha-Charleston Shelter’s Kids Club, which meets every Saturday (except June 21) from 12:30 to 5.  Karin Fuller can be reached via email at karinfuller@cnpapers.com and Nicky Walters can be reached at nwalters@wowktv.com.