Crabs shouldn't elicit 'Ewww' response

I’ve got crabs.
And they’re not just mine. I share them with my wife, Jenny, and son, Braden, as they are now part of our ever-growing family.
Most people would be afraid to admit they own crabs, probably because the reaction you receive when you tell someone you have crabs is “Ewww, crabs.” But in my opinion these hermit crabs are so cute that I want to talk about them, despite other peoples’ opinions.
Jenny purchased the crabs last weekend while shopping without me. If I had been there, I would have said “Ewww, crabs,” and not allowed her to purchase them. But since I wasn’t there to stop her, she bought them for Braden.
Braden is a spunky 3-year-old who is not afraid of any animals, including worms, which he put in his mouth once after I jokingly told him he should eat them. That surprised me because the boy doesn’t put most of the food he is given unless it’s a peanut butter sandwich, chicken tenders, hot dogs, cookies, Captain Crunch cereal, grapes or apples.
So when Jenny brought home the crabs, he was elated. Especially when he saw the bright painted seashells they came in.
We’ve already got two cats, BigE and Priscilla, named after Elvis and his wife, and a goldfish named Dorothy, which Braden named after Elmo’s goldfish, also named Dorothy.
Jenny asked Braden what he wanted to name the crabs. He didn’t understand the question and said one was green and the other was rainbow, the colors of their seashells.
Jenny suggested he should call the rainbow one Sebastian, the name of the crab in “The Little Mermaid.”
Understanding the question better, Braden said the other one should be named Roast Beef – not because he likes to eat it but because he likes the “Toe” poem I always tell him when putting on his socks. You know, the one that goes “This little piggy went to market, this little piggy stayed home, this little piggy had roast beef, this little piggy had none, and this little piggy went ‘wee-wee-wee’ all the way home.”
It’s an unusual name, but we like it. Maybe with a name of a food most everybody likes, people would be less likely to say “Ewww, crabs” when I mention that I have crabs.
With Sebastian and Roast Beef as official members of the Steuck clan, the number of animal members in it is greater than the number of human ones. That’s odd for me because I didn’t grow up with many pets – just a dog or cat every once in a great while. I’d like a dog again, but until Braden is old enough to take care of it, specifically clean up after it does its “duty,” a dog is something that will wait.
Crabs are a new experience. They make Braden laugh every time they come out of their shells, and they’re clean and easy to care for.
They also come in an enclosed aquarium, which prevents BigE from trying to eat the crabs. We have to keep Dorothy out of reach from BigE, because she has tried a few times to paw the fish out of its fishbowl.
Although BigE is actively trying to make the Steuck clan smaller, while Jenny is the opposite and making it bigger, I’m content to keep it at three people and five animals. Unless Jenny would allow me to have a tarantula or a pot-bellied pig, then I’d gladly increase it again.
Tarantulas are cool, and something I’ve been minorly obsessed with since seeing the “Gilligan’s Island” episode as a boy that featured the giant spider crawling on Gilligan while he slept. I even allowed a pet store owner once to put a tarantula on top of my then full-haired head.
Snakes are even cooler, and something I’ve taken Braden out on unsuccessful missions to find. Someday we will bring one back to Jenny, who is deathly afraid of them. She reacts the way most people react to crabs – “Ewww, snakes.”
I’ll never understand this “Ewww” reaction to any animal, especially crabs. They are after all just wonderful creatures in a world full of them. And people that keep telling me that I should go to a doctor to take care of my crabs are plain ignorant. Veterinarians, not doctors, take care of animals. Fools.