From Raptor's Easter Thread:

Rabbit Story #1:

Mrs. Raptor brought home this beautiful six month old Netherland Dwarf rabbit colored like a Siamese cat. Netherland Dwarfs are very small with short snouts and ears. Her rabbit expert friend who gave us this rabbit said it was a girl. So we named her Sonya after my secretary, who was Dutch Indonesian, visiting in Holland at the time, and had big brown eyes like the rabbit. Sonja thought she was a dog, was housebroken, came when you called her, and slept in the bed with us.

We had some friends who lived in Solana Beach that had a sailboat. We used to go sailing with them to Catalina Island all the time. They loved Sonya and got a boy rabbit, which they named Bibby after Henry Bibby, who was playing basketball for UCLA at the time. Bibby had a white patch on his chest like a bib. One time we took Sonya down to meet Bibby and go sailing. We found out within about three seconds that Sonya wasn't a girl and Bibby wasn't a boy. Mrs. Raptor was laughing so hard she was crying. Sonya became Isaac. Isaac lived to the ripe old age of nine. He died when we moved into our current house -- the move and installing hardwood floor in our dining room was too much for the little guy.

Rabbit Story #2:

Shortly after we moved into our new house, some kids down the street sort of adopted us. They raised Netherland dwarf rabbits. One day they showed up with these tiny 2 1/2 week old bunnies in a blanket. We said "We'll take that one," a dark gray little guy with a white chest and feet. They said "OK, but they won't be weaned until they're eight weeks." Well, the next Friday evening I came home from work to find this tiny little bunny hopping around on the kitchen table. Mrs. Raptor said "They declared him weaned." I made myself a short drink of Jack Daniels on the rocks and set it down on the table. The rabbit started drinking it! He wasn't supposed to be weaned from his mother's milk until eight weeks and at 3 1/2 weks he was drinking whiskey. Of course, we named him JD. He also thought he was a dog and slept in the bed with us.

Mrs. Raptor's best friend moved to Chicago and gave us her cat, Jamaica, a 25 pound ass kicking guy. We had a Blue Jay who used to dive bomb and torment all the cats in the neighborhood. On day one, Jamaica ate the Blue Jay. Jamaica then proceeded to kick the crap out of all the cats in the neighborhood. Then he tangled with a possum -- and lost. Well, JD really had Jamaica's number. He was just a little bit bigger than Jamaica's head, but he used to chase Jamaica around. He once chased him up a tree. JD also lived to be nine. Then one day, chasing the cat, he ran headfirst into a metal bedpost. That was the end of JD.

Rabbit Stort #3:

Then we got a really little Netherland dwarf baby bunny that was cream colored with a black nose and ears. He loved to climb up things and pissed a lot (housebroken). Since he always went up and made water, we named him Archimedes after the Archimedes Screw. This was quickly shortened to Archie. Archie was a real charmer. He also slept in the bed with us and thought he was a dog. People would come over to visit us, but they really wanted to see Archie. Unfortunately, he had some congenital birth defect and died at nine months. We were very sad.

OK, Raptor's theory on rabbits: Think about it -- in what settings have you ever encountered rabbits? (1) in the wild, where you cannot make close contact, observation, or interaction and (2) in cages or hutches, where their personalities are stifled and their bodies are atrophied -- rabbits like to run! They're little hot rods. Pretend you were from outer space, conducting a survey of the human race, and your sample consisted of (1) the Tadasay in the rainforest highlands of New Guinea who are (at least until recently) still in the Stone Age and (2) people in prison. What kinds of conclusions would you draw about the human race? My observation is that rabbits are much more intelligent, personable, communicative, and clever than people give them credit for.