Pets and the prospect of alien invasion

I wonder if pets are not some sort of alien conspiracy meant to drain our society of vital resources and leave us vulnerable to invasion.

Let's think about this:

1) Pets consume food, bedding, newspapers, couches, children, laptop cords, and other vital goods.

2) Pets establish solid relationships with us. They dig emotional talons deep into our very souls and then, when we least expect it, drop dead. I think the aliens might own stock in anti-depressant companies. Anyway, this leaves us needing to buy still more pets.

3) Pets produce no useful physical goods. I have never seen a pet hack up/shed/emit, for example, a replacement set of car keys when one would be convenient.

These three points may not worry you a bit, "Ah," you counter, "what of the intangible benefits of pet ownership? Never mind that, what about stories of dogs calling the fire department or saving lost skiers?" Let us again list the facts:

4) Pets cause people to have lower blood pressure and reduce (or delay) the onset of many symptoms of old age.

5) Your pet might call the fire department as your house erupts in flame around you.

What is the consequence of this? People live longer. This is the key to the grand alien conspiracy. First, they decrease the birth rate by making children unfashionable in the industrialized world. Second, they use "pets" to increase life expectancy. By my calculations, in 2130 the average age for a human male will be 85. It is then, when we cannot, as a global society, remember where we put the remote, let alone the nuclear launch codes, that they unleash a massive attack. Most of us probably would not even make it out of our Barcaloungers.

So are we doomed? I think not. This tactic, you see, works both ways. We must immediately launch millions of small capsules containing hamsters into space in all directions. We cannot afford a gap in pet technology. Hamsters only live 2-2.5 years. Without our massive supplies of Prozac the alien horde would be quivering heaps of emotionally distraught rubble in mere decades.

I would lead the proverbial charge in this endeavor, but any mention of firing hamsters into the void would cause me, at the hands of my sister, a demise even more terrifying than the prospect of alien invasion.

I'll stop trying to be funny in my next post. I promise.

Disclaimer: Almost everything I just wrote is a lie. Probably. Fido is watching you right now, isn't he?