You can’t let opportunities pass you by. I know it seems cliché, but it’s true. When a great opportunity comes, you can’t just say, ‘oh, I’m too busy, maybe next time.’ Because ‘next time’ may not happen! There may not be a next time!

You gotta grab life by the metaphorical balls, and not waste it. You don’t want the world to leave you behind. For instance, if you see a chance to do what you love on a large-scale, for money, why in the hell would you pass it up?

Maybe you don’t think you’re ready. Get ready!

Maybe you don’t have the money. Sell some shit!

Maybe you don’t have the time. Quit your day job!

Life doesn’t give you second chances. You were lucky enough to get the opportunity the first time, why in the hell would you throw that away!?

And that’s sums up a recent episode of Littlest Pet Shop, where Blythe refuses to let the International Pet Fashion Expo pass her by! Wait, how is that a thing!?

Our story opens outside the pet shop, where Blythe and her furry/scaly compadres are cleaning her motorized scooter.

Apparently, this scooter is one of Blythe’s most prized possessions. Which confuses me since we rarely see the damn thing.

Anyway, in one of the most random openings I’ve ever seen on this show, we quickly switch to the three stereotypes; Jock, Boy, and Asian; arriving on the scene. They invite Blythe out to lunch, when she spots an ad on the back page of a magazine that Youngmee just happens to be reading at that time.

The International Pet Fashion Expo is the largest pet fashion expo in the world, according to Blythe, and it’s coming to Downtown City. You know, I’m with Jasper. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the only pet fashion expo in the world. Don’t take this the wrong way, Blythe, but it’s kind of a niche market.

Anyway, Blythe wants in. But there’s one catch: It’s only open to designers with their own shops. Seems a bit arbitrary, but whatever, we’ll run with it.

Of course she’s already ahead of the game isn’t she? She sells fashions out of the Littlest Pet Shop. Would that not count? No? Why not? I’m serious! I’m sure she gets a cut of the sales! In fact, I always assumed she got most of the proceeds from the fashion sales. Therefore, she has her own shop. It’s a shop within a shop. I guess she needs to own the space. Alright, easy solution: get Twombly to sell her part of the shop. Buy shares of the company. How much? Well, I doubt much is needed. We’ll say one per cent. Of course even that would be outside her budget. Which is why Twombly could also give her a personal loan, that’d she’d pay off in installments off her paycheck. It’s win-win! Twombly gets some coin off the interest on the loan, she’d get to help out a friend/employee, and it’d make it easier to ensure the shop would be in good hands were something to happen to her. In fact, I’d be surprised if Twombly hadn’t already taken those steps, and put Blythe in her will. I know I would. Can’t think of anyone else better.

Anyway, that’s my idea. The pets offer up a few suggestions as well. Pepper and Zoe basically suggest fashion busking, which wouldn’t count, and would probably get her arrested for harassment. Sunil uses his magic to conjure up a shop, and ends up conjuring a Littlest Pet Shop play set…

That’s… fucked.

Vinnie suggests stealing a vacant lot, and building a shop out of trash. I shouldn’t have to explain why this is stupid.

Then Penny comes up with the best solution, which Blythe realizes is basically a kiosk. A portable shop one would typically find in the middle of a mall. Zoe suggests finding a used kiosk at a second-hand store. Brilliant!

Don’t see how it’s better than my suggestion though.

So they hit the shops, to find a kiosk, and…

That’s not a kiosk!

So they hit store after store, spending money they should have saved for a kiosk, but come up dry. Then, Zoe’s nose leads them to the holy grail!

Hang on… she smelled a kiosk? Anyway, turns out it’s slightly outside her budget. Which is why you shouldn’t have bought that other shit! Then the owner makes her an offer she can’t refuse: trade in her scooter for the kiosk.

She accepts, and now has to cross town with a shitty broken down kiosk, on foot. They cross through Chinatown, pick up some street pizza, and have a run in with the world’s most incompetent crane operator.

That’s not health and safety either!

But their odyssey ends when a wheel breaks off outside the Largest Ever Pet Shop. They call Twombly for a pick up, then the Biskits teleport in front of them. The twins begin their traditional trash-talk; which, by the way, doesn’t work, it never works, because they’re too stupid to be clever. Blythe doesn’t even seem uncomfortable, just amused. And it gets pretty desperate when they suggest that they’re gonna go to the International Pet Fashion Expo as well, even though they’re not pet fashion designers, or ever shown any desire to be pet fashion designers. They’re two spoiled brats whose father owns a pet shop. Not much reason to sign up.

Twombly arrives, repairs the wheel, hooks the kiosk up to the back of the truck, as opposed to throwing it in the back seat like one might expect, and they take off.

Back at the pet shop, it’s time to fix the damn thing.

They get to work. Russell cuts a few two by fours, since apparently he doubles as a buzzsaw.

That’s… even more fucked.

They replace the wheels, patch up a few holes, and scrub the thing down. Minka gives it a new coat of paint, Blythe paints a logo onto it, and their work is done.

Roger’s impressed. And as an aside, asks if Blythe and the pets would like to meet him at the airport so they could check out the new PetJet service. It’s a plane specially equipped for travelers with pets. Which was a B-Plot I didn’t bother mentioning until now.

Basically, Roger suggested the PetJet during a meeting with his bosses, who were concerned that ticket sales were so low. Perhaps part of the problem was the fact that they were asking airline pilots, who presumably had no experience in business or marketing, for suggestions regarding business and marketing.

But that aside, most of the episode featured brief intercuts with the pets fantasizing that they were on an airplane, with Russel and Penny as pilots, and Pepper and Minka as flight attendants. There was a Snakes on a Plane reference (the snake was in a toilet, what else could it be?), but it really didn’t go anywhere. So it’s really not worth analyzing. But the song was pretty good.

So Roger suggests she take her scooter there. Yes, he suggests she use her scooter, a device generally useful for travelling short distances, to travel the dozen or so kilometers from the middle of the city to the airport.

Yeah, she also sold her scooter, but he doesn’t know that… and oddly, she doesn’t tell him. Yes, because she thinks he’ll be angry or disappointed, she doesn’t tell her father that she sold her own personal scooter to start a business. It’s her scooter, which she owns; and she gave it up to buy the kiosk, which shows a seriousness of intent. I don’t understand what the logic is here.

So, instead she points out how far it is, so Roger gives them a lift.

They arrive at the airport, and check out the plane, fully decked out for all one’s furry friends.

Seems a bit excessive. I assume this’ll be used exclusively for long-haul, or maybe coast-to-coast flights. Any trip over six hours, otherwise you’d have to be pretty indulgent to bother with the extra costs.

I’m also concerned because the plane seems a bit off-balance. Everyone sitting on the left like that just doesn’t seem right. It’d make flying the thing a bit difficult unless you re-balanced it somehow. I guess one could use the fuel tanks to do that.

Anyway, as a reward for fixing up the kiosk, Roger buys Blythe a gift: A trailer hitch to attach the kiosk to her scooter.

So it’s at this moment, with no excuses available, she finally reveals that she sold her scooter. And Roger reveals that he was fucking with her.

Well, at least this explains his moronic drive-your-scooter-several-kilometers-out-of-town suggestion from earlier.

Yes, it seems Roger was well aware that Blythe sold her scooter, since he recognized it in the window of a second-hand store, and bought it back.

Actually, that surprises me, since generally second-hand stores put a hold on any item sold to them, just in case the original owner changes their mind. Perhaps he made an exception for the original owner’s father, or this shop owner doesn’t have that policy to prevent people using his shop as a storage locker. Seriously, I found out a little over a year ago that some people use pawn shops as storage lockers… Twats.

Anyway, we finally get a happy ending, and it didn’t cost anyone anything! Except Roger, whom I presume is out $250. You’d better pay that money back, Blythe.

Some may question the fact that Blythe didn’t lose anything out of this. She gets to keep her scooter and get a new storefront kiosk. It probably sends the wrong message to kids. After all, there ain’t no free. But she didn’t know that would happen; and she did give it away with the presumption that she’d never get it back again; and once it happened, she didn’t look back, not really.

So I think this episode sends the perfect message. Blythe had to give up something precious to get something important, and she knew how important that was. I think it was sublime. One of the best episodes yet, with one of the best messages one could ask for. You only get what you give. Blythe just happened to get a bit more.