Dogs
The power company meter reader nodded at the teenager seated on the carport door steps then stepped around to the back of the brick house.
He paused at the gate of the backyard fence and studied the two canines enclosed therein with the meter he needed to check.
Going back to the carport, he asked the boy, "Do your dogs bite?"
The boy looked surprised and answered, "No."
So the meter man let himself into the backyard, checked the meter and ran back out, slamming the gate behind him as the barking furry duo snipped at his heels.
Annoyed, he called to the teen, "I thought you said your dogs don't bite!"
"They don't," he said. "Those aren't my dogs."
It wasn't even his house. It was mine, and my friend Tony was waiting for me to get home one summer afternoon in the mid-1980s.
My dogs didn't bother anyone, but they liked to make noise at people they didn't know. Any cat that came in the fence was fair game, however.
While visiting my friend Bo one day, his massive mastiff named Ajax walked up and planted himself in front of me. I sat on the couch and he sat on the floor, but I swear we were almost eye-to-eye.
Ajax began to growl and I almost ruined their furniture.
"Um, Bo? He's growlin' at me," I said in a strained whisper.
"He's fine, he won't bother you," Bo tried to assure me. "Don't pay any attention to that end. As long as he's wagging his tail, you're fine."
That didn't help. I was staring into teeth. His tail was nowhere within my line of vision. I talked to God a lot in the next couple of minutes, mainly about my preferred methods of dying.
But I guess Ajax's tail was wagging and I was boring, because the horse finally lumbered away.
I got an idea of what irritated him a few minutes later, however, when their tiny Chihuahua kept yapping in the mastiff's face. Ajax scooped him up in his mouth, back legs and tail sticking out of the giant dog's mouth and the tiny Mexican dog's yapping echoing in the enclosed chamber, then spit him out onto the floor. The saliva-slimed dog shook himself off and trotted quietly away.
Dogs are companions we often take for granted. As I rubbed the white head of an 11-year-old boxer mix yesterday, I bemoaned once again the fact that we cannot have fur babies where we live.
We have two plecosta-whatevers -- algae eaters -- that live in our aquarium with our black, bulgy-eyed goldfish. Hetfield and Cash, the black plecos, are each about eight inches long. Sabbath, the goldfish, is about a foot from lips to tailfin and very hefty. He was at the surface when I fed them yesterday, so I petted him.
He did not like it.
Not the same for me, either.
By the way, I think you can tell a lot about a person by how they treat animals. So, if you have access to a pettable animal, give them a pat from me, would ya?
I miss my dogs.
He paused at the gate of the backyard fence and studied the two canines enclosed therein with the meter he needed to check.
Going back to the carport, he asked the boy, "Do your dogs bite?"
The boy looked surprised and answered, "No."
So the meter man let himself into the backyard, checked the meter and ran back out, slamming the gate behind him as the barking furry duo snipped at his heels.
Annoyed, he called to the teen, "I thought you said your dogs don't bite!"
"They don't," he said. "Those aren't my dogs."
It wasn't even his house. It was mine, and my friend Tony was waiting for me to get home one summer afternoon in the mid-1980s.
My dogs didn't bother anyone, but they liked to make noise at people they didn't know. Any cat that came in the fence was fair game, however.
While visiting my friend Bo one day, his massive mastiff named Ajax walked up and planted himself in front of me. I sat on the couch and he sat on the floor, but I swear we were almost eye-to-eye.
Ajax began to growl and I almost ruined their furniture.
"Um, Bo? He's growlin' at me," I said in a strained whisper.
"He's fine, he won't bother you," Bo tried to assure me. "Don't pay any attention to that end. As long as he's wagging his tail, you're fine."
That didn't help. I was staring into teeth. His tail was nowhere within my line of vision. I talked to God a lot in the next couple of minutes, mainly about my preferred methods of dying.
But I guess Ajax's tail was wagging and I was boring, because the horse finally lumbered away.
I got an idea of what irritated him a few minutes later, however, when their tiny Chihuahua kept yapping in the mastiff's face. Ajax scooped him up in his mouth, back legs and tail sticking out of the giant dog's mouth and the tiny Mexican dog's yapping echoing in the enclosed chamber, then spit him out onto the floor. The saliva-slimed dog shook himself off and trotted quietly away.
Dogs are companions we often take for granted. As I rubbed the white head of an 11-year-old boxer mix yesterday, I bemoaned once again the fact that we cannot have fur babies where we live.
We have two plecosta-whatevers -- algae eaters -- that live in our aquarium with our black, bulgy-eyed goldfish. Hetfield and Cash, the black plecos, are each about eight inches long. Sabbath, the goldfish, is about a foot from lips to tailfin and very hefty. He was at the surface when I fed them yesterday, so I petted him.
He did not like it.
Not the same for me, either.
By the way, I think you can tell a lot about a person by how they treat animals. So, if you have access to a pettable animal, give them a pat from me, would ya?
I miss my dogs.
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