A Dog’s Life – Page 21

Cats peacefully coexisting in a kitty condo

Good grief! My mom was so happy to see this. Two cats peacefully sharing their kitty condo. Ophelia even poked her nose out of her hiding place. That sausage shaped toy is (or was) filled with catnip. Turns out both cats are catnip junkies.

My mom Cathy is ecstatic. “Next thing they’ll be playing together! Cuddling up in the winter!”

Yeah, right, mom. And pigs will fly. And you will win the lottery. And I will go to the dog park every day and twice on Christmas.

You don’t think mom bought that kitty condo, do you? Hah. Mom is VERY cheap. Frugal, she says. She got it as a gift when somebody moved out. She put the cushions through our washing machine and then we got a new piece of furniture.

However, this is NOT a good time to insult my mom’s frugality. I’m due for a teeth cleaning. My mom makes no complaints when it comes to giving us vet care. We get more preventive medicine than she does.

Accepting a treat in the Dog Park

Lindsay, who was Dog Park Steward until recently, is exempt from the “No Treats” ban imposed by my mom. Lindsay likes to sit on the wall surrounded by a bunch of dogs. That’s her big black lab, Jasper, on the right. Jasper is an official service dog. He’s all trained and he looks awfully impressive when he’s wearing his tags.

Hmm…have you noticed a pattern to the recent pictures in this blog? All about treats. Is my mom trying to tell me something?

Dog begging for treats in dog park

Here I am in Regrade Dog Park in Belltown, right in the heart of Seattle. It’s a warm Saturday afternoon. My mom wants me to get some exercise so I’ll be tired when she goes out tonight. So we walked over here. That’s over a mile, Mom. More like a mile and a half. I thought I was getting adopted, not joining a hiking club.

This nice man had a box of treats. I tried…and tried. But mom said, “No way. I don’t want Gracie begging for food in the dog park. We came here so she could get some exercise.”

I can be very persistent when it comes to treats. Mom thinks I’ll stop begging if I never get any reward. We all know: it’s an uphill battle.

Why some people do not deserve to be dog owners

My mom Cathy woke me up from my nap today. “Look what I just read in an Examiner column,” she yelled, pointing to her laptop. I refused to budge so she told me what she read. And then I see why she got so mad.

You can read the whole thing for yourself, right here.

Accoding to my mom, some Examiner.com columnist praised the best Craiglist Ad of the Week. The ad was headlined: “Wanted: Someone To Make My Kids Cry.” Here’s the story:

A single dad was looking for an actor to pretend to be a dog walker. The dad had found a new home for the dog which was a “terror” who couldn’t be trained. This actor would take their cocker spaniel for a walk and return, pretending the dog had run away. In fact the dog would supposedly go to a new home. The actor would be there when the kids started crying. The actor would be pad $500 for about two hours of work.

Can you believe this? A cocker spaniel who’s terrorizing the family?

I’m a dog and I can tell this whole thing is sick. No wonder nice dogs like me end up in rescue.

Here’s what my mom wrote as a comment:

Sorry, I don’t think this ad is funny. If the dad would invest the $500 in a dog trainer, the kids would have their dog and no reason to cry. Has the dog been tested for health problems? Was it abused? If the kids grow up into terrors (not surprising, with this parenting) will he give them away too?

Dog and owner on beach

My mom wanted a picture with the water. So as we were leaving, she got Jake to take a picture of her with Scott, the club president. Scott looks happy because he’s getting married in a couple of weeks. My mom looks a little uptight because she’s within a mile of a camera. Even though she wanted this picture, she told me, “I belong in the Guinness Book of World Records for Least Photogenic Person on the Planet.”

I don’t know what she’s talking about. Guinness? Records? Planet? But I do know she was never born to be a model.

I, on the other hand…

Mom and I go to a picnic

I’ve been telling my mom she needs to get a life. Finally she listened. We went to the picnic of my mom’s alumni group. See, my mom went to a college called Barnard in New York. Barnard is part of Columbia so my mom gets to go to Columbia’s alumni activities.

This one was good because I got to go too. Here’s a picture of my mom and me with a bunch of other alums. My mom’s t-shirt says, “Friend Request Denied.” She wears it to social events, figuring people might ask her about her life on the Internet.

Notice how I hold center stage?

Uh oh…a dog who’s cuter than I am.

This is Meatball, a dog who lives in our building. He’s just a puppy so he’s in the cute stage.

Usually when I’m with another dog, I steal the show. “Gracie’s so cute,” everyone says. But Meatball is the ultimate scene-stealer.

He’s just a pup so I try to ignore him when he wants to play. All that young puppy energy! Too much for me. Anyway, I know what’s coming. Meatball is going to grow into a big 70-pound dog. They’ll be calling him Meatloaf, not Meatball. Then he’ll be way too big to play with me.

My mom’s not good with kids herself. She doesn’t even adopt puppies and kittens. I have to admit she’s a good dog mom but her maternal instinct isn’t quite all there.

Me too. But we have to admit: Meatball’s adorable.

Queen Anne Farmers Market: Good For Treats

My mom just bought a dozen eggs from the Dog Mountain Farm booth. She noticed they were selling bags of treats from last week, which was Dog Day at the Queen Anne Farmers Market.

“Good healthy treats,” she said approvingly. “Carrots. Veggies. No preservatives.”

“Delicious,” I said. “Worth a good sit.”

Last week the Dog Mountain folks were handing out treats. So this week I made a beeline to the booth. I moved right into my very best treat-accepting posture, which almost nobody can resist.

“Amazing,” my mom said. “Just one treat, ONE time, and Gracie remembers a whole week later. Now why can’t she remember the basics of walking on leash?”

Too many details, mom. Besides, it’s so boh-ring.

When my mom’s friend Bob came to visit, he remembered Creampuff. He had visited Cathy in New Mexico, when her cats were Creampuff and Tiger.

Bob has always been very nice to Cathy’s cats. When she moved to New Mexico from Florida, he kept them for about six weeks till she got settled. Cathy was sure she’d never see the cats again but no such luck. Bob put them on a plane for Tucson and Cathy met them at the airport. They even managed to change planes in Dallas without getting lost.

Bob told Cathy, “You need to give Creampuff more attention.”

“No problem,” Cathy said. “I’ll send her to you. I bet there’s room in your luggage when you fly back tonight!”

Way to go, Mom! You’re finally catching on. This household would be greatly improved with one less cat.

WSJ Does It Again: Health Care for Dogs vs. People

My mom thinks the WSJ editors need to take some courses in logic and research. She is still appalled at the way they discussed education in their editorial section. Today the WSJ Weekend features a HUGE story comparing veterinary care with people care.

“See, Gracie,” Mom says, holding up the paper. “Pictures of dogs in the Wall Street Journal. Aren’t they cute?”

Nah. Not as cute as me. Besides, they’re boring breeds, not a one-of-a-kind CUPPIE like me.

“This is nuts,” Mom continued. “What’s new here? Of course dogs get good health care when their humans pay cash for a vet. I shudder to think what I’ve spent on your care, given your sensitive tummy.”

Ouch. This is a sore subject, literally. But mom is being unfair. We haven’t been to the vet for my tummy in six months, probably because that nice Dr Clare at UrbanVet gives Mom a supply of tummy pills that she can use on her own.

“We’re almost out of pills,” Mom says, giving me The Look. “So stay out of the garbage!”

Anyway, the WSJ story seems a little silly, even to a dog. All over the world, people with money will go outside government systems to get good care. Canada doesn’t allow private health care so what do their rich citizens do? They come to the US. They go to the Mayo Clinic.

Pay cash anywhere and you get to choose your medical service, whether you are a human or a canine…or even a feline. I have to remind mom that Ophelia came with her own big stack of vet bills.

Charity vet service? Good luck. My vet told my mom, “Many people wouldn’t have nursed Ophelia back to health when she had liver disease. They would have taken her back to the shelter or had her put to sleep.”

Life without Ophelia? No comment. My mom’s generosity doesn’t extend to visits with the doggie psychiatrist.