Dog Sense

There’s something odd about the way Pepper is wired. If my neighbor opens his garage door an inch she goes instantly from a snoring sleep to a barking frenzy to protest his audacity.

If a deer is standing right outside the front window munching his way through my plants

like it’s the salad bar then she just carries on snoozing. My next door to the next door neighbor has an evil looking pudgy cat that I admit I would love to toss rocks at and it makes Pepper go off like a box of rockets. The other day we were taking a walk when a fox crossed the road in front of us and it was as though it was invisible. Stink bugs. She loves Stinkbugs. And with the weather slowly warming up more and more of them are emerging. They come from the back of the fireplace or the chimney or I don’t know where. She sees one and oh my goodness its like she’s found a long lost toy. She sniffs it and then tries to suck it up and flip it in the air. I end up scrambling with tissues to delicately pick it up and release it outside before it explodes into a cloud of horrible stench the way Stinkbugs do. Pepper then starts whining like I’m Mr. Cruelty throwing away her plaything. Her idea of what is a plaything is definitely a little wonky. When we out walking last week she found something in the grass that she started to prod and push and I thought great she’s found fresh deer poo a frog or a snail or something like that. It was actually something not like that at all but an 18-inch snake and a not too happy 18-inch snake at that. I yanked Pepper’s leash just in time to see the serpent hissing madly and slithering off into a pile of leaves. Her box of misfit toys lies untouched and only the fabric bone gets Pepper time. One time a bird flew into the house and led us on a merry chase all over until I cornered it and captured it by throwing a towel. As I carried the trembling thing to freedom Pepper was running alongside me jumping up and down trying to snatch it back. As it flew off with nary a glance backwards Pepper watched it with ever-increasing sadness. She gave a deep sigh looked reproachfully up at me and took herself off to go dream of my neighbor’s garage door.

Park n bark

The weather was unseasonably beautiful last weekend so we made a spur of the moment decision to jump in the car and go for a long walk at a nearby park.

Pepper always acts weird in cars. She is so excited to get in and then a few minutes into the ride she starts giving out a strange quiet but high pitched whine almost like she’s crying and I can never tell if it’s a happy whine or an unhappy one. I open all the windows on a theory that cabin pressure is uncomfortable for her even though we are flying at an altitude of maybe three feet with no turbulence in sight.

At the park she goes into a sniffing frenzy. It’s like she’s been dropped into the worlds

biggest collection of smells and she’s in sensory overload. She’s so excited her bladder and bowels can’t take it. Mr. Pickup is always on duty with a roll of hot pink bags.

She’s so excited she pays no attention to people. On our neighborhood walks she always

gets barky when strange people come into her view. Here in the park she’s also about 80% unaware of other dogs. Only when they notice and react to her does her back suddenly grow a hump of stand up fur to indicate she’d like to show some pooch or other who’s the top dog. She is so happy to be discovering new and different smells that she is marking territory like crazy. A drop of pee here drop of pee there. Here a drop. There a drop. It’s a wonder she’s got any left. Probably doesn’t. Probably just spraying pee scented air now. And then its time for home. Again she eagerly leaps into the car and off we go. 2 minutes later its wheeeeee! Whhhhhhheeeeeee! All the way home. And there she drinks a whole bowl of water and fall fast asleep.

Toy Story

Toys have a very short life with Pepper. To be told by Santa that you are destined to be

an indestructible play-bone for my little princess is to be told you are going on death row with a grisly death coming your way quicker than you ever imagined. She has had the toughest of the tough and rendered them to rags spilling their foam guts everywhere in a matter of minutes. Her toy box as of now is a pitiable sight that is the toy equivalent of a battle field hospital tent during the Crimean War. If they could speak we could never sleep for the heart-rending groans of the torn and tattered bodies that gave themselves in service so gallantly. Last week her longest living indestructible squeaking bone gave up the ghost at last. In a frenzy of chewing scratching tearing and stretching the weakened fabric fell like the walls of Jericho. Pepper is never gracious in her victory. Honor would be to allow these victims a quick and merciful consignment to the trash. She is however a dog without honor. She rips out their entrails gleefully and parades their lifeless carcasses around and around like Achilles gloating in the death of Paris. When what is left of the toy is taken from her and placed in the kitchen trash she takes up a position in front of the trash drawer and cries. These are not cries of mourning and regret. They are the cries of an enemy who wants to dig up your grave and build a cage with your bones as Warren Zevon once sang. If re-incarnation is our way of journeying toward the light of spiritual perfection please don’t let me come back as a chew toy for Pepper. That fate is reserved only for the baddest of the bad.