Winnie the Poop

“Hey! You tramps! What the hell do you think you’re doing here! Bunch a freeloading sons a bitches! Get off my goddamn porch!”

Up to then I thought I had the situation under control. Until my wife grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and hauled me - with extreme prejudice I might add - into the kitchen.

She shoved me into my favorite kitchen chair, the one with my ass print in it - god, how I love that chair - poured me a cup of farm fresh apple cider from the fridge and flung it in my face. Cup and all. It was plastic so I give her points for not actually trying to kill me.

“You grouchy bastard!” she said. “Those tramps were no older than six! One I know for a fact was still in his Spiderman underoos! And now we got more than a few enraged parents ready to put your head on a stick and plant it in the nearest cornfield! And I’d be more then willing  to hand it over! Just what is it you don’t get about Halloween!”

I guess I don’t know what I don’t get about anything. From grocery shopping to walking the dog to making love in the style of the romantics. I’m more the grunt and roll sort. But let’s stick with dog-walking on this one. I thought I had dog-walking down pretty good. Until that one time I come down with a severe case of bronchitis and had to take a week off from work. My wife never gets sick. She’s too busy avoiding me to catch anything I've got. It’s a theory of mine, anyway. 

My wife had her own full time job at the post office. Perfect for her disposition while being married to me. Which meant I was to be home alone with Winnie, our two year-old Pug, for the entire work week. All five days. Nine and a half total hours a day. Up to the this point I had never been left alone with the dog while at the same time juggling a raging fever and and a wheeze that would have passersby checking their backs for Darth Vader impersonators.

On day one the dog insisted on going out do his business. Even though I’d clearly stated that I was ill and he’d have to make do with the Amazon box I had filled with sand. Inside the box I had placed his favorite wubba-wubba toy to entice him. 

He was having none of it. Going so far as to raise a leg over my favorite favorite pair of penny-loafers. ‘Don’t you dare,’ I warned. ‘Them’s my favorite Sunday morning getting the bagels and paper shoes!’ But that damn dog played a mean game of statue and wore out my patience. 

After bundling up in overcoat, hat, gloves - as it was mid-winter and a recent ice storm had let it be known that it had been through here, and one had better come prepared to greet it on its own terms - I stepped into a pair of my new calf-high snow boots with the tire-chain bottoms. Take a picture and put me in that LL Bean catalog! I got this one, Mother Nature, you four-seasoned whore! My dog? Not so much. Winnie was a pug whose first inclination when confronted by anything other than warmth and a proper tree to pee upon was to bolt between my legs and race home. Letting it be known that he would not be doing his pissing and pooping standing still in the frigid air. He would be doing those things on the run. And taking me and my weakened condition with him. Winnie was tiny, but when motivated by the horrendous roar of neighborhood chain saws and snow blowers, he could bring the term ‘hysterical strength’  to a whole new level. And if you’d ever been swept off your feet and dragged over the ice by a pug under duress, you’ll know what it’s like to come up smelling like an overworked cesspool cleaner. 

Damn dog needs lessons in how to be a dog! It don’t seem to come natural. 

When I was a young boy I always loved the Lassie TV show. A fella could do no wrong around Lassie. Fall from a ladder and break your leg? No problem. Quick as an autumn breeze Lassie would head out to the wood shed and select a proper splint. He’d even race to the medicine cabinet to fetch a roll of medical adhesive tape to secure the job. Then he’d mosey on over to the liquor cabinet and bring you your favorite bottle of bourbon to wash away the pain. Damn fine dog, that Lassie. 

And, by the way, them boots with the tire-chain bottoms - the ones they say was worn by Admiral Perry on his expedition to the North Pole - are going back in the Amazon box together with the sand, wubba-wubba and, if I catch him snoozing, that damn pug. 

Now, excuse me while I go get the anti-freeze from the liquor cabinet. 

Photo courtesy of wiki pics:https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?search=pugs&title=Special%3ASe...