I don’t need to take days off from running very often, but today Mom insisted. It started last night when my tummy started feeling funny and I had some really impressive-smelling farts. Mom wasn’t as impressed by the smell, so she insisted that I go out to the dog bathroom. Since there was nothing out there to bark at, I decided to go potty instead, and that made my tummy feel a bit better. So for the rest of the night I made Mom get up every hour to let me go potty again.
When we got up in the morning, I barfed. Mom was in the people bathroom so I tried to eat it up before she got out, but my tummy wasn’t feeling good so I didn’t get through all of it. She always gets so disappointed when my toys leave their insides all over the floor, so I thought she would be real mad at me for leaving my stuffing on the floor too. So I hung my head when she saw it. She surprised me by being real nice to me and kissing me and scratching my ears. Then she made me eggs for breakfast because she said that it would be easier on my tummy. I didn’t have much of an appetite, but cold eggs are my favorite so after awhile I ate them and felt a bit better.
As understanding as Mom seemed at first, she did punish me by not letting me run with her. I didn’t even mind that much, and I was feeling so lousy that I didn’t bark to cheer her on for the first 5 minutes she was on the dreadmill. But by lunch time I was feeling a little better. Angry farts weren’t coming out of me anymore to punch Mom in the nose, so I decided to take Mom on a lunch date into town and buy her a burrito as a treat for being so nice to me.
When she left me tied to a tree outside the burrito shop, I was very brave and only barked a lot, rather than screeching nonstop as a lesser dog might have done. Then she waited with me on the sidewalk while they made her food and gave me kisses and butt scratches, just like a real date.
As we were walking back home with Mom’s burrito, a man in a truck slowed down and shouted something out his window. Mom gave him a suspicious look and pulled her headphones out of her ears. “I said,” he shouted, “that’s a good looking dog!” She smiled and thanked him and we walked on.
“Why were you being so unwelcoming to one of my fans?” I asked. “Well… because I thought that he was saying that I was the good looking one, and it’s rude for boy humans to shout things like that from cars at girl humans.” “But MOM, why would anybody say that you’re a good looking dog? You don’t look like much of a dog, and you’re not even a very special looking human. You’re old and wearing men’s pants.” “Well, people used to shout cat calls to me, even when I was wearing men’s pants. I guess I hadn’t noticed that they’d stopped until just now.”
At first I couldn’t figure out why Mom called it a “cat” call when I’m obviously a dog, but then I realized that it meant that the person barking was as excited as if they’d seen a cat. As much as I love Mom, I couldn’t imagine anyone finding her as handsome as I am, and I thought it was pretty preposterous that she would think that someone would find her the more attractive of the two of us. But I didn’t say so because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. One thing a gentleman needs to remember about ladies is that they always want to feel attractive, even when they pretend that they don’t care by wearing men’s pants.
-Oscar, the damned good looking dog
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