If you think you have the best dog in the world you probably do.
Here’s the deal: Everyone’s dog, including yours, is the best dog in the whole wide world.
People love their cocker spaniels and why wouldn’t they? Same with Collies, Sheep Dogs, mutts and strays. All great dogs.
Dogs have dogonalities just like people but without all the neurotic weird, sneaky hidden agenda stuff. If you believe dogs are sneaky you are wrong. Those are cats.
I once thought Airedales were the finest dogs on the planet and they were and are. If you’ve got one, congratulations. Fine, fine dog the Airedale.
But I’ve had a couple Golden Retrievers and I now think Golden Retrievers are the best dogs in the world and by a considerable margin. They are funny, good looking and not very smart so it’s easy to trick them by hiding their stuffed squeaky duck under a sofa pillow.
One problem with Golden Retrievers is that they are everywhere: TV ads, magazine covers, Youtube videos, airline flight attendants and a surprising percentage of your neighbors.
You can hardly walk down the pet food aisle at Safeway without a dozen or a hundred Golden Retrievers leering at you from package labels. How long before a Golden Retriever runs for Ukiah City Council?
And like anything that’s crazy popular (Big Macs, Toyotas, Taylor Swift, California) you don’t want to appear as if you’ve been swept up in a big hot fad, like women watching Outlander or men not drinking Bud Lite. You want to be different so you pick a Schnauzer, which is a marvelous dog. Maybe the best.
But no, Golden Retrievers are best. Their dogonality may be limited, but it’s true and genuine: They love you.
A Golden Retriever adores its owner and does whatever it takes to make him happy. They smile, they roll on their backs, they chase stuffed duckies.
My last dog would have done whatever I asked. If I’d said “Puppy, go get me a beer” she’d gallop off to the fridge, stand a while in the kitchen, then return looking sorrowful. She’d be wearing her woeful “Sorry I let you down” look, and with her limited vocabulary try to explain about the opposable thumb stuff. Very sad.
She’d make up for it by leaving her stuffed duckie on my chair, but I’d never know because I’d be in the kitchen looking for that last can of Milwaukee’s Best, which I now remember I drank in the shower this morning.
So it wasn’t the opposable thumb thing at all. Silly me. But she should have known it was the last beer in the 12-pack. (Jeez. Can’t even count to 12.)
Told you Retrievers weren’t very smart. And what’s this gnarly old stuffed yellow chicken doing on my recliner anyway?
Dear Readers, this rambling introduction leads to breaking news that a puppy will soon be landing on our doorstep. By now the Spousal Unit will have knitted little pink booties and spent several thousand dollars on turquoise bandanas, stuffed toys, and bouncy balls that light up and speak Esperanto.
Our civilization’s obsession with dogs is yet another yardstick with which to measure the collective madness. Tell someone you’re getting a dog and they light up as if you won the lottery.
Tell them you’re getting a child? Oh how nice they say, and change the subject to the marvelous French Bulldog they just saw on Church Street.
I’ll not be surprised if friends and neighbors stage a puppy shower, the city puts a banner across State Street, and Joe Biden calls to remind Trophy to register the dog to vote in November.
It goes on: There are more Rainbow Ag dog food options than entrees at The Broiler. Starbucks has free birthday cream drinks for dogs. Your dog has a better chance of breaking into Hollywood movies than your niece.
If we die more people will fight over who gets the dog than who gets my savings account or Trophy’s Nancy Drew books.
By the time you read this the pup might already be here. If so, it’s probably upstairs napping with its mommy, on the bed I once slept on.
Common Sense Breaks Out
A cool breeze of intelligent thinking gusted through the County Supervisor chambers recently when the board unanimously rescinded its ill-conceived Inclusionary Rule.
Like many mischievous laws, the Inclusionary Rule came to life as a well-meaning gesture to supposedly increase affordable housing. In reality the Inclusionary Rule demanded every construction project include 25% of new housing be “affordable.”
You’re from California so you can guess who had to foot the bill for this magnanimous gesture. (Hint: The Contractor) But don’t think too hard about why local housing is so expensive, and thus scarce. Both are results of your hardworking representatives performing their magic, i.e., dreaming up more tax penalties for any business doing anything.
But Poof! and Voila! By a 5-0 vote, our beloved Supervisors disappeared it. Give yourselves five well-deserved pats on each others’ backs.
Be First to Comment