A Dog’s Life

I normally complain about the cats in my house but this time I have a bone to pick, metaphorically, with my dogs.  It seems that the two dogs, yes, 2 cats, 2 dogs, that also live here are also trying to kill me off.  I have reminded all 4 of the pets that if they were to break my neck some night by tripping me up in the dark hallway then things would be pretty lean around here.  They might not get the fancy cat treats or dog treats, heaven forbid just Milkbones.

See, I was going back to cat bashing, but its alright, I caught myself.  Dogs, yes dogs, the two we have are mixed breed, one is mostly a “Rat” or “Manchester” terrier, he is a feisty 8 years old and we have had him for 6 years.  Well earlier this year it looked like he was way too comfortable with things around here so we went and rescued another dog, a playmate for him, at least we thought.  The second dog is a 2-year-old mixed up kinda Beagle thing.  She is full of pep, and we found out pee too as she wasn’t very well house trained.

In an effort to lose a bit of weight I thought it would be good exercise to walk the dogs.  I see people doing it all the time in the neighborhood, dogs walking obediently beside their Master’s, heeding every word or slightest tug on the leash.  So, that was it then.  Slipping on my brand new Nike’s, hey its been a while since I exercised ok, I took the two leashes that my wife had purchased (a blue one for the male, and gasp, a pink one for the female) and hooked them up.  Baseball cap on and I was ready to head out into the hot Atlanta evening.  I should let you know right now that I have never taken these two dogs for a walk before, I don’t know that either of them had ever been on a leash before, but what the heck, I have two hands, two leashes, let’s go.

As I opened the door out to the garage I was instantly aware that these dogs did not know how to walk on a leash, but they sure as hell knew how to pull me along like a team of horses pulling a wagon.  My arms were outstretched fully as the dogs walked, no trotted, down the driveway and onto the street.  I was pulling back on them with a fair amount of force, as I am not a small guy, but they were undeterred.  As we approached the third mailbox the Rat Terrier stopped and decided to relieve himself on the poor flowers around the mail box of some unsuspecting neighbor.  I just figured he was leaving some “pee-mail” for them, neighborly of the dog wasn’t it.  This scene was repeated over, and over, and over again as the male drained himself of what had to be a gallon of uhmm well you know what.  Theses momentary stops were the only times that my arms were not outstretched to the maximum during the walk, or was it a drag, I can’t remember it happened in a blur.  I do know that there were neighbors standing at their front doors watching me, some commenting to others and I think I heard the words “big guy, pink leash, poof” but I’m not sure.  I finally convinced my two sled dogs to head home, the male by now was leaving pee mail with no stamps on it, he was drained, the female didn’t leave any messages, she was to uppity for that I suppose.

I managed to get them in the house, un-hooking their leashes and sitting at the kitchen table, sweating profusely, my wife giving me that strange look as I gulped down a few glasses of ice water.  The male dog went and drank about a gallon of water, I suppose he was reloading.  The female wanted to go in the back yard to relieve herself, and I just wanted to lay down and sleep.

I have done this several times since, and I actually have it so I don’t have to run after them now, they begrudgingly wait for me to keep up with them.  The neighbors don’t come out as often, I guess it is not as entertaining as it was that first time.  So I will continue to walk, it is good exercise, my arms are already much bigger than they were when we started.

I wonder if I could get my cats to go outside.

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