It's a (Little) Dog's Life

Life was bad enough when I was lost and homeless and never had a square meal, day after day. The ticks were biting me and the hawks were trying to bite me and I can't remember how many times I almost got run over by cars...


Then some big scary people caught me and I thought I was done for.

But they gave me to Mom. She took me in her shop and washed me and cleaned off the ticks and clipped me and made me smell pretty and started feeding me this re-e-e-e-ally expensive dog food so I wouldn't..... uh, so I didn't.... well, you know...so I smelled better all the time.

Boy, things sure changed for the better for a while. I figured I was in Heaven, the way Mom cuddled me and decided to keep me, even if Dad said she couldn't, but she did anyway and now Dad lets me sleep on his lap when he's in his big chair. And Mom calls me her froo-froo dog, which I think sounds kinda nice.




I didn't even mind when she took me to the Grand Canyon, but I really didn't want anything to do with looking over the edge, and everybody laughed at me when I dug in with my front feet. So, Mom carried me.





Back home, I'm not so sure anymore. I have these two doofus big brothers. They get more to eat than I do....


It's bad enough when Bonehead and Shadow get to ride in the back of the truck like real dogs....







It's bad enough when Mom pays so much attention to old Ruthie, 'cause she's her "fav-or-ite"....








It's bad enough the horses are always trying to step on me....


It's bad enough Goat tries to gore me with his little nubbin of a horn which isn't such a little nubbin when you're my size...




It's bad enough they went off and had Indian fry bread and gave the left-over to some camp dog instead of bringing it home to me....


It's bad enough I got in trouble for tracking up the clean kitchen floor after they got the yard all wet and muddy by irrigating....


It's bad enough I got in trouble for barking when this stupid mule got loose and ran all over the yard all night.....


It's bad enough everybody thinks these noisy baby chickens are cuter than me.....


It's bad enough Mom gives the chickens the good left-overs and won't let them share with me....


It's bad enough Mom spends almost all day washing and clipping and pampering a bunch of strange dogs while I sleep in the towel basket, just hoping for a little attention...


It's bad enough they keep all the good stuff in this big white box with the handles that are too high for me to reach....





Yeah, all that's bad enough. But listen to this.

A couple days ago, Mom was sitting in Dad's big ol' comfy easy chair and I was resting on the arm of it like always, and everything was fine with the world. Then some hairy little dust mop dog comes busting through the front door....





runs right into the living room....



and jumps up in Mom's lap before any of us knew what was happening. And, instead of screaming and kicking the interloper out of the house, Mom says hi to it, all lovey-dovey like, and starts petting it, and makes me stop growling.

I was ONLY doing my job.

Besides, it woke me up.

So, what's a poor dog to do when something like that happens?


I went and sucked up to Gramma, even gave her kisses. Mom didn't seem to care, no matter how long Gramma held me. In fact, she laughed, if you can believe that!


I tell ya, it's a dog's life out there.