My sister Carla has five dogs in her house. Two of them are full-grown pit bulls.
They're as gentle as lambs. And dumb? Huh boy. Between the two of them they don't have the brains God gave meatloaf. These two characters are to "stupid" what Picasso was to painting. What Rubinstein was to the piano. What Orville Redenbacher was to popcorn.
They actually belong to my nephew Joey. In one of his get-rich-quick schemes a few years ago, Joey decided he was going to breed pit bull puppies.
But Nature threw him a curveball. Sophia, the girl pit bull, is sort of, well, deformed I guess. She's built rather close to the ground and she walks slightly bowlegged. For this reason Bosco, the boy pit bull, can't mount her. (And if I know Bosco, he'd probably be too lazy to mount her anyway.) Hence, no puppies to sell. Joey has bred Bosco with some other pit bulls, but here at home these two lovable oafs just hang around, slobbering, demanding love and generating acre-feet of shit.
Bosco might well get the idea that his name is Get-Out-Of-My-Way-Bosco. Unless he's in the garage, he's always underfoot somewhere. I want to go to the refrigerator. "Get out of my way, Bosco." I turn around in the living room. "Get out of my way, Bosco." I get exasperated: "Bosco, get out of my way!" My sister thinks she might need knee replacement surgery soon, the reason being that not long ago she tripped over Bosco.
They have very distinct personalities and facial expressions, these two pit bulls. I call Sophia "Miss Hyper-diapers." She pants and slobbers all the time, and always wants to go outside (unless it's raining -- then you couldn't get her out the door with the Jaws of Life and a rubber plunger.) . She never needs to be asked twice if she wants to go outside and always needs to be told three times to come back inside. Bosco is more diffident. He'll go outside if you tell him to, and he'll come inside when you tell him to. He moves slowly, and one gets the impression he would just as soon continue with his nap as go out in the yard. Sophia once ran through a picture window to get outside.
Sophia's facial expression is always questioning. She looks up at you, eyes wide and brow furrowed, as if she's expecting you to pull a rabbit out of a hat. Bosco is a master of the reproachful look. He glances up at you, head lowered, as if to say "Pet me or I'll make you feel guilty."
Actually, Bosco has an agenda. The poor dope suffers from a skin condition, back near his tail. It itches him all the time, so he always wants someone to scratch him there. He'll come up to you and put his head in your lap, and then when you pet him between the ears, he turns around, (at about the same speed the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Ronald Reagan turns around) and offers you his butt. That's where he wants you to scratch him, not his head. But he doesn't seem to have a clue as to his own size -- I swear, both of these characters think they're puppies -- and he always pulls away too far. Me: "Bosco, get back here! I can't scratch your ass if I can't reach you!" There's a spot along the baseboard in the hallway, between my niece Alicia's bedroom and that of Ann, my sister's boarder, which is smeared with Bosco's blood. He tries to stratch himself against the doorjamb there, and sometimes bleeding results. We've tried ointments, oatmeal baths, hydrocortisone spray, even olive oil on his itchy spot, but nothing seems to work except temporarily.
Scratch Bosco's ass (gently, avoiding the scab) and you'll have a friend for life. I found a plastic back-scratcher in the hallway; I use it on him, scratching around his wound, but even then I have to reach far -- "Will you stand still!? Quit squirming around!" He's happy for a few moments. But that doesn't stop him from giving me that "look" of his as soon as I stop scratching.
"Bosco, quit giving me that martyred look!" I'll say. "You are NOT going to make me feel guilty!"
My sister's next-door neighbor, a true crank who by the way, never weeds his lawn, so his place looks like the Addams Family lives there, has accused Bosco and Sophia of attacking his child. This is what's known as Prejudice. Pit bulls have a reputation for being dangerous, therefore all pit bulls must be deadly. Bosco-and-Sophia shit, I say. These two clowns never attacked anything but their dinner. The family cats routinely ignore them, and the ignore is mutual. When my eighteen-month-old great niece Lucy comes around, they show a half-animated curiosity, mainly because they wonder why she's getting everyone's attention all of a sudden: sniff, sniff, wander in circles, sniff some more ... They're bigger than she is, so they frighten Lucy without meaning to, and have to be ordered back into the hall, but they would no more hurt her or anyone else than manatees would sink fishing boats. I don't think either of them has ever heard the word "kill," and they wouldn't know what it meant if they did.
I was never a dog lover, myself, until I entered on my second marriage. I always preferred cats: they're quiet, low maintenance and I'm one of those people who finds their aloofness amusing -- they remind me of me. Dogs like everybody except those they don't like for some reason, but when a cat makes you his friend, you know you're his friend because you didn't pick him, he picked you. I always regarded dogs as just a nuisance: noisy, dirty and disgustingly subservient.
But my second wife Valerie had two miniature schnauzers when we got engaged, and they grew on me. Jacqui and Alexandra were their names. Jacqui was gray, Alexandra black. Alexandra was the smaller of the two. I didn't get to know Jacqui very well, because he had cancer and had to be put down after Valerie and I had only been married a couple of months. But I formed a deep bond with Alexandra, who was already failing from age when we met. When she died in 2008, I was crushed. Along the way we acquired three more miniature schnauzers: the two boys, Fulbright and Stanley, were named by me. My wife bridled at this; as she saw it, they were her dogs, so what business had I giving them names? When we acquired a third miniature schnauzer later, Valerie promptly named her Olivia, asserting her rights as dog owner, home owner, and owner of everything else "we" owned.
I came to love Olivia. Every morning after my jog, we would go for a walk. Valerie and I later divorced. She kept the dogs. She kept everything except what she didn't want. I miss Olivia more than I miss Valerie.
I like this time of day, the early afternoon. All the dogs are asleep: Bosco, Sophia and our three smaller guys, Dominic, Vinnie and Lulu. The two cats, Pablo and Golden Boy (I address Golden Boy as "G.B.") are lurking about somewhere. "The kingdom is quiet," as the old song says. Lord, let us thank you for Thursday afternoons, and may they remain my friends ... You know, like those two smelly creatures snoring out in the garage, dreaming no doubt of their very favorite thing in all the world: being doused by the garden hose. They get so excited when someone turns on the hose that they start climbing all over each other, wanting to be first in the spray.
Natural born killers.
They're as gentle as lambs. And dumb? Huh boy. Between the two of them they don't have the brains God gave meatloaf. These two characters are to "stupid" what Picasso was to painting. What Rubinstein was to the piano. What Orville Redenbacher was to popcorn.
They actually belong to my nephew Joey. In one of his get-rich-quick schemes a few years ago, Joey decided he was going to breed pit bull puppies.
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| Sophia: "Me look." Bosco: "Me sleep." About right. |
Bosco might well get the idea that his name is Get-Out-Of-My-Way-Bosco. Unless he's in the garage, he's always underfoot somewhere. I want to go to the refrigerator. "Get out of my way, Bosco." I turn around in the living room. "Get out of my way, Bosco." I get exasperated: "Bosco, get out of my way!" My sister thinks she might need knee replacement surgery soon, the reason being that not long ago she tripped over Bosco.
They have very distinct personalities and facial expressions, these two pit bulls. I call Sophia "Miss Hyper-diapers." She pants and slobbers all the time, and always wants to go outside (unless it's raining -- then you couldn't get her out the door with the Jaws of Life and a rubber plunger.) . She never needs to be asked twice if she wants to go outside and always needs to be told three times to come back inside. Bosco is more diffident. He'll go outside if you tell him to, and he'll come inside when you tell him to. He moves slowly, and one gets the impression he would just as soon continue with his nap as go out in the yard. Sophia once ran through a picture window to get outside.
Sophia's facial expression is always questioning. She looks up at you, eyes wide and brow furrowed, as if she's expecting you to pull a rabbit out of a hat. Bosco is a master of the reproachful look. He glances up at you, head lowered, as if to say "Pet me or I'll make you feel guilty."
Actually, Bosco has an agenda. The poor dope suffers from a skin condition, back near his tail. It itches him all the time, so he always wants someone to scratch him there. He'll come up to you and put his head in your lap, and then when you pet him between the ears, he turns around, (at about the same speed the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Ronald Reagan turns around) and offers you his butt. That's where he wants you to scratch him, not his head. But he doesn't seem to have a clue as to his own size -- I swear, both of these characters think they're puppies -- and he always pulls away too far. Me: "Bosco, get back here! I can't scratch your ass if I can't reach you!" There's a spot along the baseboard in the hallway, between my niece Alicia's bedroom and that of Ann, my sister's boarder, which is smeared with Bosco's blood. He tries to stratch himself against the doorjamb there, and sometimes bleeding results. We've tried ointments, oatmeal baths, hydrocortisone spray, even olive oil on his itchy spot, but nothing seems to work except temporarily.
Scratch Bosco's ass (gently, avoiding the scab) and you'll have a friend for life. I found a plastic back-scratcher in the hallway; I use it on him, scratching around his wound, but even then I have to reach far -- "Will you stand still!? Quit squirming around!" He's happy for a few moments. But that doesn't stop him from giving me that "look" of his as soon as I stop scratching.
"Bosco, quit giving me that martyred look!" I'll say. "You are NOT going to make me feel guilty!"
My sister's next-door neighbor, a true crank who by the way, never weeds his lawn, so his place looks like the Addams Family lives there, has accused Bosco and Sophia of attacking his child. This is what's known as Prejudice. Pit bulls have a reputation for being dangerous, therefore all pit bulls must be deadly. Bosco-and-Sophia shit, I say. These two clowns never attacked anything but their dinner. The family cats routinely ignore them, and the ignore is mutual. When my eighteen-month-old great niece Lucy comes around, they show a half-animated curiosity, mainly because they wonder why she's getting everyone's attention all of a sudden: sniff, sniff, wander in circles, sniff some more ... They're bigger than she is, so they frighten Lucy without meaning to, and have to be ordered back into the hall, but they would no more hurt her or anyone else than manatees would sink fishing boats. I don't think either of them has ever heard the word "kill," and they wouldn't know what it meant if they did.
I was never a dog lover, myself, until I entered on my second marriage. I always preferred cats: they're quiet, low maintenance and I'm one of those people who finds their aloofness amusing -- they remind me of me. Dogs like everybody except those they don't like for some reason, but when a cat makes you his friend, you know you're his friend because you didn't pick him, he picked you. I always regarded dogs as just a nuisance: noisy, dirty and disgustingly subservient.
But my second wife Valerie had two miniature schnauzers when we got engaged, and they grew on me. Jacqui and Alexandra were their names. Jacqui was gray, Alexandra black. Alexandra was the smaller of the two. I didn't get to know Jacqui very well, because he had cancer and had to be put down after Valerie and I had only been married a couple of months. But I formed a deep bond with Alexandra, who was already failing from age when we met. When she died in 2008, I was crushed. Along the way we acquired three more miniature schnauzers: the two boys, Fulbright and Stanley, were named by me. My wife bridled at this; as she saw it, they were her dogs, so what business had I giving them names? When we acquired a third miniature schnauzer later, Valerie promptly named her Olivia, asserting her rights as dog owner, home owner, and owner of everything else "we" owned.
I came to love Olivia. Every morning after my jog, we would go for a walk. Valerie and I later divorced. She kept the dogs. She kept everything except what she didn't want. I miss Olivia more than I miss Valerie.
I like this time of day, the early afternoon. All the dogs are asleep: Bosco, Sophia and our three smaller guys, Dominic, Vinnie and Lulu. The two cats, Pablo and Golden Boy (I address Golden Boy as "G.B.") are lurking about somewhere. "The kingdom is quiet," as the old song says. Lord, let us thank you for Thursday afternoons, and may they remain my friends ... You know, like those two smelly creatures snoring out in the garage, dreaming no doubt of their very favorite thing in all the world: being doused by the garden hose. They get so excited when someone turns on the hose that they start climbing all over each other, wanting to be first in the spray.
Natural born killers.
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