Don't Judge a Pup by Its Pawprint

Things have gotten weird around here.

Mama’s never home anymore. I’d be super sad about that (like I was in the beginning, when I was a baby and cried a lot). Except for three things. One, I’m a big girl now and crying is for sissy dogs. Two, Brown-haired Mama comes by more than ever, and she loves me. Plus, when she sits on the sofa and opens up her light machine, I get to chase the black bug that flies around the top screen. Sometimes, Brown-haired Mama’s friend comes too, and when they both sit on the sofa, I can climb all over them and find the best nooks and crannies to snuggle in.

And the third thing that keeps me from being sad is Kai and Yeti. Well, I guess since Kai and Yeti are two separate dogs, it’s the third and fourth thing. Except that they live in the same place, and it’s going there that keeps me from being sad, so maybe it is just one thing. I dunno. I never had math. I never had school either.

(That doesn’t mean I’m stupid though. I know a lot of things. Like it’s better to pee inside on a pad than outside on the grass. Really. It is. Cuz when you’re outside on the grass, if you squat to pee, you could get bitten by a fire ant in your pee area. Kai told me that happened to her and she said it hurts a lot. And since my legs are shorter than hers, a fire ant wouldn’t even have to jump that far to bite my pee area. I’m telling you, that is SUPER SCARY and I don’t ever want it to happen to me! So I’m sticking to the pee pads. I’m usually pretty good at aiming on them, but sometimes I lose track of my back end. It’s so far away from my head, I don’t always know where it is.)

I only started going over to Kai and Yeti’s house when Mama began being away so much. This Big Guy came over one day and picked me up and drove me over to Kai and Yeti. I didn’t know where he was taking me, and you might say, “Hey, you let a complete stranger pick you up and take you away? What were you thinking?” Listen, when you’re little like me, and everything and everyone could just as soon squash you, SPLAT! like a blueberry (omg, can we just talk about blueberries for a minute? I mean, what is their deal? I don’t understand them at all) – anyway, when that is how things are, you learn to go with the flow. Try to be as cute as possible so nobody kills you, even by accident, that’s my motto.

Anyway, Kai is the best. She has soft fuzzy ears that she lets me bite when we’re playing. We chase each other and roll around and she doesn’t try to swat me across the room. (Not like my cousin Walter, who’s constantly fwopping my body with his paw. I met Walter at the beach a long time ago. That dog is crazy, it’s like he can’t control himself.)

Then I met Yeti. Seriously, the first time I saw Yeti, I just about pooped myself. I was on the floor scrabbling my legs at Kai’s head, when I heard a loud “WRR-OUF!” that basically shook all of my bones back into my butt. I mean really, it was loud, like the sound the sky makes right before it starts washing the earth. And before I could get up and hide under the sofa, this huge animal – I’m talking BEAST, I’m talking scary-nightmare-monster-come-to-life CREATURE – thumps into the room and stops right in front of me. And I was looking straight into his mouth, which had like a waterfall of slobber pouring out of it, just gushing forth from his giant tongue onto my smooth and beautiful fur. And I thought, “Ok, this is it. Bye-bye Mama, I really love you, I really really love you, and I’m sorry I let the Big Guy take me, I didn’t know he was going to feed me to a monster, I love you love you love you . . .” and then the monster (which was Yeti, in case you don’t know) licked me.

Not gonna lie, it was more than a little gross. SO. MUCH. SLOBBER! But, you know, you do what you gotta do, and if it’s a choice between being eaten or getting slobbered on, I’ll take slobber any day. Turns out Yeti is super nice. Which just goes to show that you can’t judge someone by their size. You’d think that I’d know that.

But boy was I glad when I saw Mama at the end of the day. Playing with other dogs is great and it keeps me from being sad, but she’s still the best. And she smells a lot better than they do.