It's always something...

T’was a beautiful morning at Bad Dog Central. I was sitting out on the back porch, enjoying a smoke and some coffee before work. Casey was stretched out beside me, Jack lounged in a lounge chair by the pool (yes – he does that). And Sparky was at the far end of the pool enclosure, barking hysterically at some doves on the power line behind the house.

Not all bad, I thought. Friday morning, not much to do at work, should be a pretty painless –

SPLASH!

I jumped up. I was looking directly at Jack, who is the only Bad Dog who should be splashing anywhere. Raced up onto the pool deck, spotted Sparky dogpaddling furiously to stay afloat in the not-by-the-steps end. He’s not much of a swimmer, so he was paddling his tiny paws off to keep his head above water. And he’s not big enough to crawl out over the edge.

So, down on my belly I went. In my work clothes (which are pretty casual, but still). On the wet and dirty pooldeck. Plucked the little guy out and set him down on dry land. He yakked and gakked and spit water out for a moment.

I returned to my chair and my smoke and my coffee. In seconds I had a small wet dog on my lap (with dirty paws. On my work clothes). In Sparky’s world, he’d been plucked out of water that may has well have been 400 feet deep, and he was going to stay on my lap as long as I’d let him.

And that’s how I ended up at work in slightly damp clothes that have muddy dogprints on them, and why I walked in smelling just a little like a wet terrier.

That’s also why Home Despot made more money off us, as the Mister has already procured gate-making materials to keep the Little Guy from having any other unfortunate pool incidents.

[sigh] It’s not easy being the Alpha Female around here, I tell you what.