Sunday, January 1, 2006

Adventures of a Lhasa Down South

You may have noticed that my Main Person (whom you know as Karen) has not written anything for about six months. Or is it 30 years? I’m not so good with time frames. Like this one time, my Person left for what seemed like many years, but she came back wearing the same clothes and she was the exact same weight, so I knew it was probably just an hour or five minutes, because my Person’s weight changes almost every single day, depending on if it’s a Fuck It I’ll Eat What I Want day or an I’m So Fat I HATE Myself day. I hide under the bed on the I’m So Fat Days because she tends to require a lot of cuddles which gets tiresome and cuts into my naptimes.

Anyway, my Person gets depressed when she hasn’t written anything in awhile, but she says there hasn’t been time. First she said she didn’t have time because of the Wedding, a day that was pretty much the same as any other day to me because I spent it napping. The next day was fun though because all the people I had ever met came over to the house and we ate cake. Then she said she didn’t have time because of the honeymoon, a time I also enjoyed because my Grandma came and stayed with me, and she doesn’t know the rule about I’m not allowed on the bed. Then my Person said she was too busy with the holidays.

But my Person still has not written a thing. And anyway writing seems to be something she enjoys, so I don’t understand why she finds excuses not to do it. Like for example I enjoy digging a hole in the couch and take every opportunity to engage in this. I never make excuses why I don’t have time to do it. Another fun thing is to bark at

Every year when it gets cold out my People bring in a bunch of boxes from the Cold Dirty Room where they keep the Giant Box with Wheels that goes very fast. The Dirty Room has a massive iron mouth that makes a bloodcurdling noise that makes my ears and tail go down, but I like the Giant Box with Wheels because sometimes it goes to Grandma’s house. Other times it goes to the vet, a person who for some reason likes to shove her finger up my ass, so I try not to think about that. Anyway, they bring in these boxes and get all excited about the things in them, none of which you can even eat. My Main person always pulls out this dusty old toy shaped like an old man with a white beard, and exclaims like she just found the pot of biscuits at the end of the rainbow, “LOOK Theo! Look! It’s your SANTA toy!” and tries to shove it in my mouth. But it smells bad, like the cold dirty room. Blech.

The best part about the holidays is the Inside Tree, which is a thing that normally lives outside and smells of other dogs’ pee, but at this time every year my People decide to bring one into the house, and put it in a bucket of special delicious water which I enjoy at nighttime while the People sleep.

Then follows a period when lots of people visit and drink stuff that makes them laugh loudly and accidentally drop food on the floor. Then they tear open the mysterious boxes that the People put under the tree like six-week-old puppies like to do with socks. This tells me we’re getting to the end. But the real sign that the holidays are over is when my People move the Inside Tree to the Cold Dirty Room. It would be my worst nightmare to have to stay in the Cold Dirty Room by myself and I can’t imagine what the Inside Tree did that was so bad, so I do my very best not to repeat whatever it was. If the Inside Tree could learn to “shake” maybe they would let it stay, because the People really like when I do that.

Then while my Main Person puts things back in boxes to store in the Dirty Room, my Other Person takes down the lights that were on the outside of our house. I decide to help my Other Person, because he’s a lot more fun, although he can be scary when he is playing with his “video game,” which is a box that is smaller than the one in the cold dirty room, and does not have wheels, but makes lots of strange, unpredictable noises. Sometimes my Other Person gets very, very angry with this box and yells very loud at it and throws things, so I have to go hide under the bed until he is happy with the box again. So anyway he climbs up a ladder to take down the lights on the roof of the house and I help by wandering off around the neighborhood and pretending I don’t hear him when he says, “Theo get BACK here,” or, “Theo do NOT crap in the neighbor’s flowers! Bad dog, bad dog!” But even though he’s a lot scarier than my Main Person, he is up on the roof and can’t reach me so I don’t pay any attention. Besides he is too busy going “dammit” a lot and losing his balance which makes my Main Person laugh very hard. The taking down the lights part is a lot of fun.

So that’s how I know for sure the holidays are over, and that my Main Person is out of excuses. But her small box with a bright shiny white screen still sits untouched, gathering dust. So I thought maybe I’ll teach my Person a lesson by writing her column. When she sees that I have taken precious time off from my naptimes just for her, maybe she’ll start to realize that she needs to MAKE time for the things she enjoys. Maybe she’ll finally understand what we dogs have always known – that you’ve got to live for the moment. That you never know what might happen next, good or bad. If you are lying in a patch of sunlight taking a peaceful nap, you cannot worry that at any moment your Person may snatch you awake, throw you into the Giant Box with Wheels and take you to the vet. And you can’t tell yourself, “Oh, I just don’t have time to dig a hole in the couch right now – I’ve got so much to DO. I’ve got to blah blah blah…”

My point is this: it is a New Year. Make the resolution to take the time to enjoy the things that make you happy. Because you never know when someone might come along and try to shove their finger up your asshole.

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