Friday, May 9, 2008

Downward Rat


My day today started with walking out my front door and my dog Yoshi (pictured) peeing while holding a dead rat in his mouth.

To get the full effect of this, you need to know Yoshi. OK, Yoshi was a street doggie. My wife found him in the parking lot of Wal-Mart in Florida. He was running around, no tags, licking discarded cups in the parking lot, and apparently trying to get him by a car. Not sure why. He’s never told me and he didn’t have a note. Anyway, my wife beckoned him to get in the car and he did and quickly adopted me as his dad (allowing him to stay on at our house because I had voted to drop him off at the Humane Society. He sensed this and buddied up to me very quickly. Thus, he is my dog.)

At the time, we had a Rottweiler, a fantastic dog named Sydnee. She’s gone now but we loved her a lot and she exemplified the ‘alpha dog’ mentality. So, when the crazy street dog showed up at our place, she put it on herself to kick his butt and get him to follow house rules. If you have animals, you know what I mean. Sydnee was very particular about the way things had to be and she expected the boy dog to follow suit. I had never seen that trait in a dog before.

Yoshi was (and sometimes is) what we call ‘a runner’, meaning if the door or gate is open, he runs. He runs for dear life, like we beat him or something. So when he would make a break for it at our old apartment, Sydnee would shoot out after him and push him down to the ground. Or he, being ecstatic about being outside, would immediately get diarrhea. Yep, he was that thrilled to be outside off a leash he’d quickly haunch over and start squirting. Sad really, but it made him easier to catch for both Sydnee and myself.

So Sydnee began overseeing his transformation from crazy street dog to well-adjusted home dog. And she rode that dude. If he barked for no reason, she’d run and clamp down on him and force him to the ground (never hurting him, although she could have, she was just teaching him a lesson). If my wife yelled at Yoshi, Sydnee would growl at him. It was weird. But he learned a lot, and one of the habits is the fact that he doesn’t hike his leg when he pees. He actually goes into ‘downward dog’ (pictured), the yoga stance, when he pees. It’s silly but cracks me up when I see it.

So, this morning I walked out of the door and saw Yoshi in Downward Dog with a rat in his mouth, it was gross and hilarious. Much grosser was having to throw the rat away. If I was a picture minded person, I would have clicked off a shot. Sadly, I just turned around and went inside to get some gloves. But picture it in your head. It’s worth it.

No comments: