August 13, 2009; Good Sex, Bad Sex

Oh! my stars! What the hell are they watching now?

Since the Mooks got the new stations they watch a whole hell of a lot of television and that means that I do too. Most of it is that artsy-fartsy crap that a thinking dog sleeps through, but some of this stuff is...well—out there.

They seem to like documentaries about really fat people. I've seen hour after hour of the morbidly obese waddling about or, more often, just lying there waiting for bariatric surgery. I mean, Mook A is a bit tubby, but at least he began to slow down a bit before he got to the point where he'd kill me with a mere jiggle of his leg-pudge.

But beyond the insanely fat people shows, there are the shows about sex. Not porn (though, for some odd reason, A watches a good deal of that...the straight variety—go figure...). No, they watch documentaries about porn or the sex industry. You see a couple of those and you realize these freaks haven't even evolved past the monkeys! There are a couple of these programs which are just downright depressing (and if you have an anthropological streak in you, like I do, explain why the entire planet is headed to annihilation). One of them is actually a series about whores and pimps and johns. If you thought that part of things was cash-'n-carry-tidy, think again. The show seems to specialize in the real whores...the ones on crack, with no teeth and fucked up complexions and hair that hasn't seen shampoo in a month or two. You can practically smell them through the screen (and it's not a nice smell, like garbage).

The Mooks also watched this documentary about child prostitution and for most of it I wanted to call a vet to administer the Big Sleep. It was about kids who had been seduced and "turned out" (as they say) when they were 13 or so. The girls were all sad and missing something in their lives and finding that thing in exactly the wrong place: some fucking asshole who was going to sell them to anyone. The doc took a slight turn for the better, halfway through, but the Mooks were blubbering like babies and I just stared—wondering what semi-tard deity had put humans at the top of the food chain.

Suddenly living with a pair of old queens didn't seem so bad. One good thing? They rarely have sex, at their age, so there is none of that—er—noise to keep you from a good nap. Another thing? No kids. Also, they are both so broken down (especially A) that they don't go strutting around in the altogether which means I don't get exposed to the hairy hideousness of it all.

Sure, they still have drives. A can't walk past a guy in shorts without smacking into a tree and when he thinks no one is looking B surfs the internet (if you know what I mean, and I think you do). But there is none of that embarrassing messy stuff I see over and over again in the movies. And they don't recruit. (But then again, what the hell could they offer recruits?)

The only thing I'm confused about, with them, is who is the woman. A is the naggier one so I think he might be. But then again, B never passed a mirror he didn't like and primps every fucking time and he tends the sad little balcony gardens and vacuums a lot.

To put it bluntly, I don't think I have a Mommy. Just two Aunties.

August 10, 2009; Bellies and Bathrooms

I'm not fat!

Things are glum at La Maison Mook.

I have not been writing because Mook A hasn't turned on his computer in a while—so depressed and messed up is he. He's been getting nothing but crap news from his nurses and when my beloved visits on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays, it certainly isn't the same old happy-talk coming out of that bedroom. Indeed, I don't know what atrocities are being done in there, but he does not sound like the carnival is in town.

I'm a bit worried about him—as much as I worry about any human—because after losing Frank I don't want to go through the tiresome process of training another one. So I am keeping a close eye on this one—staying glued to his ass and when I notice his mood shifting I close in and cuddle him up. (We dogs all have that art of being sympathetic down pat—it's a survival tool.) Problem: he's a little weepy these days and there is nothing I hate more than a wet head.

One place I like to follow the Mooks is to the bathroom. They think this makes me a little wacko but it is the place where I feel the most comfortable and in control. When I lived with Frank I would spend hours in there while he was "reading" and sometimes I would just go in there because the floor was always cool and I could get some real darkness if I needed to sleep. But the Mooks do a wide variety of bizarro crap in there besides "reading" and, especially with Mook A, I like to see all the gadgets and bandages and such which go into the routine.

When A went back to the computer and to that game he plays—World of Warcraft—I knew that the hard times were passing and, more importantly, I'd have access to my blog while he was occupied elsewhere (as the computer is always on). But with the good mood came the renewed attention to his fucking diet and that, my friends, is where things truly went bad.

This morning was weighing day. He announced that he had lost another pound and then he picked me up and I thought it was for a little hug of joy. Nope. "Mother fuck!" he bellowed. "What! What! What!" Mook B yelled back. "This little porker has put on seven fucking pounds since we got him. From a healthy 17 to a grotesque 24!"

Well, even to me this was a shock. I mean, that's the size of a tubby chihuahua with a teacup terrier on its back. This means I am not quite the tight little war machine I thought I was! Mother fuck is right! But what to do?

They were talking diet almost immediately but I was thinking: they feed me dust as it is—3/4 cup of dry with two or three tablespoons of wet, twice a day. I am still so frigging hungry when I'm done with it! Where the hell can you go from starvation rations?

Clearly, smaller portions are on the way because these two certainly won't be getting off their arses to exercise me more—that's clear. But I do like my food and I do like my sleep and it is sooooooo hot out today.

Wouldn't it be nice if dogs could barf?

I mean more than we already do.

August 4, 2009; Little Critters

Kids in a schoolyard, a dog's nightmare (and why do you think they keep them in cages?)

Hey!—I'm getting tired of this. Yesterday it was the nurse and today it was a house-guest. "Oh! He's putting on weight!" they said. This, of course, opened the door for Mook A to say, "Yeah, I've lost 22 pounds and he's found it." Hardy-fucking-har.

Apparently the Sainted Late Cosmo never got tubby and was sleek and handsome 'til the day they offed him. But one thing I've also heard about him: he didn't like children. On this we are agreed.

I was thinking of this during the walk, this afternoon, when a murder of kids came dancing and la-la-la-ing down the block, on our side, and started shrieking, "Doggie! Doggie! Doggie!" when they saw me. Mook A immediately reeled me in and pushed over to the side of the sidewalk to let the little fuckers pass and keep me from molestation. Their mother (or nanny or shepherd...whatever you call those hapless broads) kept them from me but it isn't always so easy. Sometimes there's no escape.

You have to understand: human children are the most retarded beings on the face of the earth. Every other animal fends for itself pretty soon after birth, but humans start helpless, develop the most basic of motor skills and only far, far, far later in life grow a brain and some semblance of consciousness and conscience. Until that time—well past their teens—they are vicious pack-animals who prey on the weak, try to attack the strong (when they're in a group) and if no victim presents itself, devour each other. (You think I'm kidding? Look into any schoolyard and see how many of the little cretins are being picked on or are simply cast aside by the herd.)

And the problem is there is not a fucking thing a dog can do about it. We're actually put down when we attack one of them! Do you believe it???!!! I mean, I can be minding my own business and one of these tards wobbles up to me and starts yanking my fur or poking me in the eye and the onlookers honestly believe I should take it! I say to that: Fuck that noise! Survival of the fittest, baby-cakes. Poke me in the eye and I'm going to tear that fat little finger off! (And they sure are tasty, let me tell you, cause they always have something gooey and sweet stuck to them.)

But no!

If I so much as grunt at one of them, a scream from hell and, often, a hail of blows comes down on my head. Now is that fair? At least with adults, if they tease you you can fight back and they say you're feisty or energetic or some damn thing. If you do it with a six year old you get torn a new asshole...if you're lucky and are not "destroyed" as they like to call it.

The worst is when they come at you like a swarm of African bees; suddenly you're surrounded by five of them who are losing their fucking minds and thumping about on their big fat legs and sticking their humongous hideous faces in yours and "petting" you—except when they "pet" it's like being gang-raped: hard little things going in holes all over you where they don't belong and definitely don't fit.

I can't even nip playfully with one of them because some of them seem to be made of fucking Kleenex and starts squealing like a piglet and then, watch out; you're labeled "out of control."

And to think, they put dogs on leashes and let these awful things run free.

Thank God for traffic.

August 1, 2009: Of Dogs and Men

Mmmmmmm...soap!

Aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh...!

For once the Mooks and I are on the same page, today.

First, there was a bath...I'm still all a-tingle, even though Mook A, while he was giving it to me notes: "How can a dog with no balls get an erection!" Sorrrrrrry for being stimulated...want to cut my frank off, now that you've gotten rid of the beans?

Anyhoo...

The other thing the Mooks and I mightily agree on is this whole Michael Vick thing. A was tearing around this morning, bellowing about it, after he read an article in the paper.

First off, let me say that I admire football players no end. I don't believe they do steroids, I don't believe they're all retards, I don't believe they'd all be washing cars if it wasn't for the sport. I believe they are modern day warriors and Frank and I, back when, could watch game after game on a Sunday afternoon just to see these guys in combat. More: they' re real men. Look, admit it: baseball players are all sissies. Hockey players? Puh-leeze...ice skates not being used as weapons in a sport...what's the point of that—they might as well be fucking figure-skaters. All the others—golf, bowling, basketball? One word: homos. Soccer? They players don't even speaka-da-English. And don't get me started on anything else in the Olympics.

But football—where you can be so injured in a game that you drool and talk to chairs for the rest of your life, or spend eternity peeing in a bag or rolling around in a wheelchair—now that's a fucking sport!

Except for Michael Vick.

What kind of fucking faggot-in-hiding needs to prove he's a man by torturing and killing fucking dogs? What kind of fart-knocking, banana-blowing, Michael-Jackson-loving, friend-of-Dorothy do you have to be to turn the noblest of all beings on Earth into vicious monsters who must kill or be killed? Even your average gay—and you couldn't get more average than the two I'm living with—have bigger cojones than someone who would do what Michael Vick did.

Worse! They're letting him back in the game? What next? Ax murderers as tight-ends? Baby-killers on tackle? Pedophiles as QBs? Nope! And you know why? Because those guys harm humans and you couldn't have that. But get a dog murderer in there and everything is just hunky-fucking-dory.

I'd like to rip all their fucking eyes out and shove it up their collective butt so they could see how big an asshole they all are.

I think I'll start watching ballroom dancing; the testosterone level there appears to be higher.

July 28, 2009; Pretty Pictures of The Future

...the horror...the horror...

The Mooks don't get one thing: I can always understand them. They vaguely suspect I understand more English then I let on (beyond "sit" "bad dog" "stop that" etc.) but they don't know I understand everything in French, English, a little Italian and some pieces and bits of other languages. (You pick this up all your life—puppy mills, pounds, owners, alleys, during walks—and dogs absorb information far better than humans; it's the nose/brain thing.)

This is a valuable tool because it keeps me in the loop—indeed, so far in the loop, I'm pretty much the one twirling the lariat. It can be fun. Like the other day, Mook A was repeating a good joke to Mook B: "If your cat goes missing, don't bother to put up posters. 1) We don't care. 2) Your cat is dead." You can't beat a good dead cat joke.

But knowing the languages can also be irritating. For instance, we were all out on the balcony the other day, enjoying the warmth, listening to the rustle of the leaves and keeping squirrels away, when the Mooks started talking about me in French. They were discussing the fact that I was getting closer and closer to being able to open the screen door by myself. Indeed, I just run at it like mad, smash my nose into it and it jumps back a good foot before slamming shut on me. Then their nastiness began.

Mook A: You realize, we're going to have to get back into the habit of closing the inside door so he can't get out.

Mook B: Why?

A: As brilliant as the dog is, he's more like a retarded child—he doesn't understand consequence; he just goes for it. What would happen is we'd be out one day and he would run for the door, get it open, zip halfway through and the door would close before his big porker ass could get through.

(As A loses more weight—19 pounds and counting!!!! he never refrains from telling the world—the comments about my "porkiness" get more frequent. I don't like it.)

A: (Continuing) And then you know how he is. He'd start shrieking—

B: —shit—

A: —yeah. And every fucking neighbour would be out on their balconies and in the alley and calling the cops and the SPCA and we'd come home to find our door broken down and a citation for animal cruelty.

B: (Laughing) You're exaggerating!

A: Oh! You think? How about the time that he got his front paws and shoulders through the railings of the balcony and the only thing holding him back from a two-story fall was that gigantic arse of his! What did he do 'til I saved him? Panic and shriek!

B: ...good point.

A: I told you: he's a little bit of a tard: an idiot savant. Never underestimate both his smarts and his profound stupidity.

I had to work very hard in pretending to have my attention elsewhere as this went on. If they ever figure out I understand French, I lose a valuable weapon in this battle. But I can't say I was as amused as they seemed to be by this conversation.

Then A picked me up, looked me straight in the eyes and this time switched to English. "You know what would happen if you went back to the SPCA, Little One?" He waited to make sure I was listening. Oh! I was listening. "Your file would include the notation that your previous owners had had you for more than six months but still had not been able to control you. That would mean that no normal person would adopt you. Because of this, you'd find yourself owned by the only kind of person who would adopt you: a lunatic. Let me describe this person: 20-22, maybe, male, halfwit. He would tell his parents—he still lives with them in a basement room—he would take care of you, but he wouldn't. You'd hardly ever eat and when you did half the things you do here, he'd beat you like a gong."

My mouth went dry. You've got to say one thing about A: he paints a vivid picture. But it got more vivid. "When he was drunk on his parents liquor, he'd get sad and lonely and horny. He'd spend the first half of the night dealing with the reason no girl will touch him: his acne. Then, in a fit of drunkenness and horniness, he'd probably sodomize that fat ass of yours."

I could smell the guy's room: old sweat, pizza, feet, spunk. I could see the guy going from cuddles to...oh! my God!

The Mook went on. "And one day, his parents would find him hanging in the close where he'd pulled a David Carradine: auto-erotic asphyxiation. They'd only know he was dead because you'd be at his bedroom door, bitching for food, as usual, and bothering them."

He stopped then and sipped his ice tea. I glanced over at B who was smiling like this was hilarious. A concluded. "You think the parents would adopt you? Ha. Ha. They would take you back to the SPCA where you would be received as unadoptable and then...oh...so...gently...the big sleep."

The last words were a whisper that floated off into the evening sky.

He hugged me hard and said, "So try not to be a tard, you little peckerhead!" and he and B laughed and both cuddled and kissed me. It was the first time I think I needed the affection.

I could have used it later too when I had the nightmare, but the Mooks were sleeping soundly.

July 25, 2009; The Beast

What? Were these teeth made for whistling? I think not.

I'm worried.

It's my rep. I have discussed this before. It's one thing to have lousy rep with the Mooks—I mean, who gives a fucking shit, right? But what I project out there—beyond the doors of The Fortress of Faggotry—is very important. How the neighbours look at you is how the dogs look at you is how the world looks at you. They don't care what you do behind closed doors, but there, in their world, every little move is important.

Where you shit, where you piss, what you eat, who you cozy up to and who you show hostility—it's all part of it. It all depends on how you play this game (and it is a game, like wearing clothes is a game for the hominids). You can be seen by one and sundry as the village idiot: the dog bounding about ingratiatingly, wagging its tail at any old fucking thing, and barking joyously at a whisper or a fart. You can be seen as the 'hood's pussy: whining and wimpering in terror when someone cracks their knuckles or belches, shaking when strangers come near, or peeing a little when another dog is within 100 yards. There are also the semi-steroidal alpha dogs who are always kept on a short leash because they'd eat your baby (or your fucking Yorkie) and use the bones for toothpicks.

Then there's my kind...or what I wanted to be my kind. Élite. You may come and kiss my paws but only if I'll allow it. You may call me cute, but also pay attention to the pearly-whites—they aren't there just for kibble. You may pet me in exchange for food. But you must always respect me because I may be little but I am the Ruler of All I Survey and if you don't like it, kiss my hairy arsehole. If you send those vibes out there, even the alphas will bow a little because they know that in a fight they might kill me, but they wouldn't walk away completely intact.

Well, the last few days, after weeks of work, I have been blowing it big time and I haven't endeared myself to the Mooks either. When I was kidnaped by them, I was told, quite clearly, "We will never hit you unless you get vicious." That was good because a dog my size getting smacked about loses all street cred. For this reason and for the sake of my rep on the street—and with great difficulty—I try to refrain from going after rollerbladers, skateboarders, and joggers because the Mooks added a swift smack to the leash-flyback if I bothered the aforementioned castes. They were right (and you'll won't see me say that often!)—no one on earth likes a squirrely dog.

Then...

I was out with Mook B for the evening walk a while back and we ran into Ginger and her owner talking with two ladies—daughter and mother, both old as fucking Methuselah. Ginger decided to be a real twat and ran around and around the three women and I just followed, tearing about. Problem? I was leashed and before you know it, I am roping the broads like bulls in a rodeo! One of the blue-hairs got rope burns and nearly tipped over. (Note: B never knows what to do in these situations while A and Ginger's owner are like ballet dancers when it comes to handling my long leash.) After they were all untangled, everyone, including Ginger and her owner, looked at me with those looks: that thing is not right in the head.

Oh-oh.

But it gets worse.

I was walking along with Mook A and the little old lady down the street—a pleasant but witch-faced, hunch-backed crone of a thing—opened her door as we passed. It caught me off guard and I went a little bloodthirsty. Well, the results were instant: the leash-flyback, the smack, the "Bad dog! Bad dog!" and the little old lady, whom I've met before, saying, "It might look like one, but that's no little lamb." Her voice said it all: I was nuts.

Then, the next day, with A again; a nice lady approached and had that look of affection and potential food offerings in her eyes, but when she leaned over there was this smell and, once again, I was caught off guard... Her: "Strange, he didn't look nasty." (Read: bananas, loopy, loco, psycho...any word in the thesaurus will do.)

Now in my defense, this last one is hard to explain. Dogs notice smells. We like ones humans hate and the reverse is also true. But our noses are far better and we notice smells no human can sense that set off all our alarms. Sometimes we can't even explain them. This was one of those times. Was she psycho herself? Was she dangerous? Had she drowned a puppy in her toilet? It was something and it screamed: RED ALERT! RED ALERT!

So there you have it. Worse, they were all women and women, like bitches, jabber and gossip—they have a secret network of information about everything (men, women, animals, spring fashion) and they can ruin your life in a New York minute. Unless I mount a campaign of suck-uppedness like the world has never seen since Chamberlain and Hitler, I will officially become the neighbourhood Head Case.

That must not happen.

July 22, 2009; At The Movies

What I'd look like if I had been put together by the wackos who made The Tracey Fragments

I don't want this to become one of those tedious lame-ass places where film geeks get their rocks off by displaying their erudition to readerships of four (including their mother, cat and a couple of goldfish), but I have to talk about movies. I have no choice.

You see, the Mooks have subscribed to HBO and The Movie Network and so now it's a steady diet of films. Sadly, most of them are those little ones that people who have a brain don't waste their time or money on but might glance at when they're free on TV and there is nothing else to watch in the summer...but they would change the channel fairly quickly. Not the Mooks—they live and breathe for these fucking artsy-fartsy pieces of shit.

Another problem: they seem to have a fetish for this actress named Ellen Page. You may have heard of her, she was in that movie Juno and was nominated for an Oscar for it. I watched it with Frank and he thought it was obscene and immoral 'cause the little whore of the title (Page) had gotten herself knocked up.

Anyhoo...

In the last few days we have watched two Ellen Page movies. The first was called An American Crime and it is somewhat of a crime it was every fucking made. I mean, it was about this kid, see, and she is left behind by her parents who work for the circus and she lives with a neighbour and then first she's tortured and beaten by the neighbour-lady and then by the lady's kids and then by all the kids in the neighbourhood and then she is dead. Not exactly farce, is it?, watching a 13-year-old being beaten and tortured to death (and let's not forget the words, "I am a prostitute and proud of it" carved on her stomach before she was deaded). The thing is, it was a true fucking story! When that kind of crap is trotted across my TV, I think I was better off in the fucking puppy mill!

Then we watched The Tracy Fragments, another one of those great Canadian films which explains why Canadians hate Canadian films and why this is a pipsqueak nation of over-subsidized whiney artistes. The story in this one might have been okay, but the whole thing was done on a variety of split-screens, with images floating about and no single one ever particularly clear. And that was for every single second of the movie. And it was an interminable—and I mean blow-your-fucking-brains-out-then-have-a-friend-shoot-you-in-the-heart-to-make-sure-you're-dead-interminable—80 cocksucking minutes! What the fuck is wrong with these people???!!!! Don't they watch their own movies? Were they all on drugs or were they still trying to see what that wonderful new editing software could do? I mean, shove a stick up my ass and call me a shish-ke-dog!

And you know what????

Today Mook B is out of town and Mook A plans to spend the whole day watching operas he taped from his lovely new channels.

Kill me. Kill me now.