#)@(! Dog

The weather here today has been nothing short of perfect.  When I came home from work, I puttered around inside the house for a bit, and then headed outside with my loppers to tame a wild rose bush that I once foolishly planted too close to the walkway.  After trimming the rose bush, I decided to move on around the yard to trim another bush, but when I took one step off the walkway, I realized I was wearing my prized houseshoes, a wonderful felted wool pair that my friend knitted for me.  I didn't want to walk in the yard in them, so I kicked them off on the porch and went inside for a pair of garden clogs. 

Now, Cousin Roger across the road has a white pit bull named Homey.  Homey loves a stick better than anything.  He doesn't fetch, exactly; what he does is grab the stick (or whatever you're holding) from your hand and run with it like a crazy dog.  He zooms by at full speed, back arched, hind feet mostly parallel to the ground, almost close enough - almost! - for you to grab whatever it is he's got in his mouth.  Grabbing it, however, is futile, and possibly dangerous.  Once he's locked his iron jaws on the prize, there's no turning it loose, and when he's at full speed, if you are lucky enough to grab it, he's more likely to pull you down than to lose his grip on his trophy.  When he tires of the game, he lies down with the object until he sees you're approach, and he grabs it and runs again.

Homey is also a thief.  Lay something down, and he's got it and gone, and the only way you're getting it back from him is to trade him something more valuable, like a stick.

Homey came over to visit while I was lopping bushes.  I greeted him, and went on with what I was doing.  He sniffed around a while, and followed his nose on around the house and out of sight.  As the light began to fade, I gathered up my tools to go to the house, when out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Homey trotting across the road with one of my houseshoes in his mouth.

I called to him and told him to come back with my shoe, and he stopped and looked at me for a split second, and then he took off like he'd been shot out of a canon.

I dropped my tools and took off after him.  Of course, there was no hope of catching him, but as I hurried across the yard, I grabbed up a good, long stick from the ground and yelled, "Hey, you sh!thead, look here what I've got!," and I waved the stick around for him to see.  By this time, he was across the road in Uncle B's yard, and he stopped and turned to look at me again.  As soon as he saw the stick, he dropped the houseshoe and came running, ninety-aught-nothing, ready to play.  Holding the stick out of his reach, with him leaping and snapping, I managed to get my houseshoe while his mind was on the stick.  I was so mad at him I wouldn't even throw the stick. 

I felt smug about having outsmarted Homey until I got back to my porch and saw that the other shoe was gone, too. 

Muttering words that would shock the parson, I searched (in vain) my yard and Uncle B's yard for the missing shoe, but it soon got too dark to see.  I came inside with my one shoe and texted The Husband:  "Text Roger [I don't have Roger's number] and tell him that Homey has run off with my houseshoe, and if Roger doesn't find it, or finds it in Homey's sh!t, Roger's fixing to learn to knit."

A few minutes later, my telephone rang.  Roger said he'd buy me a new pair of houseshoes.  I told him he couldn't *afford* houseshoes that special, and that if he couldn't find mine, he'd have to learn to knit and make me another one.

He said, "I'll try."

That's all I can ask of him, I reckon.