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Duke Chases Tail and Calvin's Vindictive

Posted on: Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Dear Amy,

I'm okay. Thank you so much for your kind words. (And thank YOU friends. I had an overwhelmingly supportive response to my Duke post. I love you all.) It's no easier today than it was Monday to be without Duke. I miss him like crazy, but it's becoming a bit easier to see past the pain in my chest and realize he's really well taken care of in Michigan. The first day he was there, he got two walks, hours of frisbee, too many butt scratches, and probably more treats than he'd ever get at home. Our family loves that little puppy.

It's so sad to me that Duke left just as Harry started really loving him. Soon, bud. You'll be home soon.
But let's not be sad. We miss him, yes. But he will be back. Instead, let's talk about funny pet stories. I've got a couple. The first, involves the hero of our story, Mr. Duke.

Duke was a sprite ten month old puppy, living his life in Colorado. Nothing was sweeter than running around the backyard, chasing squirrels in the cool springtime air, except maybe a hike with his mom and dad, or the taste of our roommate Fred's hat (chair, toothbrush, etc.). He had recently discovered a vile creature who had to be taken down by force, and that vile creature just so happened to follow him pretty much everywhere he went. He heard it called "Tail," and Tail needed to be stopped.

So Duke chased Tail. He chased him, and he chased him, and he chased him until he was able to pin Tail under his own butt. Lamps, glasses of water, human feet be damned when Tail was around... there was nothing else to consider. Tail had to be stopped.

Unfortunately, Duke's humanfolk did not understand the importance of stopping the loathsome Tail. If Tail showed his ugly face in the house, Duke was to do nothing about it. Nothing! Just let that no good, obscene creature follow him around. Mocking him. Chasing him. But oh, Duke took care of Tail anytime he was outside and free.

One day, I was cleaning up the kitchen. Tail hadn't shown his face in the house in quite some time. It seemed as though Duke had scared him enough that he didn't dare follow him in the house. I was thinking about how brave my little puppy was, when I heard something. It sounded a little like Tail. Being chased by Duke. But Duke wouldn't do that. He knew to leave Tail alone inside of the house. I went looking to see what the noise was. Neither Duke nor Tail were anywhere to be found, and the noise had stopped. As I started to panic, I walked briskly past the bathroom, and something caught my eye. Turning slowly back (so as not to scare either Tail or Duke, whomever it was, away) I caught the eye of my sweet puppy dog. In the shower. Peeking out from behind the shower curtain.

That was a clean tub.
He quickly disappeared, and I heard the unmistakable sounds of Tail being chased by Duke. Surely, this smart dog wasn't chasing Tail right in front of my face. Ah, if only. You see, Duke believed that he was hidden behind the shower curtain, so he and Tail were having a full out chase in the bathtub. The bathtub I had just cleaned. And Duke thought he had found the secret room, of whose existence I had no idea (the bathtub), where he could chase Tail to his hearts content. Peeking over the shower curtain, I saw a puppy spinning wildly in circles, chasing Tail. And then he knocked his head on the faucet and turned on the water.

I mean, does it get cuter (or more mischievous) than that? Maybe. Here's a story about our equally loved cat Calvin.

This dapper gentleman is Calvin.
Calvin was a scratcher. We adopted him as a slightly overweight five year old, brought him home, and immediately, he went to our stairs and scratched the carpet. That was not going to fly. So to the store we went to buy a water bottle for training purposes.

The training went well, but Calvin developed a fear of the water bottle. The sight of it alone sent him fleeing to the bedroom, to the safety of the spot under the bed only he could fit. I had figured this out whilst training him not to use our stair as a scratching post. Jon figured it out a different way.

We were laying on the couch watching something (probably House Hunters International or ESPN or Father of the Bride) and Jon reached down to pick up the water bottle, in order to move it away from his feet. Calvin, who had been snuggled up next to us on the couch, angrily bolted to the bedroom. I tried to explain to Jon that he had basically just started a war. Calvin took it personally when the water bottle was used (or he perceived the water bottle to be on the verge of being used) if the situation did not warrant use. Jon laughed, and that was that.

Or so we thought. We heard one crash from the bedroom. After a second, I got up to see what it was, and by the time I had reached the bedroom, there had been a third. As I walked into our room, I saw Calvin perched on our dresser, a mess of picture frames behind him. Looking closer at the situation, I started to piece together what had happened. Calvin, the crazy little cat, had run into the bedroom, mad at Jon, and jumped up to the dresser where we had pictures framed from important life moments (like weddings and graduations and Tuesdays). He had walked along the row of pictures and knocked over just the photos that Jon was in. I kid you not. He skipped over the picture of my bridesmaids and I, to  knock over one of Jon and his groomsmen. Only the pictures of Jon were knocked over.

We slept with our door locked that night, per Jon's insistence.

So tell me some good Hurley and Chuck stories. Mend my sad, broken heart. Happy, heartwarming pet stories make things better every time, don't they?

xo, Mallory

2 comments:

  1. Your Calvin sounds SO INCREDIBLY CREEPY. Wow. It's blowing my mind that he knew what photos Jon was in...

    ReplyDelete
  2. RIGHT?! Luckily, he loves Jon now. Anytime he's gone for work, Calvin sits directly on his neck when we're reading to Harry at bed time.

    ReplyDelete

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