I see in last week’s issue that the City of Chamberlain has a dog catcher on staff and that straying animals have been put on notice. What a wonderful idea! Pets are fine and everyone who wants one should have one, the little dickenses should be taught not to bark 24 hours a day, run loose to chase cars or poop on the neighbor’s beautiful green grass.

Well, come to think of it, Ed’s dog is not allowed to poop on our grass or anyone else’s, either. So, that means he is penned up, right? I’m also of the belief that no dog should be penned up or tied up 24 hours a day, seven days a week. When we first "inherited" our dog it NEVER barked, but barking lessons were free in our neighborhood that week, so what the heck … a dog’s gotta do what a dog’s gotta do. And he got darned good at it, too. The lessons to undo the barking are about 95 percent successful … we don’t have to yell at him as much as we were.

Where is this going? Is my column going to the dogs? Looks like it to me. However, it does make me think of the story a co-worker, Donna Kentch, told in the office the other day and I think it might be worth repeating. Me, not being the storyteller she is, I may lose something in the translation, but I’ll share it anyway.

   As she was sitting out on her deck one wonderful afternoon the peacefulness was rudely interrupted by three, not one, but three dogs; two adult Labs and a Lab puppy. She immediately slapped her hands together and the two big ones ran off. It seems knew what it meant when someone clapped their hands in their direction. However, the little one apparently thought it meant, "Come here little puppy," and it was more than happy to oblige her. Donna tried throwing little rocks from her planter to scare it off. The puppy thought she wanted to play and brought the little rocks back to her. It was so happy, jumping around excitedly as if to say, "Look, she’s throwing things for me to catch," and wagged its tail to encourage to throw more.

By now, Donna realized more drastic measures will have to be taken and this time it was her turn to oblige the puppy. She went inside the house to get Charlie’s "dog-enforcer BB gun" while the puppy waited patiently by the deck to see what new toy she was bringing out and smiled at her as she lowered the gun to its face and shouted, "git!" The puppy thought she was so funny it bit the end of the gun’s barrel. Now what’s a woman to do? She did the only thing she could do; the puppy had been "playing" so hard and it was pretty hot out, so she got him a dish of water (besides, she was thirsty after her workout).

So, what valuable lesson did the puppy learn from all of this? The next time it needs a drink of water it can go check to see if the nice lady with the stick is out on her deck so it can get a drink of water and bite the end of her stick.