The ducklings make themselves comfortable tucked in this Mastiff’s neck ruffles. I hop on the dog grapevine to talk to my bloodhound buddy, Otto.
“Hey big guy, where you at?”
“This ol’ hound bein’ treated like royalty here at the poleece station. Dispatcher Ralph, he a hoot, nothin’ the likes of someone this hillbilly dog ever met. Handsome black German Shepherd, too. Rare breed whar I grew up. Makes me self-conscious ‘bout my ears draggin’ the floor when my nose moves along the scruffy wood sniffin’ the strange smells of shoe bottoms, gum, and whiskey hidden in the desk of the officer who brung me here. I git to take a look-see at Ralph’s office. Ain’t seed nothin’ like all them electronic doodads watchin’ people and their dogs. We ain’t got no privacy, Dawg. Scares this hound he arrested sooner than later. Sure can’t wait to meet my savior, Dawg. I owe yer somethin’ big. ‘Spect it be soon. Ralph say he haveta locate a lost soul in the sewer agin. Man, you got some strange humans livin’ in your holler. Take a while to wrap my hillbilly head ‘round city life. May need some hep.”
Otto and I go back and forth for a while jawboning about his new life here with a detailed description of his new sister Lola being a cute chihuahua with a tendency to skitter when life becomes too much for her. Otto figures her puppyhood must not have been perfect and the lady who stole her probably has a screw loose if she thinks every small dog is worth the effort of snatching it from a stranger’s backyard. I agree, mostly out of respect and appreciating a new perspective rather than my own jaded view of the wicked woman screaming like a banshee when the little dog crawled up under me.
I tell Otto about the pesticide problem in our neighborhood and ask him to give it some thought, mostly on how to utilize his nose to locate the offenders without confusing them with the ‘green people’. Then, of course, I have to explain the term ‘green people’ to a hillbilly dog ‘cause they don’t have nobody in the hills who differentiates among the varying substandard humans I have been rattling on about since becoming a new father of two ducklings. I guess I forgot to tell the long-eared boy about my new offspring ‘cause he seemed surprised over my sudden interest in cleaning up the neighborhood for Bubba and Lester, which took some explaining on my part as to how Yours Truly became a new parent overnight.