Everything I know I learned from my pets?, Part II

Everything I know I learned from my pets?


I have spent, literally, minutes observing my dog and cat so I can teach you all about how to live life in a more positive way, and hopefully get a show like Dr. Phil in the process. I watched them eat, drink, sleep, play, "use the facilities", and abuse these same facilities, as I will show you later.

My plan was to boil down life's lessons into trite, humorous sections that you would hopefully learn something from and would possibly make me rich beyond my wildest dreams.

I should have realized there was a basic flaw in my plans. That flaw would be the genetic aberrations we have for a dog and cat that quite honestly, throw the whole idea of natural selections right down the toilet. My cat and dog show that the survival of the fittest isn't necessarily always true. For instance, if Zeke, our wonderfully friendly dog were put up against a tremendously powerful creature in the wild, such as a hamster, I'm sure the hamster would end up being the only survivor. If Darwin himself were here today and observed our pets, he would throw the Origin Of Species into our trash can and become a Republican, or better yet, a professor at Patrick Henry College. (Motto: If you can't see it, it ain't science.)

Now Zeke is the dog I observed for multiple minutes. He's a large, hairy, friendly black lab mix. However, if I lived the lessons that I learned from observing him I would probably get put in jail. Other than eating, sleeping, and playing, he enjoys:

1) Licking people to show affection
2) Licking himself even more.

In fact, he licks himself in the "facilities" so vigorously, he shakes and rocks about the house. I hesitate to even mention the sound generated by this exercise.

Of course, he usually saves the most vigorous sessions for when when we have visitors. These visitors generally stare for a while, wondering if they are really seeing what they are seeing, then turn away with an embarrassed look on their face. My wife and I generally just smile and change the subject to something more pleasant, like the war in Iraq.

But what are you going to do? He's family.

It's so bad, that we have turned to calling his dubious performance "Dancing" to avoid calling it something I probably can't even print here. If Zeke had a theme song it would be Billy Idol's: "Dancing With Myself." For those of you Seinfeld fans out there, he is the Kramer of dogs. Oh yea, he lost the bet and he's proud of it.

But remember, I'm supposed to be teaching you life lessons through the actions of my pets.

So, the two life lessons I've learned from my dog are:
1) If you lick someone in the face, it's a sign of affection for all to see.
2) If you need a quick pick-me-up, or a little happiness in life, 'dance' with yourself.

And dear God in high heaven, Zeke, please don't do #2 before doing #1 on this list.

So really, what are the deep lessons about life that I have learned from my dog?

Maybe it is to enjoy life, no matter what others think? No, that's too basic.

Maybe it is to lick those you love? Nope, a little too visual.

Or maybe Zeke's life's lesson is that no matter what the obstacle, no matter how high the peak, (insert your overused metaphor here) you can reach just about any goal if you as a species don't have to wear pants. Well, that's really not a universally accepted message, but it's at least that's a lesson I can live with.

So as you can see, my after observing my dog, I realized that the chances of making a ton of money with a clever, tried and true concepts were 'dancing' away on the carpet, right in front of me.

So I gave up on observing my dog and went on to the cat.

This wasn't much of an improvement.

To be continued . . .