Skip to main content

Dogs are okay. Outdoor cats are low maintenance."

I was at the grocery store the other day. Just as I stopped my car, I became aware of a loud, boisterous, quite-annoying barking emanating from inside the cab of a big new 4x4 pickup idling there, in whose front bumper shadow I had inadvertently parked my car.

This unseen beast was yowling and barking like it was ripping through the undercarriage of the vehicle it was left in, and I swear I could see large chunks of upholstery and vinyl heave up toward the savaged headliner that received its indignant first realization, that the pickup's driver, perhaps this beast's owner/trainer/handler/shock collar operator, had left it/her/him/ there, by itself-- and had gone into anywhere without him/her/it cradled in his/her/its arms as though a very small frail child, a tiny monkey on a short bejeweled leash, or an ancient bottle of very expensive priceless, invaluable, irreplaceable, hootch the person dared not break for whatever reason (feel free to make one up) and left it there alone, to interminably wait until it presumably died, and whereupon, then and only then, could be safely removed from said vehicle and deposited in the nearest garbage can--which would be the ones located on either side of the grocery store entry and exit doors.

This idea is not so far off, nor unreasonable. It could be done. For this particular spoiled-beyond-measure beast was no bigger than a 16-ounce can of beer and probably weighed less, with its bulgy little head and its scrawny hairless skeletal-like body, its protruding fidgety eye balls constantly straining to escape their eye sockets, its bowed-for-traction little legs and splayed squirrel-clawed feet, its erect rigid little tail no bigger 'round than a No. 2 pencil . . . could be easily compressed even further--and poked into that garbage can with no more thought than,
 "Hmmm, only 31 or 32 more of those would've made a pound, I should've recycled instead.."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

August 6th, 2020 Tired of Writing

                    Comment on Parental Rights 1869-1940     I finished the second installment of my grandfathers biography I wrote in the Wannaskan Almanac for today, late yesterday evening. http://wannaskanalmanac.blogspot.com/2020/08/thursday-august-6th-2020-parental.html       I had worked on it for a good day, by Wednesday, including a few hours on Tuesday too, and in my waning energy for it decided just to wrap it up, rather than keep slogging through dozens of transcribed interviews, page after page, searching for some item that would fit my story, chronologically. In truth, I wanted to be writing something fun.     It wasn't like I wasn't interested in what I was mired in; I enjoy a good slog once in awhile myself, but my dilemma was how do I keep it interesting to others and not get bogged down? I could've just copied pages to be sure, but I needed it to flow somewhat smoothly, and not become just a repetitive list of names, dates and places. Argh. But t

GUD-RIDGE! MAYBE THIS YEAR, BABY!

    Late April renders up another fine Joe tradition hereabouts, the Gud-drudge’ (Goodridge) Lions Annual Smelt Fry, in Gud-drudge’ (Goodridge), Minnesota, seventeen miles east and a mile north of Tuff Rubber Balls (Thief River Falls), Minnesota. ‘Gud-drudge’ is the local vernacular for ‘Goodridge,’ and its proper annunciation, is the separation between towners and tourists.     A small rural town, with a population of about 150 people, is an agricultural community residing within and well beyond the city limits. Often several miles apart, resident farmsteads dot the remote flatland topography of northwestern Minnesota, whose inhabitants often share the lifelong experiences of church, school, employment, and/or family relation.    The smelt fry is a community event that brings people home from across the region. Beginning in the morning, and in combination with area garage sales, auctions begin around town selling consignment items from boats to barrettes, wood stoves, ductwork, framed

Friends to the End: Delmer Roseen and Curtis Johnson

  Delmer and Curtis: Friends to the End      From where he was buried on Saturday April 11th, 1992, the tin roofs of his buildings could be seen through the trees. Across the fence, at the foot of his grave, were the fields he farmed. Between them, Mikinaak Creek--so much a part of Delmer Roseen’s life and sadly, his death--still winds through willow slough, over beaver dams below the Palmville Cemetery, and past his door to the South Fork of the Roseau River, only a few yards to the southeast.         Delmer lived northeast of us in Palmville Township. If I looked just right, I could see his yard light through the woods between his place and mine. Either of us could hear the soft ‘clung’ of the rope and pulley against the flag pole in the cemetery at the corner of our two farms. Red willows, popple islands, and slough grass; green mossy fence posts; the often submerged patchwork of woven wire, and the depth of water in the creek vaguely separated us.      Delmer had live