The Dudette Abides

 The first thing I should make clear is this. The arrival of our adopted ladydog Nicolette Dudette, alias Nikki is not intended as a replacement for the gone but never forgotten Max. 

Max, the hyper-entitled Maltese is the only purebred dog we've ever owned. He hung out with us for more than a decade. Our vet, Dr. Ferguson commented, upon first examining him; "this dog's got attitude. He will bend you to his will." People would drive by us when we walked him doubtless saying to one another; "Hey, who's the girly-man with the little white dog?" Max rode all the way to New Mexico, via Southern California with us, quivering and slobbering all the way. Max insisted on designer dog food. I tought him how to howl on our front landing. Carolyn was not amused. When a horse appeared on TV. Max would skitter back and forth and warn them, low in his throat, against stampeding in our living room. He learned a handful of tricks, but soon lost the knack when we failed to make him demonstrate them. Max, it goes without saying, has earned his spot in the doggie hall-of-fame.

We had not set out to adopt a new dog. But I made the mistake of mentioning to our friend Merlene that we might eventually think about another furry friend. Next thing I know there's a Facebook page devoted to finding us a new pooch. And Kathy, another friend sent links to a number of sites devoted to finding homes for canine orphans. They somehow knew that a steady diet of doleful doggy eyes would break us down. Sure enough, a female dog named Nova showed up and we (Carolyn says I need to correct that to I) were hooked. 

Nova, soon to become Nicolette Dudette thanks to the intervention of two grade-school aged neighborhood girls we call "The Minions." was very easy to love. And her story was fascinating. She started in Mexico, had pups, survived a flood, (although sadly one of the puppys didn't make it) had a prior home in California and ended up being fostered by a very nice lady named Becca in SE Portland. We met, noted how friendly and smart she was and decided to go for it. She's been with us for almost a week. She hasn't replaced Max in our hearts. She's just augmented our affection for him. 

Our first days with the Dudette have been slightly altered by a dog-sitting assignment for our friends Sky and Lori. Their doodle-dogs Huck and Daisy have made the Nettleton/Rose abode a flying, furry flurry of canine clamor. Walks with the three of them are the doggy equivalent of red rubber-nosed clowns piling out of an impossibly small automobile. Fun!!!! 

Bottom line. The doodle dogs will make their way home to Troutdale. Max's legacy remains unvarnished. And Nicolette Dudette, Nikki, the Nikster,  is here to stay. 

Nikki is a rescue dog from the doggie adoption agency Underdogs Rock. 

Learning to Love an Unlovable Dog

 

 

Carolyn J. Rose

 

Every time I scrub the kitchen floor—and, for the record, that isn’t nearly as often as I probably should—I have fond recollections of a dysfunctional dog. 

When my father died nearly 20 years ago, he left a huge empty spot in my heart and my life. He also left a 45-pound dog named Ugly, a dachshund/Labrador mix with enough bad habits to drive even a veteran dog whisperer to shouting. Ugly barked at rocks. He carried rocks into the house. He dug holes. He clamped his jaws around things he wanted and refused to let go, even in exchange for a chunk of steak. He ate cantaloupes and cucumbers off the vine. He couldn’t be left alone in a car because he’d chew the seatbelts and the seats. He’d stand on his hind legs and use his front paws to pull plates off the table. If we opened the refrigerator wide he’d try to climb in. If there was one time he came when I called instead of staring me down, I can’t recall it.

 

Despite all that—and also because no one else would take him—Mike and I adopted him. At the urging of my aunt, who thought it might improve his self-esteem and behavior, we changed his name to Dudley. It had no effect.

 

It was too hot to fly him, so we bought my father’s Jeep from the estate, and drove from the Catskills to Vancouver. On the first day we slipped him a doggie downer. It also had no effect.

 

He bounced around the back seat like a metal orb in a pinball machine. He tried to climb into the front. By the time we’d gone 100 miles he’d shredded the dog toys we’d brought to entertain him. He was the reason we ate our meals in the car or motel rooms, took a wrong turn in Chicago, and missed out on a close-up view of Mount Rushmore.

 

We deluded ourselves into believing that once he got used to us and a new home, he’d abandon many of his bad habits. He didn’t. We lived with them. We laughed at them when we could. And we focused on the few good things he did.

 

First, he was protective of Bubba, our 10-pound Yorkie/miniature Schnauzer mix. He once held off a pit bull until its owners could get it under control.

 

Second, he was a sound sleeper. He didn’t interrupt our dreams by barking at the door. He could log a straight eight hours without needing to empty a bladder we estimated to be roughly the size of a small watermelon.

 

Third, when I dropped or spilled something, he was on the job. He licked it up and then licked in a circle around it. When he was finished, he’d grin as if to say “Job done.” I’d see a clean spot perhaps a foot across. Many times, to avoid a session with the mop, I’d toss down a few glops of peanut butter or bits of sandwich meat and he’d get to work.

 

Dudley died of stomach cancer more than 10 years ago. I don’t miss the barking, the rocks dropped where I was most likely to trip over them, or the holes in the garden. I don’t miss his stubborn attitude. But when I see blotches on the kitchen floor, I miss his deep-cleaning abilities.

Ten-pound Tyrant

Carolyn J. Rose

I live with a ten-pound tyrant.

If there is a dog out there with a stronger sense of entitlement and privilege than Max the Maltese, I’ve yet to meet that canine.

 I’ve shared space and time with a dozen dogs over the years. Every one of them would seek me out and relax against me for a hug or a cuddle. Not Max. He doesn’t cuddle and, unless he’s hungry or wants to go out, doesn’t look for me at all. He hangs with the Y chromosome guys. If there are no men around, he makes himself comfortable in the basement man cave and waits for one to appear.

Even after nine years of this, I still try to win him over. I offer full-body massages, ear scratches, tummy rubs, and treats. Like a potentate receiving tribute from his subjects, he accepts it all as if it’s no more than what’s due to a dog in his lofty position.

There are days, perhaps 50% of them, when he condescends to lick my nose when I ask for a kiss after getting him into his harness and clipping on the leash in preparation for a walk. But he offers only a single lick. On other days I get the thousand-yard stare. Occasionally I decide to wait him out and stare back. One day out of 20, perhaps in the spirit of noblesse oblige, he relents and delivers the barest tongue-tip of a lick. Nineteen days out of 20, I cave and we go out the door.

And yet I come back for more—although I often ask myself why. In the course of my life I’ve walked away from several unbalanced relationships like this one. But this little guy has his paws around my heart. All he has to do is cock his head and give me the doggie equivalent of a smile and he’s guaranteed himself another week of excusing his refusal to obey my commands and overlooking his snubs.

So I work with what I have. And I make what I have work for me. I use Max as a model for Cheese Puff, the scruffy orange mutt from my Subbing isn’t for Sissies mystery series. In appearance, they’re nothing alike, but their attitudes and actions are similar.

And, okay, they’re similar because I transfer fact to fiction. But according to the fine print on my poetic license, I’m allowed to do that.

Bubba's Limo--Max's Lament

Bubba and Max--Roll Playing

By Carolyn J. Rose

  
Max: (confronting Bubba at the water dish) How long are you going to keep limping around and milking this?

Bubba: Milk? Somebody spilled milk? Where?



Max: Forget about eating. I’m talking about that alleged injury of yours.

Bubba: Nothing alleged about it. (Bubba limps around in an exaggerated manner, ala Chester from Gunsmoke) I pulled a thingie in my knee. Dr. Ferguson said so.

Max: (A) You don’t have a real knee and (B) I bet you made that up.

Bubba: Did not. If you hadn’t been at the groomer getting all clipped combed, massaged and girlie smelling, you would have heard him.

Max: I’m a purebred. Grooming is important.

Bubba: So is doing what Mom and Dad ask you to do, but nooooo, you can’t be bothered with that.

Max: I’m busy. Sun was in my eyes. I had an itch. (Licks himself in an embarrassing place to make his point).

Bubba: You’re busy every time they ask you to sit or come?

Max: Mostly. My calendar is, uh, crowded. You wouldn’t believe how many squirrels I’ve had to bark at this week. Besides, I’m protesting my treatment. I have to walk. You get to ride. It’s hot and my tongue hangs out. It’s not fair.

 Bubba: (Practicing a prom-queen wave) Seems fair to me. Besides, I walk as far as Mom lets me. The stroller was her idea.

 Max: Yeah, well, that shows what she knows. That stroller is way uncool.

Bubba: You’re just jealous because people stop and pet me and say “Ah, what happened to the puppy?”

Max: (Snorts). You haven’t been a puppy since Clinton left office.

Bubba: Sure, play the age card. (In a creaky voice) Someday you’ll be old. Someday you’ll wish you weren’t so “busy” and paid more attention when Mom asks you to stand on the right step so she can put on your harness.

Max: Blah. Blah. Blah. Harness, blah blah, step, blah blah old. (He sniffs the air) I still say you’re milking it.

Bubba: And I say you’re a squirrel-chasing dum—

Max: Squirrel? Where? (He sprints for the sliding door, only to collide with the screen full face)

Canine Confidential

An Advice Column for People Who Love Their Dogs (Possibly Too Much)

Max: (gnawing on a pencil) Remind me again why I have this.

Bubba: Not as a dietary supplement. We’re starting an advice column.

Max: Cool. (Runs in a circle) I’m jiggy with that. Let’s do it. (pant, pant) Uh, what’s advice?

Bubba: It’s what Mom always gives Dad.

Max: Oh. You mean the stuff he never listens to.

Bubba: Except when she bribes him with the last ginger snap.

Max: Ginger snap crumbs. Oh, boy, Oh boy! (Wrestles with the pencil) How do you hold this, anyway?

Bubba: Use your thumb.

Max: Don’t got one.

Bubba: Oh, yeah, huh? (Takes the pencil from him). Okay, then, it’s settled. We’ll type our answers.

Max: Answers. Yeah. I can do that. Uh, what do we answer?

Bubba: Questions.

Max: You mean those words with the hooky-dotty thing at the end?

Bubba: Right. (Rips open envelope with her teeth). Here’s one: “What’s the best time to take your dog for a walk?”

Max: Ooh. Ooh. I know. I know. “Right now.” (Spins repeatedly until he falls down dizzy on another sheet of paper and reads it). This one asks: “Should you train your dog to fetch?”

Bubba: Easy. “Not without checking your state’s dog labor laws and rules governing the weight of the object to be fetched.”

Max: Wow! Governing! You’re good at this.

Bubba: (Buffing her toenails on a sofa cushion) I know.

Max: So, do we just keep on making up questions?

Bubba: No, we wait for people to write them in the comment space down below.

Max: (peering under the sofa) I don’t see anything down here.

Bubba: (sighing) Down below this blog.

Max: (Chewing his tail) I knew that.

Bubba: Right. And I just grew an opposable thumb.

Max: Okay, so what do we do while we wait for people to write something?

Bubba: I guess you could always chase a squirrel.

Max: Squirrel? (Runs full tilt into sliding glass door then collapses in a heap). Where?

Bark/Counter Bark/Max's Great Medical Adventure

Max:  How come you’re not speaking to me?

Bubba:  You should know. Just think about it.

Max:  Thinking. Thinking. Thinking. Got nothin'.

Bubba:  Isn’t that just like a guy, totally unaware.

Max:  And isn’t that just like a girl, thinking we guys should be mind readers. In touch with our feelings and like that.

Bubba: (sigh) Good point. Okay, I’m mad because you got to go on a special trip with Mom and Dad Saturday night.

Max: You won’t be mad when I tell you where we went.

Bubba:  (cocking her ears) I’m all ears. Where did you go?

Max: Beats me. It was a place with metal tables and a man in a white coat and they put me in a cage and stuck a needle in me and made me hurl my dinner.

Bubba:  Eeewwww. Why?

Max:  Beats me. When Mom carried me in the door she told a woman something about morning glory leaves and then the woman yelled, “Triage to the lobby.” Then another woman came and took me down a hall and after I puked they squirted this saline stuff under my skin and made me eat charcoal.

Bubba: I thought charcoal is what Dad cooks with in the barbecue.

Max: Me too, but I guess the guy in the white coat cooks with something else, because he told Mom he wanted to give me some to eat to clean out the toxins.

Bubba: (shuddering) Ugh. I’m glad I have sense enough not to eat stuff that’s bad for me.

Max: Hey, how was I to know? Mom had these plants in a pot by the window. They were green, just like the lettuce she gives us sometimes. And they were down where I could reach them. It coulda happened to any dog.

Bubba:  (sotto voice) Any dog with a brain the size of a pistachio nut. (aloud) Yeah, I guess it could.

Max:  And I thought all the stuff on the floor was mine to chew on. You know, like all our toys and Dad’s underwear, and the cardboard cylinders that fall out of the recycling, and the carrot pieces that get away from Mom when she’s making salad.

Bubba: (sighing) Maybe we need to review what we find on the ground and what’s safe to eat and what isn’t.

Max:  Okay. Good idea. Good idea. How about those chewie things Mom brings home from the store?

Bubba: Check.

Max: Peanut butter toast crumbs?

Bubba: Check.

Max: The crunchie stuff that falls out of our Orbo toys?

Bubba: Check.

Max: Pizza crusts.

Bubba: Check. But only if Dad doesn’t say, “Leave it.”

Max: Leave it. Okay. Okay. What about stuff outside, like frogs and toads?

Bubba: Eeewww. If you so much as lick a toad, you’re never grooming my face again. Besides, Dad says licking toads can make you hallucinate.

Max: What-in-ate?

Bubba: See things that aren’t there.

Max: There where?

Bubba: What?

Max: Or here where?

Bubba:  Anywhere! Everwhere!

Max: Underwear. Silverware. This is fun! Rainwear. Teddy bear. Brush your hair. Double-dog dare.

Bubba:  Stop! You’re giving me a headache.

Max: Oh, sorry. I’ll run get Mom and Dad so they can take you to the man who makes you puke and then you’ll be all better.

Bubba: No, don’t! Hey, look outside, it’s a—

Max: (turning on a dime and racing the other way) Squirrel!

OF DOGS, DESPONTS, DEMOCRACY AND DISTRACTIONS

Bubba:  So, I was reading about the protests in the Middle East and—

Max:  Reading? Is that like eating?

Bubba:  No. You use your eyes instead of your mouth.

Max: You really must have to blink a lot to chew up a cookie.

Bubba: (baring her teeth and growling low in her throat) No, doofus, you use your eyes to see words.

Max: Oh, I get it. Kinda like when I see SQUIRREL?

Bubba: (sighing) Sort of. Except you don’t look in the yard, you look in the newspaper.

Max: The one Dad gets off the step in the morning? The one he saves the bags from to pick up our poop? The one that makes him all red in the face about something he calls politics?

Bubba: Right. That one. So I was reading about—

Max:  How did you hold it up? We don’t have thumbs.

Bubba:  I didn’t hold it up. It’s lying out on the patio.

Max:  Oh, in the place where Mom puts it because you’re not a boy dog ad you hate to squat in the wet grass?

Bubba: (sighing louder) Thanks for sharing that with everyone. Right. The paper is on my spot. Anyway, so people are protesting for more rights and freedom and democracy and I think we need that too.

Max:  Yeah. Freedom. Democracy. Rights. I want a whole goo-gob of rights. (Gets a suspicious look on his face) Wait just a doggone minute. Are those all good things?

Bubba: Yes.

Max:  As good as dog cookies?

Bubba:  Yes. Even better.

Max:  What do they taste like?

Bubba:  (groaning) You can’t eat them. They’re concepts.

Max: Uh, right, I got it. Concepts. Uh, huh, uh huh. (Tilting his head) Then why do we want them?

Bubba:  Because Mom and Dad are dictators. They decide when we eat and when we walk and how many cookies we get. And they make us wear collars.

Max:  Mine is blue.

Bubba:  And they make us do tricks to get treats.

Max:  Yours is pink.

Bubba:  Pay attention.

Max:  I like my collar.

Bubba: That’s not the point. We should decide what we wear, when we eat, and how many cookies we get.

Max:  Yay, cookies. Let’s protest. Right now. Power to the canines!

Let’s . . . lets . . . uh, how we gonna protest?

Bubba:  We make signs and lists of our demands.

Max:  Uh, looks like we’re back to that “no thumbs” problem.

Bubba: Much as I hate to admit it, you’re right. Okay then, we’ll refuse to obey them until they make concessions.

Max:  Ha. How is that different from what you do now? When it’s time to do tricks, you roll over once and then just sit there.

Bubba: That’s not true.

Max:  Is so.

Bubba: Is not.

Max: Is so.

Bubba: (Shaking her head till her collar jingles) Hey, look out the window. Isn’t that a—?

Max:  SQUIRREL!!!!!

To learn more about Bubba, Max, Carolyn, and Mike, visit http://www.deadlyduomysteries.com/ and check out their pages.