It’s either the Blog or the Dog

Son wants a dog badly. He says he is the only child and needs some company, as if we (wifey and I) aren’t good company.

On my morning walk today, as I was thinking about this, two dogs barked and bounded towards me. They were ferocious looking ones, the sort my bosses have in their homes, the sort that are fed a lot of red meat and even cake. Yes, that’s what a boss fed his Nepalese royal family’s scion of a dog, whose ferocity was unmatched in the annals of my encounters with dogs. This Nepalese scion once bit an acre from my ankle and then when I kicked it, started yelping as if I had tried to strangle it. I have never been on my boss’s good books thereafter.

I have a long history of such confrontations. The first one was when my nephew (older than me) pushed me ahead when we went visiting a relation, knowing fully well the house had a ferocious Alsatian. Well, what happened was predictable, the nephew escaped and left me to deal with this brute, which canine floored me with a jump towards my throat, then when it was about to gouge my eyes out the lady of the house, my aunt, came and rescued me. So much for the trustworthiness of nephews who are older than one.

Well, I digress, again, a habit. These two ferocious mutts bounded towards me when I was at my most peaceful and meditative about the problems dogging my life. My first instinct was to turn and run, but then what would neighbours think? So I kept my cool, and walked straight ahead, to one side, ignoring the damn curs. They, wonder if I can call them that – having been a dog-unfriendly person all my life – stopped near me, saw I was not responding and then walked away, goofily, I might add.

Son Ronnie keeps insisting that now we have a bigger house we should keep a dog. I say, “For what? I would rather spend it on feeding a human being, or give money to charity.”

“But, papa, having a dog is cool. My friends all have it. They say dogs can be trusted more than friends these days.”

“I know. I have some friends of that type. And some critics, too.”

“How come?”

“My critics, they don’t read what I write on my blog and jump to conclusions," my eyes grow moist.

“What papa, here I am talking of dogs and there you go talking again about blogs. What’s the connection?”

Well, see the connection, son? Dog and blog rhyme and it’s expensive keeping both of them for a few comments and a few wags of the tail, which I get from my blog when readers comment. So either it’s the blog or the dog and I prefer the blog.