Half a step short of a squirrel.

I was on the way to the kitchen to fix my pre mid-morning snack.  Just a little something to tide me over 'til snack time.

My route took me by the doggie door, where I found the Beagle Posse involved in some intense beagle project.  Tuppence was squatted by the inside of the door when Tommy came at full run from behind me, did a four paw drift turn, and slammed through the flap. Tuppence growled at him and yipped, and Tommy turned back inside with a low head and a tucked tail.  He was backing off to, evidently, take up his starting position again when I said, "Wait. What in the Wide Wide World of Crazy is going on?"

"Squirrel practice," said Tuppy as Tommy began to butt wiggle as if settling into some unseen starting blocks.

"OK, wait.  STOP, Tommy. What is this?"

"On our runs after squirrels, we've been missing by 'bout half a step," says Tommy.

Tuppy spoke up, "We've got a whole plan to find that step.  And it starts with Tommy being more quiet going through the dog door--the sound of the flap is warning the squirrels."

Tommy petulantly asked, "Why didn't you spend a couple more bucks and get a quiet kind?"

"Well, I don't know that there is a 'quiet kind,' and anyway you're not putting your wham-bam exits off on me,"

Tommy began to settle back into his starter stance, and Tuppy was saying, "Think swoosh. Think swoosh.  Nothing but door."

"What else are you doing besides door flapping?" I asked.

Tuppy said, "We haven't even thought of everything yet.  There will be lots."

"In other words, you got nothing."

Tommy said, "It would help if you pitched in. I was looking at the back yard, and there's two easy things you could do.  You could move the bird feeders closer to the house so the squirrels have to run further to the fence, and you could grease the fence."

"Grease the fence?"

"So they slide off of it."

"We like the bird feeders where they are, they are part of the garden plan, and if they were closer to the house, we couldn't see them from more than one room.  And, since the fence is wood, I don't think we could make it greasy enough that squirrel claws couldn't dig in. And it would create a nasty mess."

"We already create nasty messes in the back yard."

"Yeah, but we take a pooper scooper and pick those up."

"OK," said Tommy, "how 'bout you shorten the fence so I can jump to the top?"

"I don't think so.  The fence is like it is so you two don't jump out."

"Then," advised Tuppence, "you shouldn't have picked us so short."

"What?"

"If you had waited a while to rescue us, we could have grown taller."

I sighed. "That makes no sense at all.  You are beagles, and beagles are only so tall."

"Yeah," said Tuppy, "and if you'd waited until we were Collies, we'd be taller."

"It doesn't work that way.  And, in any case, if you were Collies all you'd care about would be sheep, and maybe kids named Timmy with an unnatural attraction to wells."

"Can sheep climb fences and trees?" asked Tommy.

"Uh, no."

"Then it would have been problem solved."

"You will never be Collies.  We wanted beagles, and we rescued beagles.  You might want to give some thought to being thankful."

"Then," said Tuppence, "if you aren't going to help, we'll get back to squirrel training.  Tommy! Assume the position."

"If you're serious about gaining a half step," I said, "then you need to consider real muscle training.  Stuff to build up your strength, your speed, really work on those quick-twitch muscles.  Like an Olympic sprinter."

"Do what?" asked Tommy.

"Really work at it," I said.  "Exercise."

"That's funny," said Tuppence. "Your auto-correct changed 'nap' to 'exercise.'  See you later."

And yawning, they walked off. Squirrel practice had entered the squirrel napping stage.

What's a Quarantine in Dog Years?

Sometimes I'm nothing more than a dictionary for beagles. (Actually, that's a promotion.  Most of the time I'm simply a kibble dispenser.)

Tommy and Tuppence, the Beagle Posse. took their place in front of my recliner.  Tuppy asked, "What's a Florentine."

"That's someone from Florence."

"No, like a Florentine for tiresus?"  The Posse listens to cable, but not too closely--they might miss the sound of a morsel hitting the floor in the kitchen.

"Oh, you mean a quarantine for virus."

"That's what I said."  Also, q is a hard letter for beagles to form.

"It's a time," I said, "when people or animals have to be kept separate so they don't spread disease."

Tommy joined. "How long is it, and do we get fed during it?"

I said, "It's as long as it takes, usually not more than two weeks, and you don't have to worry, you aren't in quarantine. I'll feed you."

"What's this two weeks?" asked Tuppence.  "How long is that in dog time?"

Readers of this blog know, I spend a lot of time in conversation with dogs. I have begun to understand their time. Basically, it consists of "right now," "five minutes," "forever," and "suppertime."  For instance, if we leave the Posse alone in the house for five minutes or five hours, it is exactly the same amount of time.  And, if during that period of time, a meal schedule should pass, it instantly becomes Forever. That old saw about "dog years"--one human year equals 7 dog years--is nonsense to a dog. They don't contemplate any kind of life span.  They are all, "Now," "Never," "Suppertime."

"Are we florentined?" asked Tommy.

"No," I said. "No one in this house is sick, so we don't have to be quarantined. What we are doing is Social Distancing.  Trying to make sure we stay healthy."

"How's that workin'?"

"Well, we're staying home. Keeping out of crowds. Only going out when needed. Washing our hands thoroughly. And we're keeping watch for any symptoms."

"In other words," said Tuppence, "living just like you old farts usually live."

"With more hand washing," interjected Tommy. "What causes symptoms?"

"Germs, mostly.  Tiny, tiny evil things called bacteria and virus."

"Oh," said Tuppence. "Tiny evil things like squirrels."

"No, much, much smaller than that."

"Chipmunks, then."

"No, REALLY tiny.  You need something called a microscope to see them, and then some are even smaller than that."

Tommy snorted, "If we can't see 'em, we can smell 'em. Nothing escapes our beagly powers.  Is it suppertime?"

"No, it isn't."

"But we've been sitting here talking forever."

"A bit more than five minutes," I said.

"FOREVER!" said the Beagle Posse in unison.

"Look," I said, "we feed you on a regular schedule.  Seven in the morning and five in the evening. And we don't miss it."

"Our tummy clocks say you do."

"Yeah, dogs, I know how that works. Suppertime is five, so at four you start whining, dancing, and campaigning for your supper."

"Our clocks don't work like your clocks."

"Yeah, well if I gave in and fed you at 4:30, tomorrow you'd start campaigning at 3:30; and if that worked, and I fed you at 4:00, the next day you'd start at 3:00. I don't plan to try to sync up my clock to your tummies."

"Old English Beagle proverb," said Tuppy. "Never try to wind another man's clock."

"Ugh, Tuppy, that could go to some weird places I don't think this blog should go."

Tommy said, "We were talking about how long we'd be florentined."

"We're not quarantined, we're social distancing, and we aren't sure how long it will be."

"FOREVER!" said the Beagle Posse in unison.

Tuppy said, "Fine.  Feed us supper."

Why are there no shrimp on the floor?

Mid 70s and 80s Six Shooter Shrimp from Gaido's Restaurant on South Main in Houston.

Tuppence sat peacefully chewing on an old stick she'd pulled from the garden mud.  "You know, you two humans need to do something about your diet."

"Well," I said, "I don't plan to chew muddy sticks. And we're pretty careful. I think we have a good diet, lots of fresh veg and fruit, not much meat, and very little red meat, and we watch our calories and weight.  And we eat 90% of our meals at home."

"You aren't doing it right," said Tommy. "We see some serious problems."

"Those are......?"

"You don't cook right."

"Sorry, Boy, I still don't understand. We don't fry much of anything.  We eat our fruits and veg as raw or lightly cooked as we can, and we have NO salty snacks or sodas in the house." (Boy, just talking to Tommy was making me feel smug.)

An exasperated Tuppence sighed, "You do your cooking exactly 3 and 1/2 feet too high."

"Huh?"

"The FLOOR! You don't drop enough to the floor."

Ahh, now, we have in previous blog entries talked about how, in a house with one-second beagles, the five-second rule does not apply. And any time I am cooking (I love to do it, and do most at our house), the Posse sets up a constant food patrol and human agility test in and around my feet and legs. In fact, Tuppy toes got stepped on just last night.  YELP.

"I heard that," said Tuppy. "We can hear you talking to them.  And you hurt my toe."

"Well, I'm sorry, but if your toe hadn't been shoved under my heel, it would have been fine."

"Where else would I keep it? Get back to the food.  We need you to chop, sling, toss, and drop more."

"Last night I dropped a spinach leaf and some lettuce."

"Exactly!" crowed Tommy.  "If we wanted to eat grass we could go to the yard and eat it right where we could puke it back up.  We're talking about quality here.  You aren't dropping enough butter, chicken, cheese, steak, and fish."

"Hey," said Tuppy, "remember that time he dropped a whole tupperware of gravy?  CHRISTMAS!  And, they never drop peanut butter," she said to Tommy, "The only peanut butter we get is wrapped around pills. That must be against the Geneva Beagle Convention."

"I would remind you dogs of a couple of things. One is the time Tommy stole a whole half a pizza right off the counter, and the other is that just this week, you, Tuppy, grabbed a strip of raw bacon off the plate I was putting in the microwave to cook it."

"Yeah," said Tupp.  "The tooth is quicker than the plate."

I continued. "As to the things you want dropped, we don't eat too much of any of that stuff, and it is expensive, so I'm careful with it.  Plus, it usually doesn't get chopped up like vegetables do."

"Humph," said Tommy, "You're falling down on the job by not dropping on the job."

"I'm not sure that makes sense, but I don't intend to change."

"Well," intoned Tuppy in her OFFICIAL voice, "we expect you to change. We demand to see more shrimp on the tile."

I tossed each a mini milk bone, and they went away convinced they'd made their point.

The Dirty Laundry, Chicken Weenie Cure

Out of the corner of my eye, it looked like a beagle with an argyle sock on its nose.

I turned, and out of my full eye, it looked like a beagle with an argyle sock on its nose. And another beagle with a Taco print sock on its nose. I had spotted The Beagle Posse, Tommy and Tuppence, passing by the den door headed out on some beagle mission.  They get a secret signal every once in a while, and must head through the doggy door on IMPORTANT BEAGLE WORK. No human has ever figured out what that work is, but it usually involves a patrol of the fence, a few barks, a couple of pees, and then return to the house.

Back to the sock.  "Stop right there.  Come in here. What are you doing with our socks?"

Tuppy's voice was muffled, she had a sock on her muzzle.  "Murber gergle mirus."

Tommy pulled off the argyle. "She says it's protection from the virus.  Don't you read the news?"

"I haven't read anything about any dog viruses."

Tuppy had pulled the taco sock off. "We don't want it to start with us. You don't hear about the dog viruses because the people who own the news hate dogs.  You don't ever read a 'Man Bites Dog' story, do you?"

I said, "That's a really old joke. So, because of a virus we haven't heard about, you steal our dirty laundry?"

"Would you buy us masks?"

"I don't think they make dog masks."

"Right. So we had to make our own. Have you ever smelled your worn socks?  No germ will get past that."

"Dogs, I don't think any of this is very scientific. Unknown virus, biased news, dirty socks?  Really?"

Tuppy said, "We do science all the time.  Lots of experiments.  Like we eat stuff by the curb to see if it will make us puke.  We roll in different things to see which will smell more.  Science."

"Well, is the experiment a success if you do puke or you don't puke? I asked.

"Either," said Tommy.  "Science keeps an open mind."

Tuppy spoke again. "Forget our virus, we'll handle that one, what are you doing about the human thing that's coming?"

"All the stuff," I said. "Staying out of crowds, washing our hands, keeping Zinc lozenges handy, and we're having groceries delivered to stay out of stores as much as we can.  Of course, we've had flu shots."

"HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!", barked Tommy.  "More delivery people at the door?"  There began a low growl chorus from the Posse.  Delivery drivers are nearly as hated as squirrels.

"Calm down," I said.  "If Deborah and I both get sick, who do you think will dish up your kibbles? Besides, this is grocery delivery, the driver may just be bringing you some Chicken Wieners."  (A favored Posse treat.  Please don't tell them how cheap chicken franks are. They think of them as specially prepared gourmet treats.)

"There are people who bring chicken weenies right to the door?"

"Yep."

"Well......... OK.  Help us get our socks back on."

Guest post from Queenie

(ed note:  Queenie is a non-beagle, but nice, canine companion who lives with Beagle Posse pal Gary Gambino. Queenie asked permission, gladly granted, to tell her own story here.  Queenie typed it herself, therefore no caps or such.  The Posse is impressed enough that Queenie can work any part of a keyboard.)

hello. my name is queenie and i'm addicted to poop.

it wasn't always this way. i grew up with an old fellow named joe in richmond, kentucky. when he passed away in 2016, i was given to his son, gary [some of you know him by his nickname, gambz]. i had never considered eating poop before. i thought it was something that only mangy mutts and obedience school dropouts did.

gary lives with his very nice wife, deb, on five acres in rural southeastern ohio. very rural. gary says that 'it's so rural that even the banjo music doesn't reach here.' they have another dog, an old basset hound named ivan. one day we were in the half-acre dog pen, doing our business, when ivan said, 'hey queenie. check this out.' a few gobbles later, ivan introduced me to what educated folks call coprophagia. 'here, try some. i call it the other white meat. [of course, dogs see in black and white anyway, and i'm sure ivan got that term from gary's endless supply of pop-culture phrases.] i declined.

the next day i was alone in the pen. i had never eaten poop before. it grossed me out. but after ivan and his efforts at peer pressure, i was fascinated. i sniffed, turned up my nose, and took a nibble. it was gross, but i decided to try a little more. it really wasn't all that bad, and i felt as though ivan and i had bonded. what was at first an occasional snack soon became an obsession. once I got used to the taste, i was on my way. soon i had that monkey on my back. i was a poop addict.

as with any addiction, the first step is admitting you have a problem. there you go. gary wants to buy some of that stuff that makes poop taste really, really nasty, but deb objects because, well, she just does. detox sounds like a drastic solution. i heard there are also poop patches that i would wear on my fur, but i'm so furry, i doubt they'd be effective.

meanwhile, one day i'll summon the courage to talk to deb about her addiction to buying stuff on amazon.