When one lives with an Australian Shepherd, one becomes accustomed to the most mundane thing becoming a matter of joy and wonder.
For the last several weeks we’ve had lizards on our lanai. They make noises, as do the frogs and whatnot that lurk out there. But some of the noises really grab your attention.
My wife, who loves me but is also full of it, tried to convince me that the noises were coming from birds in our trees and echoing in the lanai. I have almost no directional hearing with the hearing aids, and so I bought into it at about 0.44 percent. But I quit asking about it, knowing she’d just make up something about robots from the moon landing in the yard.
Chewy, on the other hand, never cared. He’d not even look up when the racket started. He’s so used to all the noises around here that he ceased to care.
Until “The Lizard” showed up and started parading around on the new sectional on the lanai. The thing had the audacity to walk back and forth in front of the sliding doors and taunt him.
It was like watching a drunk sailor watching “Top Gun” on the day room television. God only knows what all was going on in his mind, but if you changed the channel (opened the door) and made the picture go away, he was all kinds of upset. He’d zoom out, around, and over the sectional looking for the lizard. But it was fast and he never got it.
Fast forward to the screen going up on the lanai. The installer swears that if the dog runs full speed into it he’ll break his neck. He’s never met Chewy. I give the screen about 1 minute of him trying to poke his face through it before it pops out of the track.
Now the lizard is back, but outside. Chewy still watches intently, but it’s like the television is in another room. He only stops when something catches his eye, and watches for just a few minutes. I guess he’s got reading to do or something.
In any event, this is a picture of him pre-screen on the lanai. It’s cut way down on the bugs we have to deal with, but it’s cut the season short for his favorite show.
I guess he can always hope for reruns.
