Last week, it snowed in Southern California. The fact that it did not make the news does not make it any less dramatic. In fact, the effect was even *more* dramatic since it happened in my living room. That's right: I came home from church and opened the door to find downy white clumps settled serenely across the carpet, the tile, even the coffee table. It looked just like snow.

It was, however, the sad remains of Stinky Ball  ... who apparently did not go down without a fight. SB's carcass would reveal several tear marks, and in fact a significant piece of his furry hide was found as far away as the kitchen. It was unclear from the location of the fragment whether the Dog in Question merely dropped it on the way to the water bowl, or was headed toward his favorite napping spot next to the oven.

One thing is clear:  it was a murder without remorse. I was greeted at the scene by two panting, grinning snouts with wagging tails. They started guzzling before the refilled water dish hit the floor. Making it snow indoors in spring is thirsty work.

And though I hate to admit it, it would appear that Chance's involvement was more than just a failed rescue attempt. Like that sad Marine wife this week on trial for the murder of her husband, it would appear that after too little effort at deliverance and too brief a mourning period to pass for socially acceptable, my stout-hearted collie went from victim to predator with probably just the slightest "come hither" glance on the part of the Kagonomist.

I have no doubt who started it, but we'll never know who ended it. But I CAN tell you who was left to clean up the mess! No surprise there.

The recently departed was Stinky Ball the Third. When I returned to PetCo for Stinky Ball: the Next Generation, I thought now would be a good time to initiate Kago into proper plushy toy etiquette. After all, April 1 marks Kago's First Birthday.

Since I am at this point unwilling to play digestive roulette with any sort of doggy birthday cake, I decided getting Kago his own "teddy bear" was a win-win: No SB sibling rivalry, no mopping up afterward. With his dad away, I thought a gingerbread man-shaped "stinky" toy apropos. Technically, not a ball. But easier to identify at a glance if one starts playing "coyote in the henhouse" with his brother's special buddy.

Trying to impress upon Kago the solemnity of the occassion, I put both dogs in a sit-stay and asked them to repeat after me:

"This is my Stinky Ball.
There are many other Stinky Balls like it, 
but This One is mine.
...I am nothing without my Stinky Ball."

(For those of you who have been in the military, or have seen the movie "Jarhead," you will recognize the indoctrination of the soldier/marine to his rifle.)

Chance, having been through this routine before, sat at sharp attention, ears at full mast, eyes focused on Stinky Ball IV with a fiery intensity. Kago, somewhat confused (but nonetheless excited) by this unusual development, pivoted his ears to and fro, up and down, in a way indicating (I thought) that we had an understanding. He forgot himself and stood up, but with one Drill Sergeant glance from me sat back down. He shifted his weight from one leg to the other to let me know his patience was wearing thin, but he held firm -- ears unfurled in anticipation like the headgear of the Flying Nun.

I presented Stinky Balls, each to his rightful owner.

Chance, predictably, disappeared to the bedroom with his. 

Kago charged around the living room like a bucking bronco, tossing his in the air, catching it, and shaking the life out of it as if it had bitten him on the nose. He snorted and charged, flipped and pounced. In 20 minutes, he had nibbled his way through the ribs into the creamy white filling. 

Ah, well.

Humans get to dismantle an entire birthday cake on their 1st birthday, using only their chubby hands. Who could begrudge a puppy dog the same pleasure of "tearing carcass"?

And now, Stinky Ball IV is back to being a nocturnal creature. He sleeps safely in the closet by day, and is released only at night, when all good sockpuppets are already in bed. Chance has taken to sleeping on the floor -- out of sight, out of mind.

For those of you who don't know ... which is all but one of you ... my good friend SunWindRider went off on a grand adventure involving a motorcyle, a GPS gadget, a pocket-sized Sandy Squirrel (of SpongeBob SquarePants fame), and a couple of oven mits. I know, it sounds like a Tom Robbins novel ("Jitterbug Perfume," for example, which was a road trip story with characters including an old sock, a can of beans, and a spoon, if I remember correctly). If all goes "well" for my two-wheeled friend, his trip will sound even more "novel" as the days go by. You can read about his travels on his own lj page, and they are well worth reading. Especially if you have a fondness for Serpentinite and sea stacks. Don't ask ... just read.

Anyway, he went on this trip and left me with his dog, Kago. Kago used to be short for some Korean word pronounced "Kay-go-gee," which means "barbecued dog." But after that joke fell flat (by no fault of trying) on the tender-hearted, sometimes vegetarian dog lovers at our local San Diego dog park, the puppy has been renamed "just Kago ... it doesn't mean anything."

But privately, his owner calls him "lambchop," and croons to him about what a nice roast he would make.

That was before. Now he is mine, and my entire day revolves around the care and feeding of Kago (and Chance, who is my own dog). For starters, I had to move into SunWindRider's apartment, since mine is too small to contain the unleashed energies of the Kagonomist. For example, right at this moment, he is playing the game I call "NASCAR," which involves racing at top speed in an oval around the coffee table, and sometimes actually getting sideways as he overshoots the "barrel" between sofa and table, and is "forced" onto the seat back cushions of the leather couch. I suppose the game could also be called "louge," like the sled race, but I don't know how to spell it and I can't find it in the dictionary. (I have never understood how one is supposed to find a word in the dictionary, when the very nature of the problem is not knowing how to spell it. But I digress...)

While Kago is racing around the living room, variously crashing into and leaping over the obstacle presented  by my own distraught border collie, said d.o. (distraught obstacle) is making strange, operatic, canine yodeling noises we can only guess have something to do with, "Slow down, quit hitting me, I'm going to tell on you, and if you do that again I'm going to bite you on the ear." Which he is now doing, much to Kago's delight.

Kago will celebrate his first birthday on April 1. So he is still a "baby." He was adopted about 4 months ago from the Helen Woodward shelter. When the volunteer attendant handed the leash of the leaping, bucking, puppy over to its new owner, he said, "Good luck!" and scurried away. 

Last weekend, I thought our sensitive little boy -- we're guessing he is a border collie/rat terrier sort of mix -- might feel a little lost and confused. He wandered around the apartment, sniffing into corners. Then without warning or explanation, he galloped through the "forbidden" bedroom, turned on a Chinese floor lamp by stepping on the switch, lept straight into the air in surprise, and landed facing the mirrored closet doors, where he promptly began licking his reflection. A couple of minutes later he left quietly, and in a rare display of self-absorption, settled into the thoughtful chewing of a rawhide bone.

That night, he slept soundly in his crate. The next night, he slept soundly on the bed. Where he has pretty much slept every night since, inching closer and closer from the foot of the bed to the pillows. This morning I woke up with his chin resting a bit uncomfortably across my neck, and his entire body stretched sideways across a pile of pillaged pillows.

I had the idea for a t-shirt: My Boyfriend Went All Over the United States, and All I Got Was This Crummy Dog.

Nothing about that statement is entirely true, but it makes for a punchy t-shirt slogan.

There is more to tell, but this is only the introduction. The rest will have to wait...

Tags: border collies, dog, sunwindrider