Monday morning sniff 'n pee tour.....

One of the problems with the self-educated is the gaps generally due to a lack of interest in some particular subject; the institutionally educated don’t have that excuse.

I wuz fifteen years old, I think, the first time I ever saw a Great Dane in real life….Oh, I’d seen pictures, of course, ’n in the movies, but that ain’t quite the same thing c’uz pictures don’t do ‘em justice.

What it wuz, I had just walked up what later wuz to become known as the old road but at that time wuz the only road, a (barely) two-lane blacktop primarily known then as US 23…I’d rounded Warnock curve, passed Frank Wheeler’s Chevrolet ’n wuz just turning the corner at Bennett’s Tea Room when I came face to face with a Great Dane who stood up on his hind legs and put his front paws on my shoulders ’n licked me in the face…

To have called me dumbfounded would’a been an understatement…it wuz the biggest durn dog I’d ever seen in my life….

Anyhow, back to real life ’n our morning S&P stroll around Village Park wherein we met a Great Dane ’n Willy went slightly nutz (Rusty seemed only somewhat stunned but recovered quickly enough, ‘specially when we took to the street in a roundabout)..the couple walking the Great Dane paid us hardly any attention at all which wuz also the case with the Great Dane…I suppose animals ’n people, too, who spend their lives with the appellation ‘Great’ get used to gawkers…..

I can’t remember who had that Great Dane on that longago day in South Shore but I vividly remember the dog….He (or p’haps, She, I don’t know) wuz tan with some white…this one t’day wuz more of a brindle….anyhow, I’ve seen larger dogs than Great Danes over the course of my life…some wolfhounds that were the size of ponies…the trait that most large dogs seem to share is everyone of them has been friendly…well, at least to people, dunno how they’d actually be to scampy, trampy little dogs like Willy who, at most, would only make two or possibly three mouthfuls for ‘em….

Anyhow, we made it home safely ’n da boyz are taking a little snooze…A little too early for me to do the same but I’m thinkin’ we could all learn a lot from observing the priorities of our dogs…..