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March 10, 2007 Buffing festival. Stealth instigation twice with Juno on Thursday buys her jail time galore with circumstantial case against yours truly inadequate to take action. Marvelous. Then multiple subliminals of Shea Butter yesterday, once again sufficiently under the radar that I am off scot-free. Then got a wound-up wheaten at grad last night with smallest facial muscle twitch. Amazed myself with that one. If there were a Nobel prize for this I'd be in contention. Aggravated assault with nail clippers, first on me, then on Crayfish, who meekly just takes it. Have given up on getting her to bite them and get the red juice. A few weeks to go until they launch the big ad campaign. Not exactly anticipating a stampede. Could incentivize by pointing out that she might not make bad eating. March 25, 2007 Have been doing some Test Buffings, to get a gauge of the incarceration threshold. A flurry of very minor ones ignored during the week and then during the commotion of our play session with Azlan, I got in some moderately rough ones. Athletic Cup in such a flirty mood, bounding and pirouetting, they were in a delighted trance, thus I again flew tidily under the radar. So yesterday I go for it - really go for it - and both times am summarily put in the bathroom. My kingdom for a pickaxe. Yes, I'd get hours and hours in the bathroom while they removed the body and cleaned up the blood but on emergence, there would be - very notably - one dog in the house: me. March 30, 2007 Official launch of Butterball marketing drive this weekend, along with a seminar, always a low-grade party. And get this. The following weekend and the week after that I get to do a DVD shoot, stay in a hotel and eat chicken all day long *without* Ballpoint, who will be oxytocin drunk at John's. Unceremonious bathroom time this morning for what was very much an aside buff. Futher delayed walkies so critter density reduced. I try and try to get him out of bed earlier, before the dawn, to ravage the still-foraging demons, so far with no success. I wait patiently. He ignores me. I do imploring "Benji" whines. He rolls over. So I walk on him. He grumbles and pushes me off. It's not like I'm doing this all the time. I love my sleep as much as the next chow. But there's a cornucopia out there this time of year so priorities and all that. One day the house will be on fire, I'll walk on them, helpfully, be tossed off as usual and so they'll burn. I'll be dramatically rescued from the roof and Irene and Bill will fly down to adopt me. Some sort of vegetable matter in the crunchies this morning. I am apparently completely unknown to them. April 13, 2007 No amount of googling has yielded any hint of a union for dog actors. I am slave-driven to within an inch of my life under lights throwing heat approximating the surface of Venus. Buffy do this. Buffy do that. Buffy do this again. And again. And again. Now more to this side. Oh, now how about up here on a wobbly table. Now do this other stuff over and over and over again. Nobody cares. David frowns occasionally but then breezes off to start creative differences fights with the director, who hates me. So third day I knock off around 5 p.m. - quite reasonable I thought - and she's all "oh oh oh you're wasting the time of this terribly important film crew" with no discernible shred of "oh oh oh film crew you're baking my chow to a crisp and she's growing a tumor from boredom." And did I mention warm beverages? Next day she puts me in a fucking vari-kennel in the lobby between takes, to keep me "fresh." Wow, thanks, what a nice "trailor." They better not try sticking any "no animals were harmed in the making of this blah blah blah" crap on this product. I go four days without a nap while Betty Crocker frolics around eating my crunchies, playing with my toys and, for all I know, humping her leg. And then, so endearing, a sleep-over at John's. Fun fun fun. Supposed to do another two rounds this weekend. She better not distribute the chicken strips quite so thinly this time. They are for B-u-f-f-y. Could that be clearer? They can subsist on the other stuff. Have a good mind to take out the ridgeback that keeps shooting me the eye. Hate show business. April 20, 2007 Final two days of shooting much less against type. Receive chicken multiple times checking into the W Hotel. Plus, no attempts to PAT PAT PAT by well-dressed W staff, who clearly get it. Next day I am required to frolic around Dolores Park, do short walkies and then, heart be still, annoy a Walker hound. Must repeat: it is written into the script that the dog must pitch a barrier fit. I am merely the instrument. Quite excellent authoring there. Then during set-ups at David's, buff around with some of the dogs, who are for the most part, sociable and cool. Later snuck in two stealth instigations with uptight ridgeback girl though the price is that I am implicated, hours and hours later, for microscopic dings on her. Uhhhhh, maybe the COLOSSAL and unstylish dogfight later in the day - the one where I was encarcerated on the other side of an eight foot high chain link fence (very glamorous) - might have had something to do with it. Slightly annoying ensuing week. Zero walkies. Zero. And, every time Margarine Tub is used as demo dog in the Academy, I am tethered to a table like a goat or bribed into a pen and forgotten about. Star treatment. But best news is saved for last. Yesterday a really, really nice lady (who very apparently gets it about chows) visits with her heavy-breathing kid, Pretzel, and seems, to all intents and purposes, to be checking out Buttercream. I keep a low profile while rolling around in my head the spectacular possibility that this could be the homestretch. I might get my house back. Mine mine mine. Yard: mine mine mine. Attention, scones, walkies, pizza: mine mine mine. All staff services narrowed to one client: me me me. Having been disappointed before, I will not jinx this with excessive hope, but instead calmly continue to endure. Almost forgot, bonus: cold weather. They whine and complain in spite of closets full of wardrobe technology. I, meanwhile, am in a 24/7, 365 days per year LINED FUR COAT. April 24, 2007 Pudding Cup is to be taken away tomorrow for a try-out. I have briefed her on the possible ramifications of her not being *extremely* well behaved on this venture. Calculated incentive buffing in yard last night resulted in some bathroom time but I have to do what I have to do. It's too glorious to even think about. Oh, am handed a raw chicken wing for breakfast on the weekend, as though we had never had that discussion. I artfully smeared blood and grease all over the floor and carpet as ant bait before leaving the hideous thing strategically placed to play some ambush with Buttercream. She cracked the code and I finally got some crunchies. Let's hope that settles that for a while. April 25, 2007 Cream Puff has been adopted. Gone. Poof. I could scream from ecstasy. The one slight scar on this perfection is the rumor that Pretzel has a podium to facillitate car window avocation. I, on the other hand, must find purchase on all manner of chow-non-ergonomic car features. I require a podium. Upholstered like Pretzel's. But in pink. It would also be nice if I didn't have to disembark to obtain a beverage. Very nice to have my house back. April 30, 2007 She's back. My life is over.
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May 2, 2007 Junk in the Trunk is adopted again. I'd be putting the champagne back on ice if it weren't for the fact that a) my office has been turned into a cheery daycare for her (what's wrong with this picture?) and b) once the honeymoon is over the Buff Me Now neons she wears will work their magic on Juno, and she'll come bouncing back into my life again. This thing is like a boomerang. I feel like a pivotal character in The Shield, boxed in on all sides. All this irritation is slightly mitigated by fabulous rough play with both John and Kelley, and by getting my car back at last. Assumed it was being fitted for a non-skid podium (in pink) but no dice. Hmm. Let's review. Happy side of ledger: Rough play, wheels. Animal Cruelty side: No walkies. No podium. No breakfast this morning. No brush-out for a week. No office privacy. Oh, and nails? Right on schedule in the concentric circles of hell. Hello hot spots. May 11, 2007 No breakfast again. Kind of Orwellian to be thinking about this lying here on the floor at the SPCA. And we are to get Flax Cup next week for a lovely visit. At least Preston is coming. Plus, they'll both be on leash while I strike terror in the hearts of ground squirrels on walkies. I'll zip back now and again for a beverage so they can catch a whiff of the critter orgy on my feet. The smell of fear. Cruise last weekend not bad. Good food. Amazlingly no other dogs with flotation technology, not to mention humans. If the thing had gone down, I alone would have made it. And maybe the two other chows who cased the deck to locate the lifeboat station with me. Anyway, Irene and Bill would fly down immediately, take over the house, crank up the AC, install one of those doors like at Longs Drugs so there's no more lag when I approach, and put me on thrice daily grilled chicken to mitigate the trauma I've endured. When I will have sufficiently recovered, we'd shop for podiums. May 20, 2007 Null set on ground squirrels this morning. My excavation site from the other day now without residents. They have to be somewhere so I'm far from defeated. I hope they have nightmares. Baby Got Back rudderless without John. I was deepening her gloom telling her that he was gone forever and ever and ever but then sunny Preston, breaking for a few seconds from endlessly squeaking toys, wrecks it with "of COURSE he's coming back and we'll all be together and it'll be so wonderful wonderful, let's just have fun, it's all good!" Whatever he's on I want some. On the other hand, the intracranial pressure from all that joy could give one a headache. She tries to entice motivational speaker boy into the pool yesterday and falls in herself, in full wardrobe, scraping leg and arm. Much cursing. Bet we won't be trying that trick today. May 27, 2007 Memorial Day Weekend Tally: Buffy 3 Groundsquirrels 0 It's a glorious thing indeed to harass and strike fear, though bumping one off would nicely round out my life. Came exceedingly close yesterday a.m. - the thing even went all WWI foxhole on me, necessitating an extra bath and blow dry, all in all sublime. The degree to which I prefer this a.m. search and destroy jaunt to "socializing" at the Concord Dog Park is parallel to the degree to which I prefer the magic of crunchies to repugnant raw chicken wings. Matters not to her as it's all about Max. Max Max Max. The dog park is much, much better for Max. Come along Buffy the Afterthought. Ooh, look, Max is sniffing a dog, ooh, look, Max is peeing again, ooh, look, Max is joining in on some urine-paw-drenched play among dogs with bad hair, ooh, look, another mini Schnauzer, will Max RECOGNIZE what it is??? Can we bear the excitement. Yippee, yippee, maybe he'll get all tired and bark 5% less. Oops, sorry, Buffy, forgot your personal collapsible beverage bowl and icewater, a basic need but oh well - here, have some of this lovely, tepid water that 65 fatuous dogs have spat in. Eek, where's Max???!!! Oh, almost forgot, while I'm being sandbagged into all this fabulousness, gimp is at home eating my chicken strips, knee noshies, and emptying out the world's easiest Kong. No doubt Zeal-o-Nova-Chow will be back soon. Apparently we're a hotel. June 2, 2007 Abandonned. He leaves - AGAIN - and she, while not physically absent, is held motionless save for typing by the computer monitor tractor beam. I am destroyed and nobody cares. I doze fitfully and dream of Doris Day's rolling grounds, where other dogs frolic and buff and eat shaved turkey breast all day every day. I bet injured organic groundhogs are flown in for them to massacre at their leisure. And no Roomba vacs ever. Distendo-Butt not only lives without Roombas smacking into her all the time but gets **trained** yesterday while I wither and decline in the office. Bet John has willed her to Doris Day. Nearly due for nails here in the inferno. June 27, 2007 Something is not right. She seems ill and always upset and stinks of cortisol. I fear I am to be made into a coat, or perhaps mittens. August 3, 2007 I have been relocated to a crack house in Oakland. It is a matter of time before I am collateral in a drive-by or car-jack. The one redeeming feature is this magical place just a few minutes away consisting of acres and acres of land near the bay, where it is always cool, and with wall to wall groundsquirrels, all of whom, oddly, are called "Cesar Chavez." Was *inches* from nailing one the other day. There is also the occasional slow bird. Perhaps I have already been gang-banged and this is heaven. August 28, 2007 Two days without one hunting expedition, in a boring and likely futile attempt to rule in or out grass as allergen. I am brought into the multi-purpose room to "play" with Bubblebutt and Company, a pretty pale substitute for gunning down a Cesar Chavez or two. Juno wags her lash-like tail incessantly in my face and they laugh and laugh as though she were Jon Stewart. Tomorrow she promises we will go back and do the full perimeter at the hour of greatest foraging density. Cesar Chavez number 81 312, in the glenn near the bay proper and prone to absent-mindedness, has my name all over him. If lucky, there will also be jackrabbits. These are fast but very stupid. There are at least two who station themselves in perfect silhouette against the morning sky and then seem genuinely surprised when I spot them and give chase. Even special needs squirrel Cesar Chavez number 934 keeps a low profile when away from a hole. Every trip I grow ever more skilfull at strategizing, searching and stalking while they grow ever more cocky and overconfident. These trends can only converge in paydirt within, I estimate, one month. September 5, 2007 If I interpret the grapevine correctly I am to receive specialized training. At first this appeared glamorous until I caught wind of the fact that it is a research project, which renders me, essentially, an experimental animal. There is no terminal depth at which she draws the sink line in her quest for early retirement or knowledge or whatever drives these things (the smart money is on, of course, early retirement; and, as if there weren't already enough irony in an SPCA employee vivisecting her own dog for apparent profit, if this venture does indeed lend monetary aid to her early retirement the ratio of walkies to days I have left on this planet will not change one iota). Pray for me. September 17, 2007 Another foster is on the way. I live in hell apparently.
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