Chicken Soup for the Cat and Dog Lover's Soul

  “Look at that!” I said to the other judges, pointing to the butterfly man.

  “Oh, that’s Frank,” several judges answered, as if this explained everything.

  Perhaps you are concerned that I, Dave Barry, a humor columnist with no formal training or expertise in the field of dogs, was on the judging panel. You will be relieved to know that there were also two professional cartoonists, both of whom have drawn many expert cartoons involving dogs. Another judge, named Edith, actually did seem to know a few things about dogs, but I believe she was not totally 100 percent objective, inasmuch as her own dog, Peggy, was entered in most of the events. Edith consistently gave Peggy very high ratings despite the fact that Peggy is—and I say this with great affection and respect— the ugliest dog in world history. I think she might actually be some kind of highly experimental sheep. Nevertheless, thanks in part to Edith’s high marks, Peggy did very well in several categories, and actually WON the Trick Dog category, even though her trick consisted of—I swear this was the whole trick—trying to kick off her underpants.

  Actually, that was a pretty good trick, considering the competition. The majority of the dogs entered in the Trick Dog event did not actually perform a trick per se. Generally, the owner would bring the dog up onto the stage and wave a dog biscuit at it, or play a harmonica, or gesture, or babble (“C’mon, Ralph! C’mon boy! Sing! C’mon! Woooee! C’mon! Wooooooeeee! C’mon!”) in an increasingly frantic but generally futile effort to get the dog to do whatever trick it was supposed to do, while the dog either looked on with mild interest, or attempted to get off the stage and mate with the next contestant.

  As you can imagine, it was not easy serving as a judge with so many strong contestants, both on the stage and hiding under the judges’ table. Nevertheless, when it was all over, approximately forty-three hours after it started, we had to pick one dog as Best in Show. It was a big decision, and although there was a strong and objective push for Peggy, we decided, after agonizing for close to three-tenths of a second, to give the top prize to Sam, the old, totally motionless, sleeping Chihuahua dressed as a butterfly to match his owner, Frank. Frank got quite emotional when he accepted the trophy, and we judges were touched, although we did ask Frank to make Sam move his paw so we could see that he was, in fact, sleeping, and not actually deceased. Because you have to have standards.

  Dave Barry

  Moving Together

  I was on a hillside whipped by wind, soaked in dew, beyond disgusted, all because of that wretched cat. I’d only opened the door for a moment. I’d been groggy with motel sleep, eight hundred miles from our last night’s bed, so I wasn’t thinking clearly.

  I had been in the rented box of a room, and I needed something real to look at for a few moments. But when I opened the door there was nothing but sky and highway— gray on gray with scrub bush in-between.

  I closed the door just as Lisa was coming turbaned out of the bathroom.

  This was the big trip, her return to Winnipeg from Montreal where she had what she repeatedly called “the best year of my life.”

  My mail and phone campaign had coaxed her to return. Now, packing hopes, memories and her smoky tortoiseshell cat into my station wagon, we were heading back west together. She had been reluctant to leave, dawdling for sips of café au lait, strolling down the boulevard of St. Denis to sigh au revoir and kiss her friends on both cheeks as they eyed me with deepest suspicion.

  It was a little later that we discovered the cat was missing from the motel room. “I only opened the door for thirty seconds,” I pleaded.

  “That’s all it takes,” she snapped.

  That’s all it took to feel like a complete failure. Eternal vigilance, the price of loving a woman with a cat.

  Moreover, it was no ordinary cat. Not when it had been raised by Lisa, the social worker. Its every response had been scrutinized. A nap in the pantry was a sulk, a scratch on the hand was a plea for attention, a walk out the window onto the second-story ledge was a suicide attempt and cause for Lisa to cancel our date.

  “I should have seen it coming,” she’d said. “Chloe’s been alone too much.”

  And how would Lisa analyze this blunder during our very act of moving together? A cat’s jealous rejection? A dark flaw in my character? This could affect our future together. I had to find that cat.

  We called out in cat sounds along the bushes. I prodded the underbrush. It opened into a jungly ravine. Where would I go if I were a cat?

  “She’s gone!” Lisa cried into the wind. “I just know she’s gone! I loved her so much!”

  If only I had a reputation for being reliable—for locking doors and mailing letters, finding my car in a parking lot—but I didn’t.

  Ashamed, I stared into bush and vines thinking how Chloe was really just a vulnerable creature, frightened of the car, anxious in the cage. She just wanted some peace. I could empathize. A quiet rabbit hole, soft leaves. She could sleep for days. And so could I.

  But we were late. We had to meet the movers. We had family waiting and friends taking time off work to help. We had jobs.

  I crashed into the ravine. Never mind the branches and nettles. Scratches were good. Blood could draw sympathy.

  Could that cat really want to linger in this wilderness? She was a consumer cat, supermarket-wise in the ways of Kat Chow and Miss Mew. What did she know about hunting mice and sparrows?

  Then I stumbled through the tangles and discovered another world. It was a housing development—streets with names like Buttercup Bay and Peony Drive and children on skateboards staring at my muddied clothes.

  “Hi, kids.” They looked suspicious. “I lost my cat.” They stayed frozen. “I’ll give you fifty bucks to find her.”

  Sudden acceptance. “Wow! Was it black?”

  “She’s smoky tortoiseshell grey. She has a hot-pink collar with toy sunglasses attached.”

  “I saw her!” hollered one of them. “She was right here. I knew I should have grabbed her!” The boy was furious with himself. Never again would he let a cat get away. He’d pack his garage with them for years to come. The kids scrambled into full alert.

  I found Lisa and told her Chloe was spotted up the hill from the motel. She suddenly came to life. “That tramp!” she said. “What’s she doing way up there?” Where there is anger, there is hope. Where there is hope, there is action.

  We put up reward posters, knocked on doors, phoned the local vet and police. As the day wore on, we left a reward if she was found later, hired someone to drive her to the airport, arranged plane fare and a flight cage.

  We finally ate. The fast-food franchise overlooked the development. We watched children on skateboards and bikes cruising the lanes below. Some were checking shrubs, trampling a flowerbed. It was comforting.

  We were both pretty quiet. Lisa finally spoke, “She was a good cat.”

  “Lisa, it’s not over.”

  “She can live here okay. As long as she finds someone to care about her.”

  “I wish we could find her,” I said. “I’d give more than money.”

  Lisa lowered her eyes. “I’ve been bargaining in my head. ‘Give me back Chloe and I’ll be better to my mother. I’ll do volunteer work.’” And then she added, looking straight at me, “And I’ll stop blaming you.”

  My secret thought welled up. “I’ve been making all this into a test. Lose the cat, lose Lisa. Find the cat, keep Lisa. I’m almost ready to give up everything—the move, the house, whatever. I guess I can’t handle tests.”

  Lisa cupped her hand as if she were speaking to me through a microphone. “This is not a test. I repeat. This is not a test.” We smiled to each other. “I’m not coming back for you,” she said. “I’m coming back for us.”

  Dusk was settling in. The hills were gray—smoky, tortoiseshell gray. Chloe was nowhere, but it felt as if she were everywhere.

  We were already packed so it didn’t take long to clear the motel room. I only had to call the radio stations and l
eave an announcement about Chloe. Lisa took out the last bag.

  That was when Chloe appeared. She simply walked out from under the bed, blinking in the light. She had been asleep inside the box spring all that time. It seems there was an opening we couldn’t see. Lisa shrieked. The cat fled back into the mattress but we pulled her out. Then we left in a run.

  As we pulled out of the motel driveway, we saw a pack of kids heading up the hill towards us. They probably had cats with them. At least two or three. We didn’t stop to check. We already had everything we needed.

  Sheldon Oberman

  Dogs Just Wanna Have Fun

  My husband Daniel and I travel frequently. When we first got our dog, Buddha-tu (we call him Buddhi), we were concerned that he would be lonely or perhaps feel that we’d abandoned him when we left him at home during our trips away.

  When we left, we always had someone stay in our house and look after Buddhi, so we knew he was well taken care of, but we still felt guilty. I even used to leave my husband’s T-shirt for Buddhi to sleep with and made sure he got extra goodies each day we were gone. Still, I used to wonder what he made of the whole thing—did he miss his lovin’s, “his rub-a-dubs and belly pats,” sleeping by our bed, taking walks with us—and who was going to play ball with him while we were away? Was our absence too traumatic for him? I supposed I would never know.

  But then one night when we called home, Buddhi made it quite clear what he missed the most when we were gone.

  We reached our housesitter, Barbara, and had her put us on the speakerphone, so that we could talk to Buddhi. He immediately started barking and howling when he heard our voices. We were jabbering at Buddhi like a pair of fools, when we noticed we couldn’t hear him anymore. Barbara told us that he had run out of the room.

  What was he doing? I wondered uneasily. Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to call home—perhaps Buddhi was confused and was searching the house for us. When he couldn’t find us, would he become upset and try to get outside to continue the search? What if he tried to jump through a window? My imagination ran away with me, and I couldn’t stop it. I thought, Poor baby, he misses us so much, hearing our voices had just made it worse. I urged Barbara to go and find him. My husband and I decided to try and coax him back into the room by continuing to talk to him.

  Barbara ran after him to see what was going on and almost tripped over him as he raced back into the room, holding something in his mouth. He bounded to the phone, where we were still spouting endearments in a highly embarrassing manner.

  We heard Barbara laughing in the background, and then she picked up the phone and told us that Buddhi had approached the phone, and had stood for a moment, head cocked. Then he carefully put his front paws up on the desk and set down the object in his mouth. It was his favorite ball. He put it directly on top of the speakerphone and stepped back—waiting for us to throw it.

  Susan White

  FRANK & ERNEST ® by Bob Thaves

  FRANK & ERNEST reprinted by permission of Newspaper Enterprise Association, Inc.

  The Cat Lady

  I have lived in my neighborhood for twenty years. It seems to me that I’ve spent at least ten of those years looking for a lost pet, either mine or one I’d seen listed in the newspaper’s lost-pet column.

  Recently, I was at it again, going door-to-door looking for one of my own lost kitties, a little black cat named Nicholas who’d slipped out the door before I could stop him. I made my rounds, visiting with all the neighbors, describing Nicholas. Familiar with this routine, everyone promised to keep an eye out and call me if they spotted him.

  Two blocks from my house, I noticed a gentleman raking leaves in the yard of a home that had recently been sold. I introduced myself and presented my new neighbor with the plight of the missing Nicholas, asking if he had seen him.

  “No,” he replied, “I’ve not seen a little black kitty around here.” He thought for a moment, looked at me and said, “But I know who you should ask. Several of my neighbors have told me that there’s a woman in the neighborhood who’s crazy about cats. They say she knows every cat around here, probably has dozens herself. They call her ‘The Cat Lady.’ Be sure to check with her.”

  “Oh, thank you,” I said eagerly. “Do you know where she lives?”

  He pointed a finger down the street, “It’s that one.”

  I followed his finger and started to laugh.

  He was pointing at my house!

  Patti Thompson

  MUTTS by Patrick McDonnell. Reprinted with special permission of King Features Syndicate.

  When Puss Comes to Shove

  Cat owners like to describe their felines in superlatives. One person has the smartest cat in the whole world; another boasts of the biggest or the loudest cat in the whole world. I have Humphrey, the ugliest cat in the whole world.

  Humphrey was a little crumpled when I got him. He was sitting in the middle of the road, suffering from a nasty case of failure to grant the right of way. His head was crooked, his jaw broken and one eye looked straight out into the twilight zone. The little fella had enough road rash to be an honorary Hell’s Angel. He was the hurtin’est cat in the whole world.

  I didn’t think he would make it, but after four months and three hundred dollars he was doing quite well. He almost died three different times, but he never gave up. His head is still shaped like the last potato at the fruit stand, and the vet had to grind some teeth to let his mouth close, but Humphrey just wouldn’t quit. He’s got an eye on one side and a fur-lined depression on the other, and part of his nose is still out on Route 16, but that doesn’t faze Humphrey. He’s a cat, and he’s tough.

  Obviously I like cats, but a lot of men don’t. Cats are not macho. Cats are not rough and tough. Cats, I am told, are sissies.

  But let me tell you something, cats can rearrange your face and hand you your lips. Ask my dog.

  My dog weighs eighty pounds and has a smile like the keyboard on Dracula’s piano. He has too many teeth and not enough jowl. He’s not afraid of anything. Except cats. So many ill-tempered Toms have tap-danced on his face, his nose looks like a country fair after the tractor races. Among the legions of slit-eyed mouse-molesters that trouble Shep’s dreams, Humphrey ranks pretty high.

  Some years ago, Shep and I were living with the aforementioned “puddy,” a second cat named Bugsy Moran, and Lynn, the nice lady who saw dutifully to their every desire.

  The five of us were happily ensconced in a modern, well-appointed duplex. Among the more admirable features of the place was a thick, springy carpet that covered every inch of floor space except for a small area inside one bedroom closet.

  One still day in the dead of summer, it was oppressively hot. Flowers were limp and lifeless. The ice cream man wore a greedy smile. As for Shep, the combination of lying on a thick rug and wearing one at the same time was too much for him. He retreated to the uncarpeted closet and stretched out on the cool cement, secure in the assumption that, among the fur-bearing four-by-fours present, his rank, guaranteed by his size, would ensure that he was undisturbed.

  Bugsy had pushed Lynn’s knickknacks aside and was resting peacefully on the third tier of a teak bookshelf. But Humphrey was having a problem. Generally, on warmer days, Humphrey sprinted down the hall, through the bathroom door and leaped into the tub, where he played with the faucet drips before passing out till dinner was served. Unfortunately, on the previous day, without Humphrey’s knowledge, Lynn had filled the bathtub with water. The result was an abrupt feline behavior modification involving a very wet cat and a slightly torn shower curtain.

  As the morning melted into afternoon, Humphrey got more and more annoyed. He paced the house glancing nervously into the bathroom and longingly into Shep’s closet space. Faced with the choice of confronting twenty gallons of cold water or eighty pounds of hot canine, Humphrey opted for the latter.

  Lynn and I were sorting laundry on the bed. She was marveling at how each of my socks was unique, when Humph
rey stalked into the room and positioned himself in the open closet doorway at the edge of the carpet. One of Shep’s eyes opened momentarily. He blinked uneasily in the face of Humphrey’s baleful stare, then, seemingly reassured by his five-to-one size advantage, drifted back to sleep.

  After several long minutes the cat stood up and stretched thoroughly like a Kung Fu priest preparing for combat. Carefully, Humphrey took one step toward the sleeping black hulk. Shep’s ear twitched, and again both eyes popped open. An almost inaudible rumble came from deep in the dog’s throat. Humphrey sat down and waited.

  After several moments, Shep’s eyes closed again. He groaned and shifted to a more comfortable position. I know what he was thinking. Cats are afraid of dogs. Right?

  Shep is not tall or long. He’s thick. Almost his entire body is protected by dense fur and heavy muscle. He has only one window of vulnerability—his feet. The ferocious and powerful Shep has delicate tootsies. Very slowly Humphrey stretched his mitt out as far as it could reach. It gently touched against Shep’s front paw.

  Shep’s foot jerked immediately in toward his body. His head came up as he showered Humphrey with a long and ominous snarl. The cat held his ground.

  After a minute, Shep’s head sank slowly to the floor. His eyes began to droop, but each breath was exhaled as a low, moaning growl. Again the cat stretched his paw into enemy territory. This time Shep’s rear leg was the victim. With a sharp and frightening roar, Shep jerked upright and tried to tuck all four feet under his body. His ears lay flat against his neck and a ghoulish row of gleaming white teeth were exposed and at the ready.