Some Dogs
I picked up a copy of John le Carré’s spy novel “Absolute Friends”. In it there’s a character with a “Scrofulous Retriever” at his feet. Apparently this is some British breed of dogs that haven’t made it off the Isles. I’ve known some Golden Retrievers, eponymous with fetching gold, no doubt. A useful characteristic in a dog, I should think. But the Scrofulous Retriever must retrieve something else. All it is known for, according to le Carré, is sleeping and flatulence.
With those two characteristics, come to think of it, I’ve known more than a few Scrofulous Retrievers myself. And not all of them had four legs, if you get my drift.
There’s a white dog in the neighborhood, who has been running around for a while with enlarged breasts, so in my mind I named her “Mother”. Then she disappeared for a while. Now I see her in the park (or is it a vacant lot?) across the street with her puppies. So I think I’ve mastered the plot. She used to be very shy with the puppies, and now she comes right up to me on the sidewalk. But now there’s only one puppy left. I shudder to think what may have happened to the others. And I don’t know what they’ve been eating, but they don’t seem too thin. So I guess somebody’s been feeding them.
These are all my shaggy dog stories…