Ray the Blind Dog: August 2014

I was drinking my morning coffee. Ray was standing on the back patio 'looking' through the sliding glass door, his major award clasped in his mouth.

First casualty

As I watched, he turned and walked away. A pancake slipped through the torn corner of the box and flapjacked onto the stone, a small morsel of it breaking off and landing a foot away. This is it, I thought, the end of the blueberry pancakes. I got off the couch and grabbed my camera to record the event.

Second casualty

Ray put down the box and interestedly sniffed the fallen treat but left it. Once again he picked up his box losing the cellophane wrapping in the process. Ray continued on into the backyard; a second treat fell from the box landing on the brick path.

Ray took a few more steps, put down the box again, and returned to the fallen treat. He crunched it in two, leaving the remnants, then returned to his box and carried it around a bit more, looking over his shoulder inviting me to chase him. I declined, waiting to see the fate of his prize.

The end is near

Ray proceeded to the grass and laid down with his major award taking a moment to say goodbye. He stood and picked up the pancake casket one last time. The box, having had a good, long run, gave way. Ray nosed through the treats uncertainly.

What do you think? One last go-round?

Deciding to start with a smaller taste, Ray returned to the morsel that had broken off from the first dropped pancake.

I'm going to miss this

Using his teeth so that it didn't touch his lips, Ray picked up the crumb that was barely big enough for a Who's mouse, and made a big show of eating it, putting it in the corner of his mouth and chewing it like a B-movie gangster's moll chews gum. Finding it somewhat palatable, Ray returned to the exploded box and picked up one of the treats.

Again making a big show, Ray flapped his head while crunching through the delicacy. Crumbs dribbled from his mouth. Well-knowing Ray's antipathy for anything even remotely vegetal, I knew that if I took all those crumbs, I could reassemble the crumbled pancake in toto.

The box remained, as left, for the rest of the day.

I just can't figure out what that smell is...

That afternoon, as Ray was communing with his pug neighbor, Dory, I carried a pancake to the fence and dropped it. Quick as a cat's paw, Dory's foot shot under the fence gap and dragged the treat to her. She carried it away before her brother, blind Archie, even knew what was going on.

I called to the the little black bowling ball who slowly rolled his way over. I held a pancake up to the fence in front of Archie's nose. The blind dog sniffed it cautiously, then gingerly took it from my fingers as I slid it between the fence slats.

That's it, I'm going in!

Ray stood next to me, ears deployed in ultra-Dumbo mode. Knowing that his neighbors were enjoying HIS treats made them oh-so-much-more desirable. Ray picked up the last of the pancakes and ate the whole thing, then went to his water dish and drank deeply to get the disgusting taste of fruit out of his mouth.

That night the arrrooooo alarm went off. The next morning all of the crumbs that Ray had crunched and left, were gone.

*I realize the title makes no sense but pretend it does.