Itza Dog's Life

Copyright PostScriptor, 2023

Sam was not a very interesting person. In fact, he was boring. At least that was what his ex-girlfriend told him. He led a boring life, worked at a boring job, and was boring in the sack. The thing that ultimately drove her out of his boring apartment was when he brought home the new THC gummies. They were really heavy duty to Sam's mind, but they made his girlfriend paranoid. She thought that she was dying when she was high on the cherry flavored gummy. The next morning, after THAT trip, she packed up and left.

That left boring Sam alone in his apartment. Well, almost alone. He still had Brutus.

He was actually kind of proud that he, unlike lots of his friends, was out on his own, not living in his parent's basement. It would have seemed strange to earlier generations that the average 30-year-old guy wasn't married and was still dependent on his parents to support them, but Sam had gotten a job at a local manufacturing plant when he graduated from high school, and he was still there. He was good enough at his job that he had been promoted a couple of times and was earning some decent money. Not great money, but decent.

One evening, while boring Sam sat on his couch channel surfing with his Boston terrier, Brutus, his life changed.

He had come home from work, eaten a frozen pizza that he heated up for dinner, taken one of the cherry flavored gummies and began looking for something to watch. He was surfing through the channels, when something struck him.

"Ain't dis just shit! 150 channels and nutin' wort watchin'."

Sam quickly looked around the room to see where the voice had come from. There was nobody. It had to be his imagination. Maybe he was overdoing the gummies.

He resumed surfing the channels, when he heard that voice again.

"Hey, stay on that channel! It's my favorite—a rerun of Lassie! She is just about the top of the heap. A really smart doggie who keeps her human out of trouble every show! I just love these doggie reality shows!

"Can I let yous in on a liddle secret? She is really a he, just playin' da part."

Sam paused for a second, but he could swear that his dog, Brutus, was the source of the comment.

He looked at Brutus for a moment, before asking,

"Brutus, ol' buddy, did you just say something, is it the gummy or have I finally gone around the bend?"

Brutus looked at him with the same look that Sam had seen many times before; the one that made him wonder if Brutus could actually understand what he was saying.

"Hehehe... I'm not sure. I'ze wondered if yous was around the bend fer a long time. Hey, big guy, be cool. I'm just joking.

"If it isn't oblivious to yous, I was talking to yous. I'ze been talking to yous fer a long time — da problem is that yous wasn't hearing me. Now, I tink, because of dat gummie yous been using, yerz mind finally opened up to me. Yous humans! It's like what de Harry Potter lady said, you see or hear tings you don't understand, and you turn dem into someting that your mind can accept.

"So all deese years, every morning, I tells yous, 'Hey buddy, get me some eats, and den we can goes out fer a walk, and I can pee and poop. But what do yous hear? Barkbarkbarkbarkbark! Always da same, we dogs talk to yous and all most of yous hear is, barkbarkbarkbarkbark!

"Now. If yous don't mind, I want to watch the rest of Lassie, den get a quick drink, a loop around de block to pee, and then back to bed."

Sam sat back in the sofa, overwhelmed by the evenings events, and then did exactly what Brutus had told him. They watched the end of Lassie (well, Brutus did, Sam was there but in a fugue state), got Brutus a drink of water, walked around the block (with Brutus giving his commentary about the neighbors dogs the whole way), got back home and they both went to bed.

Sam was fairly certain that by the next morning, after the THC had worn off, things would be back to normal, and the evening before would be revealed as a drug induced vision.

The following morning, Sam was slowly becoming conscious. His memory recalled the THC induced delusions that he had the night before. Thank god, he felt back to normal this morning.

"Wake up. Wake up," he was startled to hear, "'Hey buddy, get me some eats, and den we'ze can goes out fer a walk, and I can pee and poop."

He looked down at the side of his bed, and there was Brutus doing his little 'morning dance.'

"Come on, Boss! Da quicker yous get up and we'ze get started, da sooner we'ze be done."

Sam looked down at his little friend, Brutus, and asked, "Have you really been doing this every morning?"

You could see the smile on Brutus' face.

"You bet, Boss. I takes my job serious."

Sam dragged himself out of bed and headed for the can to do his usual morning ablutions, then he put on the sweats, socks and shoes, and the hat he wore while talking Brutus for his morning constitutional.

While Sam was contemplating whether having a dog nag at you was any better then having a wife or girlfriend nag at you, Brutus interrupted his reverie.

"Hey Boss! When we gets to the corner, can we'ze toin left and go down dat way?"

"Sure, Brutus. Why?"

"Dats where dat nasty, stuck-up Tom cat lives. I needs to gives him a lesson."

"Oh." Sam thought to himself, "Well that explains it! NOT!"

That morning saw Sam and Buster turning left at the intersection instead of going straight through. Sam had his little plastic baggies in his pocket to pickup Buster's little, messy poops, one of his least favorite things to do in the world: picking up dog shit.

Buster, on the other hand, was having a grand old time, sniffing places and leaving his own piss.

"Wow! Can you smell dat! Eau de Fifi! It's from Fifi, the miniature Poodle up the street. She says she's up for going out on da town and having a wild time whenever I can get loose. What a great bitch! Her favorite position is 'doggie style.' Dat's a joke boss — all doggy bitches favorite position is 'doggy.' Only one problem; she'll go out wid any old doggy. She's kind of a first-come, first-served, if yous knows what I mean.

"Hmmm," he said, taking a sniff at a brown patch in the grass, "a little message from Beauregard the bloodhound. He is upset that the vet changed him to all dry food and now he can hardly crap. Poor Beau! His human can't talk to him. I tinks dat da vet is a cat guy."

Sam and Buster went past the big green house with the huge bushy hedge along the front, and then Buster spoke to Sam.

"Hey Boss! When we gets to da cat's house, let loose of my leash so I can put a scare on de nasty cat. I promise, as soon as I chase him away, I'll come right back."

"You sure, Buster? I know how excited you get when you come up against a cat. You'll need some self-control to come back."

"Take it easy, Boss. 'Control' is my middle name!"

"Okay, we'll try it this time, but if you take off and I have to spend hours trying to find you like the last time you got off the leash, that will be the last time."

"Oh Boss. Last time I got off and went wild, it was 'cause Fifi was hots to trots. Dats an entirely different situation! It took me a long time to catch her. Only about two minutes to give her the old heave-ho. About the same as you and your old female bitch who left you."

"Buster, knock that off. That wasn't why she left."

"Right, Boss..."

The Tom was sitting on a tall brick wall that extended along the front of the old house, broken only at the opening where the gate to the estate was.

As usual, when Sam and Buster came this way on their walks, the Tom saw them and started yowling, making nasty, obviously condescending cat sounds at the pair.

Buster gave the signal. "Okay Boss, let me go!"

Sam let loose of the leash, and Buster took off, launching himself directly at the wall where the Tom was sitting. He ran full speed ahead right up to the wall and using his inertia, began climbing up the wall.

The Tom had been sitting there complacently until Buster began his run. Understanding at last that Buster was loose and coming for him, the Tom did one of those almost vertical leaps that cats can do, turned 180 degrees in mid-air and skedaddled, his tail waving wildly behind him. It was a classic 'turned tail and ran' maneuver.

Given Buster's short stature, even with his speed behind him, he didn't get within two feet of the top of the wall before he came falling back again.

Buster fell back to the bottom of the wall, rolling back and forth on the sidewalk, his little rear legs pushing him around in circles on the concrete. Sam almost panicked; he thought that Buster was having some sort of seizure. Then he heard Buster LAUGHING.

"Oh, Boss, dit yous see dat cat's face...HAHAHAHA...Dit yous sees him doin' a 180 in the air....HAHAHA"

When Buster finally caught his breath and regained his footing, he turned to Sam and said, "Okay, Boss. Let's go home now."

Buster, somehow envisioning himself as some sort of hero, was laughing to himself, congratulating himself, the rest of the walk home.

"HAHAHA. Great job, Buster, me boy. Put dat cat right in his place. HAHAHA. You struck a blow for freedom and da American way. HAHAHA..."

When they got home and were sitting on the couch, Sam couldn't help himself; he had questions.

"Buster?"

"Yeah Boss."

"Why do dogs seem to have a problem getting along with cats? Like that Tom that you scared off his place on the wall."

"Boss, did yous hear what he sait to you? He was sitting dare goin' on about how if he was bigger, he'd play around with yous like yous was a mouse, until he wast bored wit ya, and den he would eat ya. He was wishing he was like his big cousins, the lions, 'cause den he could have peoples fer breakfast, lunch and dinner. He was telling me dat he has his human so submissive, dat he can poop in her shoes, and all she does is clean them out and tells him that he is a 'naughty boy'. But she don't do nuttin to punish him. She just submits and treats him like a god! I finally got tired of listening to his trash talk and we'ze put him in his place!

"Don't yous know Boss, all cats is evil and dey always has been."

Sam thought about what Buster had just told him, and he suspected that Buster was right. He'd read articles that said similar things; that if they were bigger than we are, that domestic house cats WOULD treat us like a live food source.

"So when did you dogs begin to hate the cats?"

Buster looked up at Sam with a quizzical look on his face.

"Don't dey teach you humans anyting anymore?

"I'll just have to teach you my own selfs.

"Okay. A long, long time ago,"

"How long?" Sam asked.

"Abouts 100,000 years or so. And don't interrupts, or I'll never get dis done.

"So, anyways as I wast saying, about 100,000 years ago, a colony ship was sent out to Eart' from de great Dog Galactic empire. Da plan wast to deposit about 10,000 doggie pods from da ship to the planet. Each of da doggie pods had one handsome, fertile doggie stud, and five bitches dat was already knocked up and close to delivery of puppies. After de first batch of puppies was old enough, den da stud dog would get the bitches knocked up again and the process would repeat.

"We knowed dat der was humans on de planet; we planned on working wid yous. We would look up at yous wid our beautiful eyes, we would smile, wag our tales, lick your hands and de humans would fall in love wid us, and doggies and humans would foim a joint venture.

"When the original doggie settlers landed, dey was horrified to find dat CATS from the Cat Galaxy had already landed and plotted to set up a cat empire world here. It was de most horrifying discovery.

"Da cats figured yous would all submit and be slaves to da cats. And when dey figured yous wasn't any use any more, da big cats would eat yous.

"Sees, dares four levels de cats: the royaltys, what is de lions and tigers, de aristos, what is mountain lions, jaguars, leopards and other mid-sized pussies; the small wilds, like de bobcats and others, and then at the bottom are what yous calls de housey cats. At each level, de eat anyting dat is smaller and weaker than dem.

"So de smallest cats would eat boids and squirrels, and rats; the bigger one would eat larger animals, de lions would eat anyting dat wasn't trying to eat dem. Dey learned about grizzle bears and rhinos and animals that could beat dem in a fair fight, pretty quick. And de alligators really freaked dem out.

"But they gots de surprise when they got to eart'. Yous humans would fight back. Yous had spears and bows n' arrows, and axes. Yous would come after dem in groups.

"Not that dat stopped dem. Sees, dey is quiet and sneaky, so dey could still hunt down single humans, especially the womens and de little ones.

"Well! Wid our doggie sense of smells, when we teamed up wid yous, we could help you track dem down and kills dem before deys had de chance to kills you. We'ze never finished da job, but we tolt dem to eat da other animals, like and deer and de antalopes where dey play.

"Since dat time, der has been a state of war between de dogs and de cats!

"Now here's de final irony and insult; the housey cats, what was da smallest and least dangerous to humans, infiltrated human society, especially de old ladies wit no kids.

"De sly housey cats found themselves worshipped as Gods in Egypt! It ain't fair, Boss!

"Now dat we'ze had our chuckles fer de night, we'ze can mosey on back home."

By this time, Sam had a stark realization: the Earth was full of aliens, in fact, overrun with them!

Sam walked Buster back to their place, with Buster smelling everywhere any of the local dogs had peed, and Buster would tell Sam what the pee told him, like he was reading from a sheet of paper. Sam just shook his head.

Back in their place, Sam and Buster got on the couch in front of the TV and began their nightly ritual of channel surfing until they found a program that one of them wanted to watch.

Buster was greatly disappointed, after watching old reruns of "Mr. Ed" to discover that horses couldn't really talk to humans, although every time they came close to a horse, just in case, Buster would trot right up and try to start a conversation. He was certain that someday the horse would answer back.

Sam got over his initial shock at finding himself living with an alien, and soon life went back to a weird kind of normal. Buster would act as Sam's alarm clock every morning with his "get up, feed me, walk me" demands. Sam would go to work (except on the weekends), come home, then he and Buster would eat, take a walk and then sit on the couch watching TV if they could find anything worth watching. A definite bias towards shows where the dog was the hero became apparent.

Life changed one Saturday, when Buster wanted to do a walk in the middle of the day.

"Hey Boss! Let's us take a walk. I wants to sees me old chum Winnie, and I tinks dat he will be out and about today."

By now, Sam knew not to object. He could try and resist, but Buster had a way of nagging until he got his way, so he rose from the sofa, fetched Buster's collar and they were on their way.

Buster was leading and directing Sam where to go.

"Let's sees. Four more blocks straight ahead, den we'ze turnings right. Den two more blocks and we stops in fronts of da house wid de green fence."

Following Buster's instructions, they walked towards their destination. But even before they arrived, a conversation started.

"Winnie! Winnie! Is yous dare, Winnie? I'ze brought da Boss wid me."

There came a reply.

"Buster! Buster! Is that my little friend Buster?" Sam noted that while Buster had some sort of greater New York City accent, mangled as it was, to his ears, Winnie sounded like a Brit!

They went on like that, back and forth as Sam and Buster got closer to the house.

"Winnie, does yous got yer human at home today?"

"Why Buster, yes indeed I do!"

"Why don't yous goes and tells her to come out and meet my human."

"Of course, my little friend!"

Winnie turned out to be an Old English Bulldog, and he turned and ran back up the sidewalk and onto the steps leading to the entryway door.

"Ah hem, Madam? Madam? Could you grace us with your presence? Madam, madam, we have new friends for you to meet."

Soon the front door opened and an attractive young woman emerged.

"Winnie! What are you barking about? Sometimes I swear that you bark just to hear yourself bark!"

Winnie stood there panting and drooling while his Mistress squatted down, rubbed his ears and touched his nose with hers.

"Okay, Winnie, show me what you've found."

Winnie turned back to the gate at the front of the yard where Sam and Buster stood, his Mistress just a step behind him. When she reached the gate, she immediately looked down at Buster.

"Oh my goodness! Isn't he the cutest thing?" She opened the gate, "Come in, I need to introduce myself to your exquisite Boston terrier. And don't worry about Winnie. He may look gruff and tough, but he's a real sweetie at heart."

"I'm Joan, by the way, and this magnificent Old English Bulldog is Winnie. That's short for Winston."

Winston spoke up right then.

"We've nothing to offer but blood, toil tears and sweat, if you don't mind my quoting my namesake."

Sam look at the young woman, "Named after Churchill, I assume!"

"Yes, indeed. And I am Joan, by the way," she said, reaching her hand out to Sam.

"I'm Sam, and this little firecracker is my best pal, Buster!"

Buster looked up at him, as close to teary eyed as a dog can get, "Oh Boss, you sais the nicest tings sometimes!"

Sam looked at Joan and saw a woman around 5' 4" tall, with a slim, athletic build (he was never one of those guys who could look at a woman and estimate that she was a 34C cup sort of details). She had on jeans that showed she had a well-defined ass and a loose flower print blouse. Sam was still almost hypnotically fixed on her face.

She had an oval face, a straight nose and light blond hair. Her eyes were hazel, and her mouth was generous, neither too thick nor too thin. Kissable. To Sam, she was almost his perfection of womanly beauty; much more so than his last girlfriend.

When Joan looked at Sam, she didn't think he was boring or run-of-the-mill. She saw a roughly six-foot tall man, with strong, masculine features, hair just a little darker than her own and a pair of warm beautiful eyes. She thought that his lips and mouth looked very kissable, and she was already looking forward to a time when she could test them out herself.

In other words, it might not have been love at first sight, but it sure was 'want to get to know you' at first sight.

Sam was not the smoothest operator with women, but Buster was always ready to lend a helping paw.

"Hey Boss, why doesn't yous ask she and Winnie to goes to lunch wid us at dat place down the block?"

Once prodded, Sam took the hint.

"Say, Joan, do you have a while this morning? There is a café about two blocks from here that will allow us to sit in the outside seating area with the dogs. We could get some lunch and take the dogs with us."

Joan's face lit up, and she replied, "I know where the place is. Winnie and I go there every now and again. I'd love to go, but let me get my purse."

That was the beginning, as Sam and Joan walked together and talked, Buster and Winnie stopped and smelled the messages left for them by other friends and added their own comments on the wet spots.

From that day forward, Sam and Joan were a couple, with their respective dogs, exploring places all around the city where they could take Buster and Winnie along with them.

There were difficult moments, though, like the first time that Joan and Sam were about to make love. It was at Sam's apartment.

As they disrobed for bed, kissing and caressing each other, a little nose pushed open the door, and in came Buster (Joan having left Winnie at home that evening. Plenty of extra food and water, so he would be okay).