Negotiating with Cookies – Fences and Holes

After dinner Fleegle goes into the backyard and barks at the night. I call him inside. “What was that about?”

“Buck, the dog across the street, wanted to know who was out in their yard tonight.”

“Did they block the hole he dug under his fence yet?” I ask.

“Yeah, but that won’t stop him. He’s digging another.”

“I’m afraid to ask, but why haven’t you dug a hole under your fence?”

“Who says I haven’t? The hole under the fence is every dog’s right of passage.”

 

Next: Negotiating with Cookies – The Mathematics of Love

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Hearing Voices

Ray heard voices when he meditated. They sounded like muffled snippets of conversation coming from another room. Not much more than gibberish, really, but twice he’d heard complete sentences, soft and intimate, spoken in the space between his thoughts and they seemed meant for him and him alone.

The first was: “You’re going to die soon.” Continue reading “Hearing Voices”

Negotiating with Cookies #18 – 425 Degrees for 14 Minutes

Fleegle stares at the pizza through the little window on the oven door. “It’s done, Raud, you can take it out now.”

“It’s not done. I just put it in.” I glance at the timer. “It still has twelve minutes and eight seconds, seven, six to go before it’s done baking.”

Fleegle looks skeptically at the timer. “That timer runs on batteries, doesn’t it? I don’t trust batteries.”

“It’s working. I can see the milliseconds flash by.”

“Milliseconds don’t flash by, they crawl, they slither, they creep, they don’t move at all. Is it done yet?”

“Thinking about it like that will only make it seem even longer before it’s done. Why don’t you go outside and check for squirrels.”

“Squirrels, you said squirrels,” he says and bolts for the open patio door, but slides to a stop halfway there and looks over his shoulder at me.

“Don’t worry, I won’t start without you,” I say and glance at the timer. “You have eleven minutes and forty-seven seconds to chase squirrels.”

 

Next: Negotiating with Cookies #19 – Parmesan

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Start at the beginning: Negotiating with Cookies #1 – Stinky Butt

Negotiating with Cookies #17 – Take and Bake

We pull into a parking spot in front of the take and bake pizza place.

Fleegle sniffs at the inch wide gap at the top of the shotgun window. “I can smell it from here. I can smell pizza through brick walls. Why ever eat kibble when there’s pizza?”

“You’re drooling.” I open my door. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll be waiting, and drooling.”

“Don’t I know it.”

I return minutes later, saran wrapped pizza in hand. “Stay in your seat, please,” I say as I slide the pizza on the dashboard in front of me and get behind the wheel.

Sitting next to a puddle of drool, Fleegle stares intently at the pizza as if with his gaze alone he could levitate it into his mouth. He leans toward it as far as he can, vigorously sniffing the air while barely keeping his butt on his seat.

He sees me glancing at him, ready to guard the pizza from sudden attack. “What? I’m just making sure you got the right pizza and not someone else’s.”

 

Next: Negotiating with Cookies #18 – 425 Degrees for 14 Minutes

Previous: Negotiating with Cookies #16 – Pizza

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Negotiating with Cookies #15 – Sharing, Or Not

“Hey, chunky monkey, how’s it going?” I say to Fleegle as he joins me on the couch to watch television.

“I’m not as chunky as you. Look at your big couch potato belly. Pressing that remote must give you quite the workout. Changing the channel is like a hundred pound bench press for your thumb. And lifting that spoonful of ice cream all the way to your mouth, well that must be like running a marathon for your arm. Very impressive.”

“Shush, watch the show,” I say.

“The show is just there to occupy your eyes while your mouth does all the work, like your jaw on a Stairmaster. I’m on to you. Always with the chocolate.”

“How do you mean?”

Fleegle snorts his derision. “You only bought chocolate ice cream so you wouldn’t have to share with me.”

“It’s not my fault dogs can’t eat chocolate.”

“You tell me it’s bad for me every time you bring it home. What’s wrong with getting vanilla or strawberry for a change? I like vanilla and strawberry.”

“I happen to like chocolate more than vanilla and strawberry.”

“No, you happen to like not sharing.” He jumps off the couch and leaves the room, then returns with a very slimy tennis ball he was chewing on earlier and drops the filthy thing in my lap, slobber and all.

“What’s this?” I ask.

“I’m teaching you by example.” He nudges the gooey mess with his nose, smearing dog spit and mud on my jeans. “I’m sharing my ball.”

 

Next: Negotiating with Cookies #16 –  Pizza

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Negotiating with Cookies #10 – Breakfast

I’m in the kitchen cooking my breakfast when Fleegle trots in from the yard. “Feeling better, I see.”

“Absolutely.”

“I bet that’s the last time you’ll be eating duck treats.”

“I’m not so sure that’s what made me sick. They were pretty tasty. It might’ve been something else,” he says, hopefully.

“What else did you eat?”dog fiction running with eggs

“Kibble.”

“That’s never made your stomach upset before.”

He sniffs the air by the stove where I’m cooking. “Bacon and eggs have never upset your stomach before, maybe I should have some of them.”

 

Next: #11 – John Wayne

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Start at the beginning: Negotiating with Cookies #1 – Stinky Butt