No, this is the traumatic tale of one dog's disastrous Thanksgiving. This is the tale of Mr. Loomis and his terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad holiday.
For those of you who don't recall, Mr. Loomis is our special needs, 15-year-old Lhasa Apso dog (with a bit of Dachshund tossed in for extra length!). He's 95% deaf and blind and sometimes bounces around like a pinball looking for a hole to fall into. I have a certain soft-spot and affinity for Mr. Loomis because he reminds me of myself: he's a cranky old man who never gives up.
But I digress. Why I remember that traumatic Thanksgiving morning like it was last week...because it was...(cue the wavy vision and flashback music)...
My wife thought it'd be a great idea for Mr. Loomis to get a bath Thanksgiving morning. After all, we had family coming over and Mr. Loo needed to look (and, um, smell) his best.
Mr. Loomis doesn't like baths. He groused, grumbled, tossed and turned, fighting my wife, until he finally resorted to howling. But she--and he--powered through it.
Once Mr. Loomis was out of the tub, my wife and I went upstairs to put some crap away, leaving Mr. Loo (and our other two dogs) free to roam the main floor.
My wife went down first, then called up, "Hey, did Mr. Loomis come up there?"
I looked around, knowing full well he hadn't. "No...can't you find him?" Panic set in. I had no idea what had happened to our senior dog. He definitely can't manage stairs any longer by himself, riddled as he is with arthritis.
I raced downstairs (well...as close to "racing" as I can get, seeing as how my knees are arthritic also). Now I couldn't find my wife either. Clearly, there was only one possible realistic conclusion: alien abduction.
But before I called Mulder and Scully, I heard a detached, echoing bark from the basement. (Actually, it was more like a "YARK!" Loomis doesn't say much, but on the rare occasion he does, it's always one loud, snappish, angry YARK.)
My wife's voice resounded up the basement stairs as well. "Oh my God," she exclaimed. "How'd he get in there?"
Mr. Loomis had somehow tumbled down the basement stairs, managing not to break any bones. Even worse, he'd found the worst possible place to land in the basement: he'd fallen into the sump pump.
Panic really kicked in when my wife told me he was swimming in the sump pump. She fished him out. When I looked down the stairs, Mr. Loomis was running away from my wife with her following in hot pursuit.
"Is he okay?" I asked.
"He's fine. Just mad."
He was about to get even madder. Now, my clearly freaked out wife said, "Guess what dude? You're getting another bath." Turning toward me, she added, "Is it too early for a drink?"
Let this be a cautionary tale for all. To paraphrase the great philosopher Willie Nelson: "Mamas, don't let your puppies fall in the sump pump."
Since our Thanksgiving went the way of the dogs, look out for other hairy creatures in the work place. Of course I'm talking about my black comedy/horror opus, Corporate Wolf, the only book that takes aim at corporate America through the lens of werewolf vision. It's complicated. Find out how so, here!
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