My parents' dog, Lucy, loves Christmas. She guards the cookies, and cries and howls for hours when she sees her stocking come out for the season. She knows what that sock with a bell on it means: several mouthfuls of treats.
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| "Here, let me help you with that, Marlo Senior!" |
Her favorite sound in the world is crinkly paper. It's also her favorite texture to gnaw on. It's a very big holiday.
This was our third Christmas with my dog, Albright, who pranced across the living room on Christmas morning with her stocking in her mouth.
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| Yes, she does have a scarlet A on her stocking, but she's not a hobag. |
Then the dogs ruined Christmas by fighting over their Greenies, growling, and pouting for the next 48 hours.
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| Well, Albright got over her pouting pretty quickly. |
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| These clever toys, a gift from my boyfriend, hide water bottles inside, so dogs can smash them without cutting themselves. So far Albright has hogged them both. |
We got them to make up long enough to take this picture, at least.
As far as the human Christmas went, well, my dreams came true:
A gallon of giardiniera and this Carl Kasell autograph pillow. These were my truest Christmas wishes. Nothing I just said was facetious.
Eerily enough, my phone thinks Carl's face is a real human face. Is NPR bugging my house? Is this pillow just a big microphone cover? Is Carl actually 14 inches tall and hiding in that pillow? Something's amiss here.
But probably not as amiss as the way I asked my mother to hide my pillow at the foot of my bed on Christmas morning, Godfather-style, right? (She didn't.)
Thanks, Santa! Now, as my father always says, "Christmas is over and business is business."