Thursday, June 24, 2010

Designing Dog

This is Gater, the four-legged mutt.



He thinks he's being helpful. Look at that face as he surveys the work-in-progress sun room. I can almost see his little mutt brain thinking, "Yup. Looking good. Keep working, though. You all ain't done yet." I'm tempted to call him Suzanne Sugerbaker, but I doubt he'd get the reference.



Side note: What's with all the 'designer' dog names that merely make the age old breed of 'mutt' somehow sound 'expensive'? I saw an ad for "Shweenies" in the paper the other day--part wiener dog, part shiz tsu. Shweeines. For $125. When I was a kid, you could find dogs like that in the classified, usually under the header 'FREE TO A GOOD HOME.'

Which got me thinking--what would you 'market' Gater as? He's part beagle, part terrier--although we're not sure what kind of terrier. The Boston terrier people make a good argument, but the rat terrier people have their points too. Berrier? Gater the Berrier? Or Teagle? Gater the Teagle? Thoughts?

Anyway, back to the main point, which, if you recall (or, more likely, have already put far from your mind), was that Gater thinks he's 'helping.'



I have to say that, in fact, this particular brand of paint really sucked. But Gater didn't help.



As you can see by the paint on his hindquarters there, he was 'helping,' all right. He was 'texturizing' the wall for us, adding visual interest and contrast in the form of what the professionals call 'dog hair.'

It's okay, though. That part of the wall is going to be behind window boxes. Yes, that's right. We painted a wall that will be permanently covered up. We're weird like that. We never would have made it in the Great Depression.

What's that? You want to know where Jake is? Jake--my old man, my three-legged wonder wiener, my boy--is sound asleep in his chair. You know what I say to that?

Good dog.

2 comments:

Hannah @ The Nanner Republic said...

You should call him Anthony as calling him Suzanne might confuse him.

Sarah M. Anderson said...

Oh, Gater's too much of a diva to be Anthony. Plus, I had forgotten what that guy's name was.

Glad you like the new layout!