Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Doggy humor: Busted

By Hobo Hudson

I had just awakened from my customary three-hour afternoon power nap and trotted over to the water fountain outside Mom’s office door when I heard Mom and Dad talking with a strange hooman. I cocked my ear the moment Dad said, “We’ll be happy to have dinner with you, but we’ll have to sneak out without Hobo knowing about it. Be real quiet because he’s a slave driver.”

Pretending I didn’t overhear the conversation and putting on my best Dale Carnegie face, I casually walked into Mom’s office and barked, “Dad, before you leave, I need a new satire piece for the website and new reader projections for the next month. Mom, I need you to write two news stories and an editorial.”

Whining, Dad turned toward me and said, “Hobo, I’ll be up until at least 2 o’clock in the morning doing all this.” Mom just cringed and said, “Yes, Hobo.” The stranger, first glancing at Mom and Dad and then staring at me, said, “Doesn’t the overtime kill your bottom line, Mr. Hobo?”

I snapped, “I don’t pay overtime. I just bark orders and expect my hooman employees to follow them.”

I had barely closed my mouth when the stranger whipped out a leash and a badge and told me he was arresting me for human slavery.

I’m sitting in a cell at the local jail right now. While I’m waiting for my attorney, Ms. Foley Monster, to arrive and make bail arrangements, I’m pondering who could have ratted me out.

My first impulse was to fire whoever did it, but Ms. Monster told me when I called her to bail me out there is some law called the “Whistle Blower Law” that prevents me from penalizing employees in situations like this. I guess I may have to devise some other way to express my displeasure.
Friday, May 27, 2011

Doggy humor: Free at last

By Hobo Hudson

After having made my one phone call from jail and talked briefly with my attorney, Ms. Foley Monster, I was thrown into a large cell with about 30 drunks. When the iron door slammed shut, I let out a mighty howl that whooshed all across doggy land, and my friends began loping to my aid.

Without wasting time to worry about their own safety, two of my friends entered the jail with a hacksaw baked into a cake while another acted as lookout. It was a well intended effort but failed because I wasn’t tall enough to reach the window, and none of the drunks could stand straight long enough to lift me up.

About the time I received the cake, as I learned later, a large German shepherd arrived at my home with three small friends, and with the help of my kitty sisters, they wriggled their way into my office. The shepherd rapidly downloaded all my stories from my computer onto her flash drive and then removed my hard drive, replacing it with the one from her computer she had brought with her and copied all my stories onto the new hard drive. In the meanwhile, my three little friends were hard at work dragging all my papers and folders into the yard and putting them on a bonfire.

Inside my cell, I had just hidden the hacksaw in the pants’ leg of one of the drunks and was licking the last cake crumbs from my beard, when I heard a hullabaloo at the entrance of the jail. I peeked through the iron bars and saw Ms. Foley Monster dashing toward the cell, panting from her long run from Massachusetts.

“I’m here, Hobo,” she wheezed while she tried to catch her breath. “Don’t bark a sound until I talk with the federal attorney.” She turned around and trotted away, leaving me dumbstruck behind in the cell.

A short time later, however, the warden came, opened the cell door for me and led me to a conference room. Ms. Monster and the federal attorney were already sitting at the conference table across from each other, waiting for me to take a seat to discuss the matter.

Staring first at me and then at Ms. Monster, the federal attorney said, “We’re charging your client with human slavery, violating the Wage and Hour Act, and I’m trying to decide if the Rico Act applies.”

Ms. Monster cocked her head and asked, “What proof do you have of any of these charges?”

“Hobo admitted it when he was arrested,” the federal attorney replied.

Ms. Monster quickly snapped, “But he wasn’t given his Miranda rights, so anything he barked is inadmissible, and I’m sure he misunderstood the question.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” the federal attorney said. “I’m sure we’ll find plenty of evidence when we search his office.”

“Not without a warrant, you’re not and you can’t get a warrant without probable cause,” Ms. Monster replied in a bored bark.

Opening the folder in front of him and digging out a piece of paper, the federal attorney said, “We’ll get around this by having Hobo sign this form giving us permission to search his office. If he has nothing to hide, he shouldn’t mind signing it.”

Ms. Monster grabbed the paper and growled, “Let me read it first.”

While she was slowly reading the consent form and referring to her dictionary for the meaning of some of the words, her cell phone rang. She answered it immediately, and after a series of yip, yip, yipping, she grinned, turned the phone off and told me to go ahead and sign the consent form. I was a little hesitant about putting my paw print on it, but I was sure Ms. Monster knew what she was doing, and so I did it.

After the federal attorney had grabbed the paper I had signed and had stormed out with the file under his arm, Ms. Monster and I sat alone around the conference table, and she told me what my friends had done. I gave a deep sigh of relief for apparently having dodged the fallout of my big mouth, but most of all, I felt honored for having such great friends who stuck up for me and helped me far beyond the scope of friendship.

When the federal attorney returned a couple of hours later he said, “Hobo, I’m going to have to apologize. There was nothing incriminating in your office. I guess my men got a false tip.”

Thanks, all you guys and gals for the valiant effort you put forth to rescue me. I’ll never forget it, and I have sure learned to keep my barker shut in front of strangers.
Sunday, May 8, 2011

Doggy humor: Garden report

By Hobo Hudson

As you know, I’m allowing Dad to use a small portion of my backyard for a garden under a sharecropping agreement. I supply the land, and Dad supplies the labor, seeds and everything else necessary to yield a rich crop, and we split the produce 50/50. Since I don’t eat vegetables, and Mom doesn’t eat meat, I have worked out a trade with her. She gives me her share of the meat, and I give her my share of the vegetables.

When I made my morning inspection, I found the first of my squash was ready for picking, and so I grabbed a great big bag and “almost” filled it up. I clutched it between my teeth, raised my head and started carrying it to the house. By the time I got up the steps onto the sun deck and into the porch, I couldn’t hold the bag up any longer and had to drag it across the porch, across the living room and into the kitchen where I collapsed from exhaustion.

After recovering somewhat, I weakly yapped at Mom to come and work out a deal with me. She took the bag and put it on her scale while I proudly barked that my half should be worth a least 10 steaks. Mom shook her head and said, “Hobo, you don’t even have enough squash here to get a smell of the knife when I cut the steak.” I looked at Mom and barked, “Just let the bag lie there. It’ll get heavier.”
Thursday, May 5, 2011

Doggy Humor: I’m going to be a godfather

By Hobo Hudson

Mabel, a little birdie friend of mine, fluttered by a month or so ago and excitedly tweeted at me that she was pregnant and due to lay her eggs in a few days and asked if I would be her babies’ godfather. I felt this was quite an honor and was happy to accept the responsibility.

Immediately, I began to look around our yard for small twigs, bits of string and similar items for her to use in building her nest. I would have been happy to help her build it, but I’m not really good at climbing trees, and so I left that part to her.

This morning, she told me that the eggs are due to hatch any time now, and she would introduce them to me as soon as they grow some feathers and could fly. I asked if I could help out by bringing her some birdseed, worms, etc. so that she wouldn’t have to work so hard finding food for her babies. She thanked me for the offer but felt that it would be better to set an example for them by bringing all the food herself. She did say, however, that as soon as her babies learned to fly she would show them where my cafeteria is in the back yard and would also teach them to greet me with a cheerful song in the mornings.

I have a feeling I’m going to be very proud of my godchildren with a mother like Mabel rearing them.

Books

About Hobo


This was Hobo Hudson, my doggy brother, a little terrier mix with black fur. He became famous after his first attempt at writing stories, which was an article published in the newsletter of our local animal shelter, the same shelter in which I ended up years later before Hobo and his parents adopted me. Hobo’s fame quickly spread as he made a name for himself as a business dog and an adventurer. To keep his memory alive, my doggy sister, my three kitty siblings and I, Wylie Hudson, are continuing his blog. Our mom is the blog’s editor.

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