“Wake up, Bozo,” the dog tells me at 3:13 a.m. “I’ve
got good news.”
It’s Ned again, the one-eyed beagle with the
headstrong personality and the mismatched jaws. Or
at least the ghost of Ned. In his ultimate act of
disobedience, he died six years ago, but he
occasionally visits us in the middle of the night to
resume giving us orders.
“What is it this time?” I say. “What’s so important
that you wake me up at 3:13 a.m.?”
“Like you never woke me up when I was asleep,” he
says. “To chase a ball if I remember right. To
chase a ball and bring it back to you, wagging my
tail as if this was more fun than anything. You
woke me up on your schedule. I wake you up on my
schedule.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I say, and close my eyes so he’ll go
back to wherever it was he came from.
But he licks me in the face—wet licks full of
ethereal saliva. I try to bop him on the head, but
it’s like bopping smoke.
“OK,” I say. “Once more, you win. What is it this
time?”
“A clipping,” he says. “A clipping from last
Wednesday’s Journal Star. Page 4A.”
He gives me a slobbery piece of newsprint headlined
“San Francisco is looking into the power of dog doo.”
“Dog doo?” I say. “You wake me up at 3:13 a.m. to
tell me about dog doo?”
“Look at this,” he says, pointing to the sub-head
with his paw.
It says “In pilot program, pet waste will be used to
create methane gas.”
“Methane gas?” I say. “Isn’t that what you liked to
pollute the inside of the car with when you wanted
us to roll down a window so you could stick your
head out and breathe sub-zero air?”
“That’s it,” he says, grinning as well as a beagle
can grin. “But look at what San Francisco is doing
with the methane gas from the dog doo.”
So I read the Journal-Star story. The opening
paragraph says “City officials are hoping to harness
the power of dog doo.” And it goes on from there to
say “in this dog-friendly town, animal feces make up
nearly 4 percent of residential waste, or 6,500 tons
a year.”
“Gross,” I say.
“Keep reading, Bozo,” Ned says, “or I may pass some
gas. I can do it at will, you remember.”
I do remember, so I keep reading. The dog doo “will
be tossed into a contraption called a methane
digester, which is basically a tank in which
bacteria feed on feces for weeks to create methane
gas. The methane could then be piped directly to a
gas stove, heater, turbine or anything else powered
by natural gas. It can also be used to generate
electricity.”
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The Truth, Mainly
“How about them apples?” Ned says, grinning a beagle
grin.
“It’ll be a cold day in hell,” I say, “before I warm
myself or my house with dog doo.”
“If it’s good enough for San Francisco,” Ned says,
“it’s good enough for Lincoln. Did I tell you that
in dog heaven we keep warm by burning methane gas
made from people doo?”
“That’s obscene,” I say.
“And did I tell you,” Ned says, “that in dog heaven
we put collars and leashes on people and take them
for walks? They seem to like it. You’ve got a lot
to look forward to.”
“One more thing,” I say. “When did you learn to
speak English?”
“When I was about three months old,” he says, “but I
didn’t speak it around humans. You’d have put me in
a cornball teevee show. It was at about the time
you bought that book, ‘How to Discipline Your Beagle.’”
“Oh yeah,” I say. “The book that recommended
shooting you with a water gun when you were doing
things you weren’t supposed to do.”
“That’s the one,” he says, “the plastic water gun
that I chewed into tiny pieces after you shot me
with it a couple of times. I was a precocious pup.”
With that, Ned audibly passes some methane, then
begins fading away. By the time he’s completely
gone, I’m shivering from the cold.
I get out of bed and kick up the thermostat. I hear
the natural gas ignite, but it doesn’t seem to put
out as much heat as I need. I get back under the
covers and shiver myself to sleep.
Retired English Professor Leon Satterfield writes to salvage clarity
from his confusion. His column appears on alternate Mondays. His e-mail
address is:
leonsatterfield@earthlink.net.
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