The Love Shack

After boy and I got hitched we moved into an apartment or as we like to call it, the "love shack". It was basically an 850 sq. foot puppy pad, because pug felt it necessary to mark every inch. I clearly remember walking around with a bottle of carpet cleaner scrubbing till my hands hurt contemplating putting a pug ad in the classifieds. It was mainly my fault because I picked out our little nest. And did I mention was that this "love shack" was on the third floor of the building, on a golf course. But not some fancy Tiger Woods golf course, a wes learin' how to play golf course where people pretended that they had skills and on numerous occasions I'd be walking pug and a ball would drop right by his head. One time I do believe we almost peed ourselves in fear and when the Jack Nicholson wannabe golfer came round looking for his ball on the green I hollered him over 30 feet to the correct location and kindly remarked "next time try yelling fore as a warning". His reply, "Oh did I almost get you?". So needless to say, Pug had limited safe peeing areas outside and I really can't blame him for preferring the carpet. I mean who really wants to walk down 3 flights of stairs just because your owner decided that we needed 3 additional feet of ceiling height for a more "chic look".

It was all worth it though because we had killer calf muscles from going up and down the stairs and our neighbors thought pug was the greatest dog they ever laid eyes on. We had one set of neighbors who we referred to as "The Smokey Smokerson's" because rain or shine they'd be sitting on their balcony at all hours getting a nicotine fix. They were as sweet as can be and when pug's head got too big to fit in between the railings of our balcony, I'd put him out there for some fresh air. I started to notice that on numerous occasions lots of talking could be heard once I put pug out there. I thought it was just the neighbor's socializing, but one day I opened up the window and realized they were not talking to any neighbor's, they were talking to pug. It was really kind of funny and weird all at the same time. He'd just sit up in one of the lawn chairs on the porch and listen, captivated by the conversations. After awhile it got really sweet and if I came home from work and noticed they were sitting outside I'd put him out there for one of their chat sessions.

The day we moved we loaded up our last box and the Smokerson's hollered down, "You getting that dog a yard?" It almost broke my heart at the therapy talks we were breaking up.

All our "love shack" memories came flooding back as I sat in my office and could hear our neighbor's kiddos on the other side of the fence and knew pug was out prancing the backyard. Every now and then I hear a yelp followed by a "you stupid dog!!!" from one of the kids.

I'm going on a hunch, but I bet pug misses the apartment fame.