Me? A "Time Out"??

Here's how it goes. We get home from work (on a SUNDAY, mind you) and it's maybe 6:15PM, dark outside. I'm hungry and bored. I hop out my little personal door and the yard is absolutely full of different smells. I'm just taking my time when I hear "Mary-Margaret....Dinner is ready!".

Well, rats. OK...OK, just a second (I say). Hang on a bit. Next thing you know, it's "Mary-Margaret? Where ARE you?". (grumble...gripe) I am BUSY (I say in my head) and I just ignore her. Well, crud. I hear the car door open, and then she comes back into the house, and out the back door with a flashlight. Not just a flashlight, but a Super Dooper Mag lite that could stop a deer in it's tracks! I dodge a bit...duck under a bush...dart behind the bird bath...you get the idea, right?

Then she REALLY gets mad and it's like I'm in one of those German war camp escape dramas with the searchlights. The only thing missing was sirens. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaack.....!! She spotted me. I started to run the other way, zigging and zagging, and then she yells, "STOP!". Oh shucks...that's the magic word. I freeze and she scoops me up, yapping at me all the way into the house.

I am having chicken...she's having salmon. Hello? I would rather have salmon! "GET OFF ME!!", she says. Bite me, (I say), and I dig my nails into her leg. "GET O-F-F ME!!!", she says, so I hop onto the arm of the chair and wait for freebies to fall. I get a few tasty little morsels when she's done with her dinner, but that's not quite what I had in mind. I snorfle into the chair cushion on both sides making as much noise as possible. She says I sound like a little piglet. As long as she feels the guilt is all I care about.

I ask to go out again, and you'd think we were entering into an international treaty. "Promise me you'll make it snappy!", she says. Yeah yeah, (I say), just open that door. She picks me up and stares me straight in the eyeball. "YOU PROMISE!!". OK..OK... whatever! But I take just a brief moment to check the yard for cats, and then I hop back inside. I haven't forgotten the day I was accidently left in the yard for a couple of hours. Nope. That's not happening again.

My bowl of freshly chopped roast chicken is waiting for me. It's actually pretty good and I ate the WHOLE thing. Knowing there's no possibility of any more salmon makes chicken taste everly so much better.

I'm in trouble and having a "time out" in my kennel. I guess I'm lucky she's even letting me dictate to her.

Sometimes I just gotta be free to be meeeeeeee!!!

Mary-Margaret "Flower Child" O'Brien