#291 Mitzi-Guided

I saw something interesting yesterday. I was driving back to my house and as I turned a corner, this large truck came screeching to a halt. Luckily, because if he had kept going he would have smashed into my side and killed me. If you’ve ever been nearly killed, you know that in the split seconds leading up to your presumed doom the world takes on an astonishing resolution. Every color suddenly becomes more vibrant, ever breath of wind on your skin feels more textured, every smell becomes more intense, and every visual image is burned into your brain with crystal clarity. Forget about your passed life flashing before your eyes, it is the striking present that engulfs you and the absolute horror that these last impressions will be with you for eternity. So you can imagine my dismay when I realized that the last memory of this wonderful existence that I was about to take to my grave was of a Chihuahua in a cowboy hat. Now I’m not absolutely sure it was a Chihuahua. I know it looked brown and relatively hairless. It could have been a shaved Shitzu. But what struck me most was the ludicrousness of my final tableau. A big truck, with duellies of course, and tons of horsepower. The man driving was modern macho himself, John Deere hat, Carharrt vest, long sleeve flannel shirt rolled up to the elbows, a bulge in his cheek that hinted of chaw. His hands on his steering wheel, positioned properly at ten and two were large and gnarled from years of heavy work. I noticed that he was wearing a seatbelt. A manly man by all accounts. Not the sort you’d expect to have a two-ounce dog skittering around on his dashboard. Most guys I know that care about it, have a lower weight limit for their dogs. 40 pounds a bare minimum to even been included in the definition of dog, so the scene had a certain incongruity. A dissonance in the fabric of the universe as I know it. Perhaps that crack in the dimension wall that was soon to admit me to the other side. Near death makes me remember all the Outer Limits shows I ever watched. So, tell me. Why would someone who obviously lavished so much attention on his toy terrier, who dressed it in cute outfits and crazy hats, who dotes on it, and takes it everywhere as a constant canine companion, why would that person not have his precious poochie in a pet restraint device? They must be available, if not legally mandatory. You have to belt in your braying baby, your terrible teenagers, and your cellphoning self. Why shouldn’t you have to belt in little foofy Fifi, or rambunctious Russell, or Maltese Mitzi? It’s time for some legislation, beause when you come right down to it, loose stewing dogs are a significant automotive crash hazard. I can see it now, fatally wounded by the projectile of an ejected tiny female dog. My o-bitch-uary says: Local punster, killed by a guided Mitzi.
America, ya gotta love it.