We all know dogs that are happy to eat a lot of things that would never pass our lips–grass, pig ears, cow leg bones, rawhide, to name just a few. There are also dogs, like Bo, my current Chesapeake, who is so picky that only kibble that costs half the national debt per bag topped with homemade chicken loaf – that’s nearly as costly to prepare – is satisfactory.
Chances are, you and I share one very important gene. A team of European scientists studied 35,035 human twin pairs to understand if human genetics influence the desire to own a dog.
This sport has always existed in a paradoxical universe. Although it’s never been immune to the frenetic influences of social expectations, that proximity has never dictated its evolution. Nothing illustrates this better than the bizarrely indefinable role of women in the sport.
So one day last week, requiring a few minutes in the dog free zone (and don’t pretend this is news to you) I stepped into the corner bar. It’s nice. The only place where my total information gap about major league sports serves me well.
When and how did we all become experts? Why do we feel compelled to even be one? More importantly, what makes us an expert? Who decides that someone actually is one?
Possibly the greatest thing about dogs is their infinite adaptability. Our rainbow spectrum of breeds is the ultimate testament to that. But even within those parameters, they demonstrate remarkable flexibility. Chihuahuas in Siberia, what’s the problem? Great Danes in studio apartments, well that one’s practically a modern-life stereotype.
Not long ago, several of us were sitting around talking about dogs. Dog people in general like to do this and people who hunt with their dogs are especially prone to telling epic tales about their canine partners in much the same way, I suspect, as the ancient Greeks and Romans used to sit around telling stories about their great warriors.
A little kid sat on a park bench, eating happily out of a bucket of candy. An older man approached the kid and said, “You know, you shouldn’t eat so much candy, it will kill you.”
We’ve all been there. We take our chance on a permit judge. We watch while the judge proceeds to butcher the stan- dard. We blame the judge. Maybe we should blame our parent clubs’ Judges’ Education Committees (JECs).
