Why Auctions and Alcohol Don't Mix

Last fall I bid on some items at an auction to benefit the New York SAR Federation. A warm amber liquid was offered by a friend and accepted before bidding commenced. Got a nice tuggie toy for Cole, a gift certificate for a company that sells training gear, and this other thing.

It was a certificate for a very expensive collapsible aluminum police dog crate.

The catalog said that it was only 32" long, so it didn't get much in the way of bids. I walked off with an auction bargain. It was puzzling though -- why would a company that caters to police departments make such a small crate (and in only the one size)?

I've got donut-spare sized SAR dogs, and I'd always coveted one of those bombproof aluminum crates for car and airline use. Didn't think about the "collapsible" aspect until later. No airline will take one. Derrr... amber liquid.

Finally sent in the certificate a few weeks ago. My intent was actually to forward the thing to a friend with a smallish dog who is experimenting with crate destruction. But since I'd never seen one, and was concerned about the "collapsible" aspect, I didn't have it shipped direct. I wanted to inspect it first.

When the UPS delivery golem -- the jackass who throws my packages in the driveway, speeds down our lane, lies like a priest, and dented this very expensive item tossing it on the porch this time -- appeared the other day, I thought the giant box he hefted out was the six or eight trees I'd recently ordered

We opened it up in the living room:


It is 42" long. Catalog typo. It eats up the entire center of the living room. We've all been worshiping it, and PC tried to brain me with a femur the other day. Cole has learned to do a handstand in front of its open door. Rosie does her best Snoopy on the doghouse impression atop it.

It won't be going off to contain Ms. Maddie; the sides are wiggly, the aluminum stock is pretty thin, and I'm fairly sure she can get her jaws around the air vents and commence injurious mayhem. The top and bottom, however, seem to be engineered to withstand a tactical nuclear strike, and the door is Hannibal Lecter-worthy, and has a lock.

It would make an uber-cool end table if we lived in a giant loft served by a freight elevator and decorated in a sort of post-modern industrial ironic mode.

It is far too large for my car.

It does easily fold down into something the size of a giant radiation-shielded architect's portfolio.



Open thread: What the hell do I do with this thing?

Rural Gods III: The Empire of Bubbahotep

The Emperor Bubba-Hotep

His historic empire* stretched from Maryland to Missouri. Some say it still does.

He and his sons and brothers and nephew-sons and cousin-daughters took to their legions of gravesites and sacred groves an assortment and volume of grave goods and offerings seen nowhere else.

Any attempt to sink a fence post, trench an asparagus bed, bury an ex-sheep, cut firewood, clear brush or delve an ancient manure pile becomes an archaeological investigation nearly guaranteed to be stopped dead by Bubba-Hotep's barely-submerged treasures. Every ravine of Appalachia is replete with his sacred tithes, the mystical middens into which sacrifices were tipped in the conviction that they'd "go away" if dumped "down the crick."

His artifacts are glass shards, bedsprings, steel roofing, mysterious and shapeless chunks of corroded sheet metal, ominous and rusted steel drums, bricks, shingles, angle-iron and machine parts, whole implements, rotting timbers, blasted fragments of clay pigeons, cat skeletons, tractor tires, broken cinder blocks, the occasional near-complete vehicle, and wire.

Fence wire -- smooth, barbed, woven, welded -- was the signature medium of his court craftsmen. Embedded in tree trunks, sagging from tree to post to ground, stretched at tripwire height through the woods, heaped and tangled amid the brambles and vines at the edge of pastures waiting to ensnare any mower deck or horse's hoof that dares profane the sacred site.

Our farm woodlot is privileged to host an especially hallowed monument, the Convertible of Bubba-Hotep's Favorite Nephew.

Teams make new discoveries every day; most recently, a wire hoard that rivals the Sutton Hoo treasure.

Being the third in a series of revelations concerning the powerful deities who govern rural life. Iconography by the inimitable Kelly Bahmer-Brouse.

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* Many thanks to Friend o' the Blog Linda Kaim for introducing us to the Empire of Bubba-Hotep and its artifacts.

Equal Time

It has come to our attention on this, the last day that you can vote for Cole, that the Fairness In Blogging Act of 2007 requires us to air a rebuttal by those who oppose Cole's candidacy for the office of Bissell Most Valuable Pet 2011.

As it happens, foster puppies Bob, Susie, Amy and Donna brought some friends with them when they came to stay at Brandywine Bone 'n' Breakfast. Quite a few friends. So many friends that one is moved to wonder how puppies so young could have networked so effectively and developed such a fanatical and loyal cadre of little buddies. So without further editorial intrusion, we present the spokescritters for the "No on Cole 2011" campaign.

A guy's just minding his own business, just hanging in there as it were, a lot of his efforts going down the shitter, but getting by, and along comes some snob like Cole with all his being shiny and not stinking and never having things that look like rice crawling around his ass. Like he's so great. His supporters claim that he was born in Montana and has the common touch, even used to hang out with guys like me, but have you ever seen a birth certificate? Let me answer that for you No You Have Not! Look at the name -- an "English" shepherd. And claiming to be a "Canine Good Citizen?" That dog is not even a regular citizen. He's not eligible for the office of MVP.


When Cole is defeated in the MVP election, we are going to take back what is ours. Starting with Bob's leg. And then on to Mrs. Evans' second-grade class. Cole's compulsory plan to apply zymox to our homes and workplaces is nothing less than socialism.


National English Shepherd Rescue is a known terrorist organization. It harbors all kinds of dangerous extremists. I have documentation here that proves that it has directly funded the deployment of chemical weapons -- referred to by the code names Revolution and Frontline -- on innocent civilian populations. Cole has pledged his MVP salary to this den of subversives. If you vote for Cole, the terrorists win. Also, I can see Russia from Susie's left ear, you betcha.

Cole is on-record as favoring firm, well-formed, and moderately infrequent poop. The Bible tells us that we are to go forth and multiply and then be expelled in a burst of mucous-and-blood-tinged diarrhea every hour or so. Cole and his so-called "science" is a threat to our traditional way of life and the values we hold dear.


Tax and spend, tax and spend, all those Cole-sponsored government entitlements for Safeguard. It's people like Cole and his lapdogs at NESR that are bankrupting this country with ridiculous runaway appropriations squandered on veterinarians and gas and pull fees at dog pounds. It's got to stop now! But hands off the kibble budget. You have to keep the kibble coming right on through Amy's gastrointestinal tract -- that's our right as Americans!