THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, December 2, 1994 TAG: 9412010183
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Jo-Ann Clegg
LENGTH: Medium: 85 lines
``Hey, Chuck,'' I yelled at my snoozing Lhasa apso. ``It's time to wake up and prepare for the holidays.''
``Holidays, schmolidays,'' he snarled. ``Why can't you just let a guy get some sleep around here?''
``Because you'd sleep 23 1/2 hours out of the day if I didn't wake you up once in awhile,'' I told him.
``So?'' he asked.
``So I have this basic female thing about the males around me being asleep when I'm awake,'' I explained. ``I think it has to do with the old days when the women tended to home, hearth and kids and the guys had to go out and club anything that was threatening them. If the guys were sleeping on the job, then the women and kids weren't safe.''
``Let me get this straight,'' my cantankerous fuzz ball barked. ``You think just because I'm of the male persuasion that I ought to stay awake so that I can bop some other four-footed critter over the head and drag him back home for dinner?''
``No, I told him, ``all I really think is that you should wake up and get ready for the holidays.''
``Like how?'' he wanted to know.
``Like helping me with the shopping and the Christmas cards and the cooking for starters,'' I said.
``I helped with the Thanksgiving cooking, didn't I?'' he growled.
``Knocking the cookie dough off the counter and not letting anyone near the oven to check on the turkey was not the kind of help I had in mind,'' I told him sarcastically.
``I cleaned up the spilled dough and nobody stole the turkey so the way I see it I did my job,'' he snarled. ``What kind of help did you have in mind for the cards and the shopping anyway?'' he asked.
``Well, as far as the cards are concerned, I figured you could lick the stamps and the envelopes for me,'' I told him.
``In your dreams! Speaking of which, I'm turning over right now to chase a few of my own,'' he said, closing his eyes and settling into his stack of pillows.
``We haven't talked about shopping yet,'' I said, raising one of his eyelids so I could make my point.
``What are you going to do, send me out in a cab with your credit cards and a shopping list?'' he asked.
``No,'' I told him, ``I intend to do most of my shopping closer to home than that. Like right up here at the shopping center. I figured you could go along and help me carry packages.''
``I'll carry anything you buy,'' he said agreeably, ``so long as it comes from the bread store, the yogurt place or the pet shop. Everything else is your problem,'' he concluded.
``Fat chance of it getting all the way home,'' I said.
``You got that one right, Babycakes,'' he responded.
``What's this `Babycakes' stuff?'' I asked.
``You insist on calling me Chuck, I'll call you Babycakes. It's as simple as that,'' he snarled, attempting to end the conversation by shoving his head under the pillows.
``I forgot something,'' I told him, yanking him back out. ``The reindeer are going to be there again this year.''
``Say what?'' he asked, finally wide awake.
``I said the reindeer are going to be right here in the Fairfield Shopping Center again this year.
``When?'' he asked.
``This Friday from 2 to 8,'' I told him.
``Why didn't you say so?'' he asked. ``Let's go.''
``Only if you promise to behave yourself this time,'' I said.
``Like I didn't last year?'' he asked.
``Like jumping in Santa's lap, nipping at Rudolph's heels and chasing Dasher and Prancer around the enclosure is not exactly behaving yourself,'' I told him.
``I thought that was what was expected of me,'' he pouted.
``Why?'' I asked.
``Well, first of all, all kids are supposed to jump in Santa's lap,'' he said, ``and as for Dashy, Prancey and the guy with the front-end pigmentation problem, I was just doing my male thing.''
``How do you figure that?'' I asked.
``I was protecting you from that band of roving hat racks,'' he announced.
``Just remember,'' he added before closing his eyes again, ``I don't do stamps!'' by CNB