I had a moment this week where I thought my were the smartest dogs that ever lived. I guess I never noticed it before because I was so used to them doing really stupid things... like going nuts over a flashlights light beam with their eyes fixated on it....for hours. Or hiding under the bed with a non stop yipping bark when a visitor arrives....for hours too. That's just a few of the stupid things they do. But I found out that they only play stupid. Kim was deciding on what she wanted to do and said these words."Well...I think I will take the boys for a (spelling this word out) W-A-L-K". And that's when it hit me....My dogs are geniuses. They know the English language. They know it enough to where we are at the point of spelling the words out that we don't want them to recognize. I even heard Kim spell out other words...like T-R-E-A-T....F-O-O-D and immediately I had visions of Letterman, Leno...Today and GMA appearances featuring our smart dogs on each show. But I could not just assume that based on three words that my wife spelled out...I needed more proof. I decided to test this and give them more words to see if they actually knew what the meaning was. I started with the word " biscuit" and I said "you want a biscuit?" Immediately the dogs sat up and both tails were wagging. So I waited a little while until the disappointment left their tails of not receiving a biscuit and I asked them again... but this time I spelled out the word.
"Do you want a B-I-S-C-U-I-T? " I waited for a response and got nothing. Confirmed?.... my dogs know the English language but just cant spell. Not so fast...If we were going on live TV...I needed more proof.
So I decided to take this one step further to see if they knew sentences. "Cmon boys..lets go outside"
immediately they ran towards the door. I thought to myself...
maybe they really do know this language. But to be honest...I wasn't totally convinced just yet.
Rico has a bad knee but we still let him go outside if he wishes to. So off we go outside...Rico goes towards the front of the house and Romeo towards the back. I watched as Rico goes to his usual places to sniff around. And Romeo doesn't go far anyway so I don't usually have to watch him much. Rico then moves towards the end of the driveway where he likes to go across the road and into the neighbors yard (He loves to play with the neighbors dog) and I have had to physically go and get him from there many times which is always embarrassing when they are out raking or cooking out. Next thing I knew he was running (bum knee and all) up the hill in the neighbors yard. Ugh !! So I called for him ....RICO!!!! He stopped and looked back at me. Hmmm could it be? Quick ...say something to see if he understands English while you have his attention. "Come here Rico !!" and What he did next...well.... That's when it was really confirmed for me...because he turned and took off even further up towards the neighbors house. Dang it...He doesn't know the English language at all...in fact he is just as stupid as I thought he was....he is running on a knee cap that is out of socket and disobeyed a simple command from his master. I mean...does it get much stupider? I walked over to the edge of our yard and called him again "Rico...come here" this time with more anger in my voice ...but to know avail he gave me not even the slightest bit of attention. So I had to revert to my wife's tricks that I used to tease her about....I yelled...."Cmon Rico...Good boys get Treats" And you would have thought that that he had just hit the doggy lotto ....he came running just as fast as he could on a three legged run.
Seems as though all of a sudden his knee now hurts again and if I hadnt still had the anger inside me I would have felt sorry for him. Meantime I was thinking to myself that.... here I thought we could have been famous for our smart dogs only to find out that they are just normal dogs.
I was bummed and didnt want to believe it so I was recapping in my mind what had transpired
....He didn't pick up on the basic sentences or commands but he would come whenever there is mention of any and all food. OMG... I get it now...he really is a genius. He will do anything you want for food....any food....all food....including fake food. I mean...they do whatever they need to do in order to get what they want... and they want F-O-O-D....how genius is that? So I have a whole new outlook on my dogs now...Not only are they my BFFs... but as a man...I can understand that concept and I think we now can move forward to the next level of our dog/man relationship which is called..."If you run from me again....you will never get a T-R-E-A-T again in your life" :)
