Dog Trouble

May 17th 2006

All the Pollitts went out early this morning; Wayne Pollitt and his wife Liz presumably to viagra online canada pharmacy work, their children Keanu and Catherine Zeta to school, or more likely to hang about the local shopping arcade dealing drugs, and the baby Nectarine probably to a childminder, or possibly a kennels, which would be more fitting. It would certainly be more fitting if their dog You Twat had been placed in kennels instead of being left out in the garden to howl and bark like a demented Dervish all day.

Some years ago Atkins Down The Road had a problem with a neighbour’s dog barking all day. As I told it the Environmental Health people eventually sorted it out, but not until Atkins and Mrs Atkins Down The Road had been subjected to weeks of barking, howling every time the dog’s owners went out of the house leaving it home alone. Atkins said it turned his wife into a nervous wreck, although having to put up with Atkins’ peccadilloes she was already halfway to being a nervous wreck in the first place in my opinion.

I’ve certainly no intention of putting up with You Twat’s sundry canine noises for a moment longer than necessary and intend to get the Environmental Health people onto the case as soon as possible, but what to do about it in the meantime? Perhaps if I were to sneak up on it and cut off its dreadlocks with a sharp knife it would quieten it down a bit, rather like Delilah quietened Samson down when she cut off his hair? A nice thought, but improbable. Far better to cut off its bollocks with a sharp knife (as Atkins Down The Road attempted to do before the dog got its retaliation in first and bit a chunk out of his leg); there’d be more and louder howling initially but it wouldn’t last for long.

In the end I decided to reason with the Pollitts, so when they had all returned to their lair that evening I called round.

Pollitt answered the door, a picture of surliness. “Yes?”

“I’m Terry Ravenscroft, your next-door-but-one neighbour. It’s about your dog.”

“What about it?”

“It barks and howls all day long.”

He cocked an ear. “I can’t hear anything.”

“That could be because it isn’t barking and howling now. It only barks when you’re all out.“

“Nobody else has complained.”

“That’s because everyone else goes to work during the day. They wouldn’t be able to hear it while they’re a work. Unless they’re unfortunate enough to work within five miles of your back garden.“

“What?”

“Anyway I’d like you to put a stop to it.”

“And how do you suggest I do that?”

“”Well one way would be to keep it in the house, not out in the back garden.“

“It shits in the house if we do that.”

“Well train it to shit somewhere else.”

“We have, we’ve trained it to shit in the back garden.”

“But if you leave it in the back garden it barks and howls all day. Probably because it’s up the arse in shit. But whatever the reason it’s not good enough and I want you to put a stop to it.”

“Tell him to fuck of and mind his own fucking business, Dad.” Catherine Zeta had joined her father. She continued, lest her father hadn’t heard her. “Fuck off and mind your own fucking business.”

“You heard the little lady,” said Pollitt, and closed he door in my face.

 

 

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