Not About Reina

This post is not about my wonder baby...wait until tomorrow. No, this is about our dogs, Jedi and Hermes. Those of you who know them know their friendly but a little in-your-face temperments, Hermes' unceasing energy and Jedi's high-pitched sound-like-she's-being-disemboweled excited squealing. They really are lovable dogs but as our vet (who loves terriers too) put it, they're easy to hate. Somebody has to love them I guess.

We live in a very suburban type neighborhood, lots of kids, swing sets and dogs. There is one particular pack of kids that live a few doors down that especially drive our dogs nuts. These kids run back and forth to other houses through our yard, inciting a cacophony of barks, yips and squeals as the dogs watch through the back door, unable to jump, chase and lick them. When the dogs are out, Jedi wearing her invisible fence collar and Hermes on his tether leash, the kids run up to the edge of our yard just out of their reach and essentially taunt them. Then the kids have the nerve to look at me like I should make the dogs stop barking at them.

The grandfather of these kids, incidentally, is Jedi's arch enemy. This old gentleman takes a daily morning walk around the neighborhood, presumably for his health. Fine, however, he walks backwards around the block, which for whatever reason drives Jedi NUTS. She barks at this man like none other and he, not being any more of a dog lover than his grandsons, freezes mid-backward stride, takes off his jacket and flaps it at her! I try to tell him this is only getting her more worked up but there's a bit of a language barrier. Jedi, bless her heart, just barks her brains out but never leaves the yard.

Hermes on the other hand has no arch enemies, just fewer admirers. While Jedi is a cuddly lap dog who befriends everyone with her charm, Hermes is all boy, jumping and running and encircling new-found friends with lap after hyperactive lap....Jack Russell Terriers are awesome. Few get to see our sweet, tuckered-out pink puppy at the end of an exciting day, all curled up and ready for bed. He is named after the Greek mythological god of mischief, not the designer label. He has been called other names as well: Devil Dog, Satan Spawn, and my personal favorite, Herpes. Great.

Today the dogs were outside with me while I was scooping the yard of various items such as bits of blanket that most certainly weren't "carried" out there when I heard the neighbor kid hoard talking out of my sight about the dogs. One kid called a warning to another as I guess they were about to set off on their next adventure. He said "they're outside, watch out." The other said "who's out?" 1st menace, I mean kid says "Jedi and Sith."

Jedi and Sith? SITH? Non-Star Wars fans (or geeks if you prefer, we don't) out there won't get the reference. A Sith is an Evil Jedi, i.e. Darth Vader. So now poor misunderstood easy-to-hate Hermes has another name. Sith. Terrific. Bill actually thought it was pretty cool. I guess in a way it is since we now are the house with the reputation of having evil dogs that kids are scared of. Maybe they'll stop running past and driving them crazy. Reina won't get harassed at least.

One final note about these kids and the dogs. A few years ago one of them came and stood next to Bill out in the yard while the dogs were out. Kid was about 4 years old. He said to Bill, "you have 2 dogs." Bill says, "yep." Kid says, "you have a brown one and a white one." Bill says, "yep." Kid (not the brightest maybe) says, "who made all this poop?" referring to our back yard dog toilet.

Bill smiles and responds, "I did."