Ace is our German Shepherd rescue. We think he was two-years old when we got him, and he had the unenviable job of following our first German Shepherd Max, the world’s greatest dog (who you can read about in the stunning book of dog stories Gone Dogs, the perfect gift for that special dog-loving someone). However Ace has risen to the occasion swimmingly. He is an awesome guy with a completely unhealthy attachment to my wife. Look at her the wrong way. Go on, I dare ya.
Then there’s Lucy. We like to refer to her as an American Sock terrier. My daughter’s friend’s dog had puppies, and Lucy was one of them. She just came home with my wife and daughter one day. I didn’t want to love her, but here we are (talking about Lucy, not the wife and daughter).
Anyway, if you happen to have the good fortune of owning a dog, you already know there are so many great things about it.
The unconditional love.
The excitement no one else in your life will ever have for you when you return from being gone ten minutes.
The warmth and comfort laying next to them on the floor, or if you’re like us, the bed.
The deep-sleep twitching that defies the boundaries of sweetness.
But for all those great things about being a dog parent, there are some realities of dog ownership we don’t discuss often (even though I’ve mentioned them before here and here).
In a word: poop. With big dogs come big poops. For the longest time, because I bought it when Max was the world's cutest puppy, the only thing I had was a small scoop to clean up the yard after my big dog.
It was frustrating, time consuming and extremely unpleasant. Just like my high school girlfriend.
Stay with me. It may not seem like it, but I’ll land the plane in a minute. Sometimes, even though the obvious answer is right in front of me I just don’t see it. I remember one time I was having lunch with a co-worker at Carl’s Jr. right after the BBQ Chicken Club sandwich came out. I told her, “This would be a great sandwich if it didn’t have that flavorless bacon.” To which she replied, “Take the bacon off.”
Like I said, slow on the uptake.
Here’s what that has to do with dog poop. We were at our fabulous friend Joan’s house one day. Joan had two or three large dogs, and at one point she went to clean up after them. I noticed she was using a super-sized poop scooper, and was easily making short work of the souvenirs her pups had left. The clouds parted, the angel choir sang and a little voice in my big head said, “Don’t you feel stupid now Einstein.”
Later that very same day, I became the proud owner of the large poop-removal device you see here: the easy-grip, rubber-fitted wood handle, the oversized tray, the convenient clasp that keeps the two together when not in use.
It’s definitely made the chore much more, not fun, but less unpleasant. There’s no struggle to make things fit. I’m able to collect more at once. And it’s far less stressful and time-consuming than it used to be.
No snappy end line today—poop is funny enough. But all this talk of it does remind me of the old joke: There's this guy who ran off to join the circus. The job he got was walking behind the elephants, scooping up their droppings. When his friend told him he should quit, and asked him how he could do such an awful, disgusting job the guy said, "What? And give up show business?"
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