ADVICE: The Christmas Tree

As a dog of good manners, I find humans are often hard to comprehend. I know from the very smell of things that they mostly do have indoor plumbing and yet, they vehemently object to their very faithful companions having indoor plumbing.

To make matters worse, at a certain time of year, even the most black-thumbed (a term that my secretary assures me refers to those who cannot care for a living plant) of humans will go out and bring in shrubbery. I do not mean the usual small to medium sized plant in a pot, but a rather large tree.

Wonderfully smelling for the most part, these trees are treated with almost inappropriate awe by humans, particularly their pups and cause much consternation to both humans and dogs. If I and most dogs were to encounter such a tree outside, our human companions would be perfectly content to stand by while one lifted a leg. Yet this tree is not for the sake of indoor plumbing for dogs, no matter how much at this time of year our human companions may curse and howl at having to take us out into the cold to relieve ourselves.

Nor is this tree meant to be a scratch post for our friend the cat. It is not meant at an exercise contraption for the family feline either.

Rather, the humans mean to hang fragile things rather precariously from the branches. A dog, no matter how well-mannered might knock these shiny things down, causing much disruption in the usual flow of good human-dog relations. Too often, humans forget that we, unlike they, do have tails and do not generally wear shoes.

Indeed, there is quite a danger of breaking these silly objects and stepping on them, causing a bloody howling mess and perhaps even banishment of the dog and not the foolish human who created the situation.

Another odd practice is the placing of edible object such as popcorn in strings, or deliciously sweet candy canes or even cookies on the branches. Talk about tempting fate! Do humans believe that we have steelier consciences and resolve than they? They often even further confuse us by placing poisonous stuff (tinsel is what my secretary calls that shiny things) that can easily get entangled in our hair and then, during grooming our intestines if we swallow.

So be careful my friends, both furry friends and humans alike. The so-called Christmas tree can be the cause of a crisis, a breakdown in communication between dogs (and cats) and their humans and even, at worst, a critical injury scenario. Oddly enough, after a few weeks, humans will toss this tree onto the curb and, at that time, not particularly care if you use it as a matter of outdoor plumbing.