Oh, dear. Did you know that puppies can recognize each other and, like teenaged humans, gang up against the Old Folks?

Yesh. They don't have to be the same breed, either.

This morning my son called as dawn cracked, asking if I'd dog-sit Charley the Golden Retriever, who, we were told, has the gollywobbles.

This is a dog for whom the gollywobbles is SOP. My son's house does not have a doggy door or any place that easily lends itself to construction of a doggy door, and so if Charley is left alone, when he's indisposed, between 8 a.m. and noon or between 1 p.m. and 5 p.m., M'hijito is likely to come home to...uhm, quite the little mess.

We do not leave our dogs outdoors, although just now the weather would permit it. Most of the year it's either wayyy too hot or somewhat too cold to leave a pet dog out in the yard. And Charley has done a very fine job at socializing my son to let him (dog) loaf in the house instead of loaf in the backyard whilst Son is at the office.

{sigh}

Soooo: Charley to Mom's house.

Once again (as often happens), the Warley shows no sign of the Wobbles here at my house. The only sign he shows is of not being the brightest star in the constellation Canis Majoris.

And majoris he is. This dog is now the size of a small elephant.

But here's the funny thing: Ruby the Corgi Puppy has not seen Charley since she was very, very tiny (about two weeks ago) and so does not remember him, as you and I do not remember the various traumas that beset us when we were infants. And so she is, in a word, AMAZED.

At first she had no idea what to make of this vast beast of a dog, a critter than can, with one clumsy misstep, bowl her over onto her back, her little feet kicking in the air like a flipped-over beetle's.

But if anything can be said about Ruby, it is that she is utterly, insanely fearless. Whereas her mentor, Cassie the Corgi, has a healthy dose of common sense, this puppy has...well, none. No common sense at all.

Flip her over, and she'll follow you anywhere.

Forthwith, Ruby and Charley, who at two years old is still, as golden retrievers go, a puppy (Charley may never progress beyond the doggy age of about six months, IMHO), are the best of pals.

And heaven help us, it's them against the grownups.

Charley conspires with Ruby to help her slip the bonds of the Human and Cassie's guardianship, where, once Ruby can no longer be seen, she can eat some twigs and plants, therewith to acquire the same gollywobbles with which Charley likes to inflict his human.

When Cassie ARFs, Ruby will ordinarily come. The Human has learned to emit a similar ARF, which also causes the Ruby to come running.

Charley has disabused Ruby of the need to respond to any such imperious commands. With Charley in the offing, Ruby does not come to call. Or to ARF. She merely sits back and continues to chew on the thorny bougainvillea twig she's found.

Charley, in a word, is a Brat. A canine juvenile delinquent. A bad influence on puppies.

Hilariously, Ruby and Charley have become the best of friends, even though they are so radically mismatched in size as to be alarming.

I do wish my camera were fast enough to catch the goings-on: she just gave Charley a gigantic smootch under the ear. And, thereafter, neither of them would come to call.

Uh huh.

Thank heaven M'hijito will be here in another 10 or 15 minutes. :-D

Click o the images for larger, higher-definition pix.