So, I came home the other day and this was what was left of my remote control. My first thought was "the beagle." Her name is Meggie, but mostly we call her beagle. It's fun to yell "beagle, beagle, beagle" when you're trying to get her to come inside.
Anyway, she's too short to reach the cabinet the remote was on, so my attention turned to my counter-surfer Tommy. The only places he can't reach are the top of the television and the top of the refrigerator. Other than that he will regularly look for security breaches such as bread left on a countertop (husband), peanut butter left on countertop (ditto), or anything that he might be able to play with, including a sock, a shoe, yarn.
So, my theory, is that Tommy got it off the counter just because he could. His nickname is thief. He loves to steal things, especially things you might value and then wiggle/waggle his butt around trying to get you to chase him. He's not above running out the dog door with a bra or a boot or tennis shoe and trotting to the back of the yard, which is a long way at my house, just so you have to come after him.
Anyway, my theory is that Tommy got it down and the beagle took it from there. I haven't owned a shredder in a long time, not since my first dog, named Bimbo. The beagle will shred anything she can find, newspaper, phonebooks, $$$$ (@#%&*^+!#@$) and now this. She loves to chew. She's chewed my eyeglasses. The other day she ripped the tag off the sofa slip cover, which was the only thing that helped me get the blasted thing on there in one try.
Anyone who has cable television knows what this mishap meant, standing in a long line at Comcast waiting to get a replacement. They are so conveniently opened during hours when most of us are at work. I pointed that out to the person on the phone who told me the office a million-miles away was open until 12:30 on Saturdays. Last time I drove by there on a Saturday, I thought they were selling tickets to The Who. The line snaked around outside. Some people had lawn chairs.
So I steeled my spine, mostly because it's infuriating to stand at the cable box and press the up button to get from channel 3 to channel 301. When I got there, 12 people were in front of me. It was the office on Poplar, the former bank that had very little decorations.
The only seats, one was broken, were a few theater chairs. Two of the televisions that should have been showing cable shows weren't on. The only one that was on was tuned to General Hospital. Wait a minute, isn't that a network station, the kind you can bring into your house with a pair of rabbit ears and some tin foil?
We inched along in line. It got to be kind of fun to watch the expression of the next person coming in the door. They opened it hopeful that their visit wouldn't take an entire chunk out of their lives. The first look was surprise that there could be that many people in line. Most looked at their watch to see if they could afford the time. Some turned and left. Others bit the bullet and joined the rest of us.
There were only two clerks working. The former bank had teller windows that would hold maybe 7 tellers, but only two to take care of those of us being held hostage by the cable company. Of course, we could leave, but what was I going to do without a remote? What's the point of cable if you can't flip around with a remote.
I thought more and more about a satellite dish. We went that route before but we were always losing our signal every time it rained. We live in a neighborhood with a lot of trees and our theory was that the weight of water on the leaves blocked the signal. Sounded logical to us, but it was tiresome to go for a couple of days without television every time a front came through.
I tried to remember my life before I got in line, how care free I had been and reckless with my time. After about 25 minutes, I moved up to the prime standing area, that was where you could lean on the former table where people used to fill out bank deposit slips. There were four of us with our elbows propped on it listening to some ridiculous Romeo and Juliet plotline on the top of some castle on General Hospital. Back in the day when I used to watch it, the show was actually set in a hospital. Bobby was a star and Rick Springfield was dreamy.
At about minute 34 (I know this because I have a watch I use for running and power walking and I time everything, traffic lights, long speeches, etc.) I moved to the clerk.
That was the best part of it. Her smile was warm, she was sympathetic and even better, she simply gave me a remote and told me I could have a pass and not pay for it because it was my first offense. Now THAT was Comcastic.
So now the remote sits high atop the television set like a priceless jewel. My dogs, of course, have claimed their innocence and have both indicated that they are innocent of all charges. They have no idea how the remote got in that state. It doesn't even taste good.
If you read the comments in the section below, you can get some details about how Bruiser is doing. He's up, he's down. He takes a turn for the better then a turn for the worse. He has to go through so much. I guess some people wonder why he wasn't put to sleep from the start. What do you think? Is Bruiser worth fighting for? Can we save one pit bull from the hell he's been through?
