Carnivore?

In his quest to get me to eat more vegetables, the boy brought over a veggie tray on Saturday night. I had requested that we grill steaks, and I'm pretty sure the boy's version of a "balanced diet" isn't red meat and more red meat. So he brought some veggies to share.

It's not that I dislike veggies. I mean, there are some that I wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole, but on the whole I'm not averse to them. I just prefer red meat. But the boy chose wisely, and scored with three out of four of the veggies he brought. I love broccoli and cauliflour. Carrots are "meh" but if there's ranch dip, I'll eat them with no complaint.

My diet is so very healthy, no? I will say that I love love LOVE V-8 juice. I drink at least a bottle a day, so I'm not entirely missing out on essential vitamins.

The fourth compartment of the veggie tray housed celery. Celery is one thing that I won't touch. NOTHING will make me touch celery. Gross. And so it sat there. And sat there. And sat there. Until I got tired of Blue's begging and decided to teach him a lesson.

Note: My dogs beg. They are active beggars. This is why I usually put them downstairs when guests are eating. They know that they are supposed to lie down and wait to see if someone will be so kind as to give them a scrap. And this is what they do for me. But they will take advantage of anyone who isn't as tough with them. If you get flustered when they get near you, or just try to avoid them, you're obvously weak or playing a game. They will shove their noses as close to your food as possible. But if you tell them to sit, and then lie down, they will stay about two feet away and just wait. Wait and drool. Drool and wait. Such is my life when eating dinner.

So Blue was watching us eat veggies and looking more and more pathetic as we did not share. The strings of drool had almost reached the ground (think Hooch from Turner and Hooch.) So I decided to give him some celery.

He took it gently in his mouth, took it to the corner where he could protect it from Casey, and laid it on the ground. He licked it a couple of times, and then decided to take a bite. The look of surprise was comical when he heard the crunch produced by biting down. The celery landed on the floor in two pieces. He sniffed them again, and then cautiously took one piece into his mouth. At this point, Casey came over to investigate, and Blue decided the time for indecision was over. He wolfed down both pieces. The boy and I waited. Blue chewed, and seemed to think. Then his tail began wagging, and he came back to lie down in front of me.

Um, what?

So I gave him another piece. This one he crunched immediately and then ate. I think he liked the first crunch sound the best.

And thus the birth of a new treat for Blue. (Casey prefers the carrots, so she has to share with me, although she doesn't get the ranch dressing.) I can seriously use the celery instead of a dog biscuit to get Blue into his crate, get him to do tricks, whatever. He's ALL ABOUT his celery now. It was such a funny surprise to see him eating it. I'll try to post a picture soon, but it's generally wolfed down so fast that I can't capture it. I guess it goes to show that there's no accounting for taste.

(I will note, however, that when the steaks were off the grill, I couldn't give Blue a piece of celery to substitute for the steak he was smelling. He would take it with no complaint, trot off and hide it in the corner, then come back and wait for steak....that he never got. Emily doesn't share steak. When the heavenly steak smell was gone, he went over and chowed down on his stash of celery. I think he was happy anyway.)