Tuesday, May 31, 2011

And They Said it Couldn't be Done.

So Memorial Day weekend was fun. After taking the appropriate time to think about the reason for the extra day off work and thank our troops for protecting us, Casey, Tyson, the boy and I went on several adventures. Adventures that left my dog like this 24 hours after the long weekend ended.

We started by going to visit the boy's parents. Where we had beer. Quite a bit of beer, come to think of it. Which is probably where this whole idea was born. You see, I spent the week before Memorial Day weekend referring to our trip to visit the boy's parents as the weekend of "six dogs, five people."

Six dog, five people, you ask? You mean the dogs outnumbered the people?! INSANITY!

I know, right?

Since I have become a pit bull advocate, I have adopted out six pit bulls - seven if you count my own. That's not a huge number by any means, but it's a number that I'm proud of because the now pit bull owners either did not previously have dogs, or hadn't ever considered owning one of this much maligned breed. And now? Some of them own two. Which is how we ended up in the weekend of "six dogs, five people" where all the dogs were pit bulls. And since all of the dogs (that outnumbered the people) were getting along famously, and since they were all pit bulls, I got the crazy idea that we should line the dogs up according to size, make them all sit, and then take a picture.

To which the boy's dad said, "That will never work."

Now, let me give you a quick lesson in Emily-Psychology 101, dear internet readers. If you want to absolutely ensure that Emily does something, make sure to say something to the effect of, "You can't do that," or "You'll never do that," or "That's impossible." Pretty much all I hear when you say that is "Challenge Extended*" If you want to make sure I'll die trying to prove you wrong, make sure there's plenty of beer involved.

And so, I set about to make my dream a reality. I had some help, as you can see. And, as you can see from the "setup"** the dogs did not originally begin in the correct order. Since we needed one photographer, we only had four people to prep six dogs. Everyone was a good sport about saying "sit" and "stay" over and over and over in increasingly stern voices. (Commands that I'm not entirely convinced that every dog understood, but since everyone else was sitting, the rest probably figured, "Meh. Why not.") In the end, as I held my peanut butter-covered hands out in front of me and backed away slowly, we got the picture below. No Photoshop needed. Absolute Perfection.

Behold, "Obedience." In order from left to right we have Izzie, Fatty, Lilly, Casey, Tyson and Odie. We had some difficulty deciding if Fatty was bigger than Izzie. I think we decided that he's bigger, although maybe not taller? And Odie is MUCH bigger than Tyson, but unfortunately his hip dysplasia makes him sit on his haunches, which makes him look not only shorter, but like we beat him into submission to get him in the picture. (We didn't.) My dog is the only one with her tongue out. (there's a joke in there somewhere, yes?)


Oh, and I was also proven right. Again.

Seriously, can you believe they're all looking at the camera? Seriously? Click on the picture and zoom in on it. It's ridiculous how cute they all are.***

*Why yes, I watch How I Met Your Mother. Barney Stinson is my hero. High Five!

**As much as I would like to say that I am not the gigantic butt in the middle of the picture, we all know that would be a lie. Le Sigh.

***But do NOT click on the picture with my gigantic butt in it. No one needs to see that.

3 comments:

AnnD said...

AWESOME!!! That is an awesome photo! Why haven't you uploaded it to FB?!?!

ems said...

@AnnD - I wanted the photographer to have a chance to share it on FB first. I'll get there eventually :-)

Anonymous said...

love the photo! certified stress buster. can i share it with my friends?