Hi! I am Dexter. Around here people know me as Dexter the Dog. That is to avoid confusing me with Dexter the cat. And believe me, no one wants to be confused with Dexter the cat, he is the clumsiest cat I have ever seen in my life. He stays with the Kumar family who moved next door last summer, but most of the time you would find him loitering around in our garden. In our house, I am the only official pet. Now there is this turtle that Jeremy has, but come on, it hardly moves a couple of inches a day. You can’t call it a pet. I would rather call it a hobby. By the way, it’s called King Lear, don’t ask me why? Jeremy named it. Yeah, Jeremy is the human of the house. He is the shortest one, just a little taller than me. Apart from him there are two more human’s in the house Joe and Jill. Joe is the tallest human in the house. Jill is almost as tall. She is the female human in the house.
Now it’s a bit tricky with these humans you see. They have it easy. They don’t have to spend hours trying to figure out their tail, nor do they have the responsibility of chasing pigeons or the cars. Joe leaves the house in the morning and comes back late at night, Jeremy leaves with Joe but Jill goes and gets him back in the middle of the day. I think they both spend time in some park relaxing on the grass. Jill spends her day either loitering around the house or lying on the couch in front of the TV. Never once has she helped me with the pigeons or the cars. I have to take complete responsibility of this tedious work assigned to me. And to top it all, I have to take care of a dim witted human that Jeremy is. Every day after Jill gets him back he comes out in the garden with his ball. But he is so stupid that he cannot hold on to his ball for more than a few moments. I don’t know how but he manages to get the ball as far away from him as possible. And I, being the responsible dog of the house that I am, have to run, creep, crawl to craziest of places to retrieve the ball. Every time, and I mean every time, that I give back the ball to Jeremy, I give him this stern, warning look which clearly says ‘Hold on to your ball now. If you lose it this time, I am not going to get it back for you.’ And yet immediately after I give him the ball back, like a moron, he throws it away.
I wonder what this family would do without me, and the Kumars as well. I have to take care of them too. Why didn’t they get a dog of the house like all normal humans? They had to go and get a cat, and that too the stupidest cat that they could find. He doesn’t even chew up the newspaper. Every morning I have to chew up our newspaper and then rush to the Kumars’ porch and chew up theirs before Mr.Kumar woke up. I tried telling Dexter the cat so many times that the humans like their morning news soft and chewed. Once Mr.Kumar enthusiastically gave me a pat on my back when he came to know I was the one doing the chewing for them. Their cat, my despicable namesake, just lounges in our garden.
Mr.Kumar is nice but I don’t like Mrs.Kumar much. She speaks very loudly and very fast. I wonder how Jill ever understands her. She sometimes drops by in the afternoon to take back the sugar that she had given to Jill. I wonder how much sugar Jill has borrowed from her as she is paying her back in bowls almost twice a week for months now. I hope we don’t lose our house because of this debt. I am sure the Kumars would take me in. The shorter female human in their house, Jassi, has some issues with me though. Every time she sees me she shouts loudly and tries to strangle me with something these humans call a ‘hug’.
There are so many humans and animals I have to introduce you to. There is Julliete whom Joe calls old hag and Jill calls mother. Then there is Mr.Johnson, the only human with hair below his nose (I wonder how he smells things) and Justin and Jenna, the young humans who stay across the road. I think Jenna is going to have human pups. Her belly has grown bigger in past few months. Then in animals you have Stevie the mouse who runs right across the middle of our garden and all, that lazy bum, Dexter the cat can move is his eyes as they follow Stevie from left to right and back. Stanley the duck who lives with Justin and Jenna and their cat Baby (seriously, who names their cat baby?). But Baby has an energizing effect on Dexter the cat. Whenever she lurks around you can see Dexter (not me, the cat) dancing on his back paws with a silly grin on his face.
Nothing much happens in this neighborhood, I handle the responsibility of chasing the cars successfully, Dexter the cat does nothing and thus stays out of trouble. Baby attracts some attention from rogue cats down the alley, especially the gang led by Batman, a black cat with white patch on one eye, but they don’t dare come around when I am near. Stevie runs around the neighborhood unchecked and Stanley the duck keeps dipping in the small pool Justin and Jenna have made for him. As far as the humans go, they are busy doing nothing the whole day. Sometimes Jenna, Mrs.Kumar and Jill get together at one of the houses and do a lot of whispering and giggling. But you can trust your friendly neighborhood dog reporter Dexter (the dog, the cat is a lazy bum), to keep you posted on anything new.
Signing out for now on Dog Day Diaries this is Dexter the Dog.
