I don’t know where we get the phrase, ‘a dog worrying a bone’.  It’s something about speaking English, but if you need a guy to worry without worrying, Sparky’s your man.

It’s good for Sparky to have his own hobbies and interests.  He is devoted to me in the sense that he likes to have someone around to appreciate his charm, and I’m the only other person here.  It comforts me to know that when I’m not here, Sparky has activities that he does just for himself.

The bully stick to the right and behind Moose, is the chew stick Sparky and I were screwing around with three days ago.   The bully stick he is chewing on, magically appeared a couple of hours ago.

A fresh bully stick is brownish, and looks roasted.  In size, shape and color, it closely resembles those long pretzel sticks that I haven’t seen in a decade or two.  Who the hell used to hand those out?  It’s like they were stale when you bought them.  The only good thing is they were covered in road salt.  The other good thing was a fella could act like he was smoking a cigar with one of them big pretzels.  

The bully sticks look like a big pretzel, but without the road salt.  Somehow, even without the salt, the bully stick looks more appealing then a giant pretzel. 

Either I’m getting worse or Tractor Supply is getting better, but most of Sparky’s treats look tasty.  The Blue Buffalo Grillers might go great with honey barbecue sauce.  His Milkbone Soft and Chewy Minis seem to be Chips AHOY Big and Chewy chocolate chip cookies, without the chocolate chips and in the shape of a dog bone.  His Retriever Twists look to be bacon wrapped around something inoffensive, kind of like a two-dimensional version of Rumaki.   Even the dental chews look indistinguishable from Spanish churros, but made out of sweet potatoes rather than donuts.

The best thing about churros y chocolate, was always the chocolate  If I had some, I’d eat a dental chew. The sweet potato kind, not the mint flavor.

No, you don’t understand.  Typical chocolate treats are never as good as they look.  Tootsie Rolls only exist to passive-aggressively show contempt for someone by giving them candy.  Chocolate fudge is all hat and no cattle.  It looks so deep and rich, but tastes like tooth decay and cavities.  Chocolate pudding should just be called ‘brown flavored’.   

The Spanish screw up a lot, but the chocolate in churros y chocolate is as thick, rich and intensely chocolaty as you could wish for.  Like Aunt Monica’s brownies, it delivers on the promise.  No bullshit about carob, or olive oil or any concession to health, because you are going to have a churro y chocolate, a shot of Anisette, then crawl over a guard rail and run with the bulls. 

The point is, when old people start eating pet food, is it because they are destitute or do they just give in to temptation?  Since they are retired, if pet food gives them the shits, they can ride it out at home.  Maybe it’s convenience.  Tuna salad sounds good for lunch, but do I really want to chop up celery?  Light chunk tuna or white albacore?  It’s overwhelming.  Crackers and Fancy Feast sounds easier.  They couldn’t call it ‘fancy’ if it didn’t taste good to somebody.

All except for rawhide rolls.  Those petrified Olive Garden bread sticks aren’t for eating.  I have two left.  Maybe I’ll use them to make nunchucks.

I was worried when Sparky showed up with a fresh bully stick.  Sparky is a delight, but he can be merciless in pursuit of food.  I did go into the solarium to check to see if the bag had fallen to the floor.  It would be just like Sparky to chew through the bag, then parade around with a fresh bully stick to advertise his prowess in acquiring food.

The bag was intact.  I can only guess that Sparky was making his bed, and found the bully stick in the crack, next to his mattress.  Maybe it was left over from Rusty’s time with us.  We went through a lot of hard chew treats back then.  I’m baffled.