A Day in the Life (of Ruby)

I don't know how many of you know me, but my name is Ruby. I belong to Chris. I don't know if you've met him, but I'm sorry if you haven't. He is the smartest, kindest, best-smelling, funniest, most giving and handsome human I have ever known. I had always dreamed of living out my days in the passenger seat of his Jeep, eating beef jerky, road-tripping, and listening to Led Zeppelin.

This was until he met "her".

She came along almost three years ago and at first she seemed okay. But then she started coming over more often. I disliked a lot of things about her.

What I couldn't take was that she took my human's time.

It wasn't too bad when she was his girlfriend. In fact, I could have dealt with just her. But then she got the furry creature I will refer to as a "step-sister". The step-sister is loud. She's smelly. She licks my face even though I frequently tell her I hate it when she does that. She eats like she'll never see food again and she drinks all of the water before I get to it. For a long time I was the alpha female, until we got into an argument and I hurt my foot. She's been the alpha female for over a year now, at least in her mind. I just feel the fight isn't worth it.

I hate Virginia. It's hot. It rains a lot. The main floor is all wood, and I fall a lot for some reason. (Usually on purpose to make it look like the evil stepmother pushed me.) My human is gone all day so I'm always stuck with the evil stepmother and stupid stepsister. The evil stepmother won't take me on walks and claims it is because I always get tired at the furthest point from the house and because I always decide to take a giant crap right in front of people. I admit she's partially right, my favorite thing to do when people tell me I'm pretty is taking a giant dump in front of them. It's my way of showing humans that they don't know everything.

I also hate that I'm not allowed in the kitchen. At our old house, I used to be able to go into the kitchen and grab whole sandwiches off of the table AND the island counter. It was amazing; I never had to eat crummy dog food or wait for leftovers. Once, I even ate fourteen crepes off of the table while the family was at church. I'm telling you, I had it made at the old house. Here, not so much. I'm not sure how the evil stepmother put up the invisible shield but I am positive that one day I will break through it.

My evil stepmother finally got off her butt and found herself a job. I was really glad until I realized it meant I would be in the kennel for eight hours a day. My evil stepsister is used to it but it's not my cup of tea. Apparently the neighbor girl (who is sweet and naive and believes I am a nice dog) is going to be coming over to let us out. From what I understand, the evil stepmother works in a place called Fredericksburg at a nursing home. She seems really excited, so that's great.

She's gone a lot, so that's great.

Except that when she got home today, the stupid one peed all over the floor with excitement.

I do enjoy watching her clean.

This is also why I have begun pooping on only the sidewalk. It really gets a rise out of the evil one. I even tried to do it on the deck the other day, but actually got into a lot of trouble for that one. The evil one also seems to care for her garden a lot, so I have begun chewing on the corn plants I can reach, swallowing them, and then vomiting it back up.

It's the little things that make me happy.