Ame and I are hosting a Dungeons & Dragons game at our place with a bunch of people that I’ve known through the years – all from my alma mater. I’ve mentioned Chad and Bobby before, but Dave and Matt and their wives have joined in as well.

I haven’t played or DM’d in awhile, so it’s a lot of fun. I’m running a 4th edition home-brew campaign and so far, the players are really liking it. Ame started off as the Dungeon Master, but I have since taken over duties and made the campaign my own.

The first week, Ame and I thought Snickers would be a big butthole and get in the way. In reality, he caused the least amount of trouble and people spilled their drinks on the floor at least three times. Eris wanted nothing to do with the whole group and sulked in the furthest corner she could find.

Since then, it’s been hard to get people together due to real life getting in the way, even when we try to hold it on Saturday. So far Ame, Chad, and Dave and his wife Traci are the core members. Matt and his wife have since dropped, not because they don’t do D&D, but they’ve moved quite far away to be practical.

This last session though was a blast: Under cover of darkness, my players infiltrated (ala Rambo: First Blood Part 2) and torched the bandit camp west of town and discovered the trapped, secret vault of treasure. Chad’s character, a druid named Elgar, brazenly walked into the main building and threw a Molotov cocktail at the guards and caught them all on fire. As that fire quickly spread, Traci’s cleric, Sam, blocked the door and wailed on them as they vainly attempted to escape.  Ame (Orianna) and Dave (Lyfe) have just discovered the vault of treasure that I’ve yet to roll up. They should hope I roll well!

These characters and players (except Chad) are all still new, so this whole bit of adventure should push them over the top to level 2. I hope they don’t find the treasure disappointing though – they are level 1 still after all. It shouldn’t too bad though, they’re all gamers (except Traci), so they should understand a level 1 treasure might not be the best, but should only get better.

Of all things, it was dog crap.

Last Thursday, I was driving back home from taking Ame to work, and there was this smell. It was bad, but it wasn’t totally awful. Just… every now and then, I’d get a whiff of it. I thought it was this little jacket that I wear a lot had gotten smelly over time, and it just needed a good laundering. In an effort at narrowing down the smell, I wore a different jacket to school. The smell continued.

What the hell was it? Where was it coming from? Was it the car that smelled? I parked the car and went to class. After a few minutes of class, there it was again. Oh god, it was me. Good thing I had already taken a seat in the back away from other students. I got home and had a very good shower and put on all new clothes.

On the way to pick Ame up from work it was there again! Well what the fuck. The jacket hypotheses came back. I suspected the cat had goo’d all over these garments and made ‘em smell bad. The solution at this point is to dry-clean the jackets.

Then, Friday morning at work, it was there again. I wasn’t even wearing a jacket. I know my chair smells of farts, and sometimes when I reposition or sit down a little roughly, some ancient farts of the Navaronne come out to haunt me, but this was that smell. My right shoe, there it was. Poop at least 36 hours old. Why hadn’t I noticed it immediately when I stepped in it? Gross. After a good scraping with a pen I’d never use into the trash can that isn’t mine, the smell is mostly gone. I don’t recommend taking a big, (un)healthy whiff of my shoe: The smell is still there as well as my nostrils.

I want to blame Snickers, but I don’t know if it’s his or even canine. Oh well. Shit happens. HAHAHAHAH. sorry…

Snickers is a loveable dog, he really is. He just does things that are gross. Most notably, he eats his own and the cat’s poop. Whenever I take him outside to do his doggie-business, it’s a race to the finish with him. The apartment complex management puts out little doodie kiosks from which cheap plastic bags are dispensed, complete with trash cans at their base after business has concluded. I almost have to dive in for the kill with one of these flimsy bags to get to the poop before the dog does.

This is ridiculous!

Why should I have to fight the dog for his poop. Obviously I’m only reinforcing the behavior by acting so excitable when he poops. This tells him that the poop is worth something, and, being a dog, he then must have to have it more than anyone else! He performs, what I call the poop-whirlwind. Snickers doesn’t poop in one place. He’ll pop a squat and then meander around, still in a squatting position. This poop-whirlwind allows him to lay a circular pattern of droppings and continue to poop, all while he eats it. To bolster the technique’s effectiveness, he spins with his butt away from me so I cannot see what he leaves, if anything. I have to assume he has, so I investigate. All the while he has already (*) left another prize for himself in which he will happily partake.

Fortunately for me, I firmly believe my sense of sight is better than this poor dog’s sense of smell – and I wear glasses. It’s sad though really. I think it’s an effect of his upbringing, and it’s all here and the links therefrom. Ame attributes his poop-eating habit to the conditions of his life before living with us, but I know better: He’s a dog. I digress, but I can see six feet away, even in the dark, better than he can sniff out his quarry from mere inches.

The best is when I defeat him and get all the nuggets he leaves. Bad is when I know he beats me to one or more. The worst is when I’m not sure if he gets any or not. I shiver in disgust as I write this, but would you want a dog with maybe-poop on his tongue? At least when I know he gets one I know to tell Ame, “don’t let the dog lick you!” Sometimes she’ll ask me and all I can say is “I dunno…”

Another similar and fun (read: gross) thing he does is eats the cat’s poop. Eris poops in a litter-box like most indoor cats, and when nobody’s looking and the laundry room is accessible, Snickers usually pilfers some litter-covered poop. The latest few times I’ve caught him, he just digs out the turds and places them in cachés. For later I guess? Who knows…

* It was at this point – not before, no no! – I realized I was making a post all about a dog who eats his own shit. Not in the planning phases, not in the ‘twinkle-in-my-eye’ phase… No. During.