His Dogness

It had dipped below freezing during the night. So, when I came upon His Dogness’s water bowl in the front yard at Sparkle Girl, Doobins and Garnet’s, the water inside was covered with a glaze of ice.

The pattern was especially beautiful so I took it inside to show everyone.

Garnet and Doobins were sitting on the couch. When I handed the bowl to Doobins, he looked at the ice for a moment then lifted his hand, poised for attack.

“Don’t do that,” I said. “I want to show it to Sparkle Girl.”

He didn’t even pause.

Poke. Poke. The beautiful ice pattern was gone forever.

“He’s a boy,” Garnet said.

As if on cue, Doobins said, “I like to break things.”

Because I’m a boy and I not only like to break things but also to stir things up, I sometimes deliberately mispronounce Garnet’s name.

It’s supposed to be pronounced so that it rhymes with “darn it.” Pronouncing it “Garnette” gets a rise out of her more often than not.

This I did later in the morning.

I was in the kitchen and Garnet and Sparkle Girl were reclining on the aforementioned couch in the living room. I called into the other room, “Is there anything I can do for you, Garnette?”

She didn’t say anything so I just figured she wasn’t taking the bait this time.

Later, I learned that Sparkle Girl had leaned over and whispered in Garnet’s ear, “Tell him, yes, he can stop calling you Garnette.”

Garnet said, “Nah, I’m not going to say that.”

“Go on, tell him to stop calling you Garnette,” said Sparkle Girl.

Still nothing.

So Sparkle Girl stood up, stuck her head in the doorway to the kitchen and said, “You can stop calling her Garnette.”

Then she went back to Garnet and said, “See how easy that was.”