Dogs (Tongue in Cheek . . . or Water Bowl, Face, Ear, etc.)

I learned something over the weekend at the 7th Annual Empire (MI) Asparagus Festival. Now, I know this "well-known" festival sets the trend each year for asparagus attire (really--attire) and food, but I didn't know that it also was THE place to be for dog owners.

YouTube Video of Weirdest Food Festivals

After spending several hours in downtown Empire highly anticipating the much promoted asparagus parade, I saw a new dog owner trend. And, yes, this was in between tastes of asparagus cuisine, one morsel after another. I did not partake in the asparagus beer and ice cream. No, this was not a float (maybe next year?); they were separate offerings.

While off and on nibbling/eating/gorging I saw what must have been hundreds of dogs. AND, the new trend of carrying your dog. I know people have carried their small dogs for eons likely since their domestication tens of thousands of years ago. I can hear the Australopithicus couple now, "Huny, u pik up Fido at hunt kamp?" "No, Spig, I ate him instead."

But, in these cases, these are medium dogs being carried in weird ways. Weird to me---not that there is anything wrong with carrying your dog in weird ways. (I carried a "C" average in a weird way one semester in college---it was weird . . . because I don't recall all of the details of that semester . . . for some reason.)

Here are some samples in order of descending weirdness.

OK, not really weird, but an example of frequency . . .

Weird . . .

Weird Front . . .












Weird Back . . .