After nearly two weeks of taking pain pills and sleeping most of the time, star JOTR columnist Peppermint Patti underwent surgery today for her blown knee. We presume she twisted her left hind leg in pursuit of one of those arrogant creatures Patti refers to as “brush-butts.” She has been kind of taciturn about the actual circumstances. Anyway, the surgeon said she severed her anterior cruciate ligament. It has been repaired and the knee strengthened. We are told Patti is in good spirits, and we can pick her up tomorrow. She will need several weeks of recuperation and no squirrel chasing. Needless to say, Patti has not felt much like writing her column in the last couple weeks. But she is a prolific little dog, and I found some unpublished columns of hers, written before her injury. Here is one that hits the bush-tails right where they live. — Ed.
By Peppermint Patti
JOTR Columnist
I have it on good authority, Sophie, that brush-butts are in fact ground-huggers. They came in from the West after the two-legged walkers cut down all the trees and drove out the tree-dwelling plume-tails.
What that means, Sophie, is that our brush-butts or bush-butts or whatever you want to call them don’t really like living up high. They prefer good old terra firma.
That is, frankly, wonderful news to me. It enhances my joy ever so much more when I drive one of those nervy good-for-nothing bird-seed robbers back aloft where they are not happy to be.
You see, Sophie, plume tails were put here for our amusement.
I know it may not seem that way when they start heckling us.
Hear that?
Dog, is she one mad plume-tail.
But note how she’s keeping out of our way.
That shows the power of a good sharp bark and a fast chase to the tree.
That one who’s chattering so crazy is the same one I nailed this morning. Look closely at her butt, Sophie. See that notch in the fur? That’s where I had her dead to rights.
Well, Sophie, I’ll tell you what happened. The female two-legger came out yelling at the squirrel.
What do you mean, yelling at me?
Why would a two-legger yell at a dog who was doing her duty as she saw it, which was to extirpate evil.
Brush-butts ARE evil, Sophie. Believe me. Hear her nattering away? Is that not evil incarnate?
As I say, the female two-legger came out and sowed confusion through the yard.
Tactically, it was a foolish move. If she’d wanted that plume-tush to get away, she couldn’t have devised a better method.
The trouble with two-leggers, Sophie. Oh well, don’t get me going. I could spend all afternoon yammering on the trouble with two-leggers.
Suffice it to say that in this instance, the two-legger’s idea of extirpating evil was to break through my concentration.
I had my jaws on the brush-butt’s tail, and the little flea-bag wasn’t going anywhere. She was lunch — my dejeuner, if you please.
When out comes the two-legger, arms flailing, barefoot, bellowing–
Well, yes, I assume she wanted me to bag the plume-haunch. Why else come out in such excitement?
It’s what two-legged hunters call “buck fever,” Sophie. My two-legger was so excited at thought of squirrel stew that she couldn’t contain herself. And in all her high-strung histrionics, she blew my chance of catching one.
No, Sophie, I cannot imagine a situation wherein a two-legger might not want to eat brush-butt stew.
It is indeed a frustration. Now we have to live with that brush-butt’s high and mighty attitude.
But I derive some satisfaction from the experience, Sophie. Look sharp — watch the plume twitch. See the daylight? She’s got an empty spot on her tail, grace a moi.
Let that be a lesson to all brush-butts everywhere that they can run, they can chatter, but they cannot hide from Peppermint Patti. They’d best stay high in the trees, where — as we all know — they do not like to be.
