Doghouse Chronicles

It was a quiet morning in the neighborhood. No one was about but a gigantic, red Shepherd mix named Choco, and a moving van full of humans.

In fact, that was the sole purpose of Choco’s outing this morning; To see if the humans had brought any one of the canine variety along.

Lately, he hadn’t had any luck in this department, because most humans only acquire dogs after they move into a new territory. And usually, they’re puppies, which made Choco’s job a lot harder than it should be. Not to say he was cruel, or mean to puppies in any way. No, in fact he rather liked them.

Their humans however, were another story.

Choco was easily the second-biggest dog in the neighborhood, only being beaten out by Percy, who was a Great Dane, and then only by a couple of inches.

Being this size, and looking rather fearsome was a blessing and a curse. A blessing, because no one really picked fights with him, or had any disagreements whatsoever with him. A curse, because, the humans feared him also.

Which was probably why he would usually be met with shouts and flying objects when he came near any canine under two years of age. That was a human’s way of getting territorial. To tell the truth, he couldn’t really blame them, he’d be scared too if he only had two legs to run on and no decent set of fangs.

But really, they had nothing to worry about, neither did any pups he came across. But for safety’s sake, he hoped that if these humans had brought along any dogs, that they were over the age of two.

Being the most giant dog in the neighborhood, one might think he was top Alpha. But that wouldn’t be true. Choco was most definitely in the Alpha’s pack, and he did have a purpose (which was why he was going on rounds today), but the big dog had never made it to top post. Mostly because he was too busy socializing to do so.

And this, was for the most part, his purpose. If a human brought in another dog from another territory, it was his job to go over and get acquainted, and then if the Alpha was interested enough, to set up a meeting between the two.

He loved the socializing part, but he never liked setting up meetings. A meeting with the Alpha was always stressful to say the least, because the Alpha was not what you would call social, but, that was part of the job description. He consoled himself with the fact that he had no say in how the Alpha treated the unfortunate ones.

Fortunately, for a dog it doesn’t take face-to-face contact to get acquainted with new neighbors. A dog can go purely by scent.

And there were two scents of interest at this particular house.

One, was a female, of nordic and herder descent, and the other was male, same descent, but maybe a slightly different breed. And right now, they were both locked in the garage.

“Well that’s just fine and dandy now, isn’t it?” he snorted. “I’ll have to come back later.” and really, it was for the best. Dog couldn’t really get acquainted with humans around, at least in Choco’s experience. Humans were very territorial, very jealous creatures.