Oh Arty McFartenstein

Why? Why do I miss this big slobbery pain in the ass? Arthur. He lived with us for 3 years and was our first love. He can best be described as a overgrown baby with a penchant for garbage eating and occasional bouts of bravery.

Don't ever leave a pound and a half of ground beef to defrost on your countertop with Arthur in the house, or you'll come home to bits of styrofoam strewn everywhere and think,"Styrofoam...what the hell? .....Ohhhhhh"

This one time [at band camp] when we lived in a quiet suburb of Denver in this great neighborhood where every third house was a repeat (kind of like Paperboy. Nintendo, anyone?) our precious first baby ran away. Someone, and I'm not naming names, ahem...husband..left the gate open at 10:30 at night, and our baby was goody goody GONE. We searched that damn field behind our house with flashlights and fears of being attacked by coyotes. The coyotes were so prevalent in Colorado, that my beloved Grandma, who lived in the hardcore section of Jersey City, once suggested that I get a pistol. Because, you know, a coyote might break in the kitchen window while I'm on the phone with my daughter and then I'll have to say, "Hold on a second honey, a coyote is breaking into my kitchen window. I'll have to call you back."

So great was our love for our Arty McFarty that, despite our fears, we braved the coyotes and pissed off all our neighbors in the process by repeatedly shrieking "ARRRRTHHHUURRR???" into the darkness. We returned to walk the sidewalks once more, desperately calling our babies' name, when miraculously he appeared; bounding towards us with unbridled joy. It seems our Harvard-bound wonder child had been sitting on the identical front porch of the house 3 lots down waiting to be let in our neighbors front door.

While we eventually had to give you up for adoption to Lennie's parents - which by the way now makes you my brother-in-law instead of my son - I still miss you. Mostly because your forehead smells so good when I kiss it, and because you manage to bend your wiggly body in half when you're happy to see me. Even though you really thought baby Sayde was going to take you for a walk when she crawled over to pick up your leash, and even though you only gave us 10 seconds warning that you had to PEE RIGHT NOW before you went incontinent in a trail through the house, I still miss you. Dumbass.