Betty's Piece of Ass

As I was unpacking the holiday decorations, I came across the this (at right): A plush Santa’s butt ornament. Now who the hell would give us that and why would I save it?

(I suspected my mom, but a Facebook posting query revealed it was not. I still don’t know where it came from.)

I set the ornament on the coffee table, took a photo of it, and left the room. Within a few minutes the ornament was gone. Betty our dog had snagged it and put it in her bed.

“Aw, how cute! She’s decorating her bunk!” I said.

So there the offending stuffed Santa butt sat for a week. Occasionally I’d find it in another place in our bedroom, the room where Betty also sleeps, indicating she played with it.

Last night around midnight I was awakened by Betty rustling in the room. She’s been doing that lately: getting up to get a drink from her bowl and playing with toys briefly before trying to get back into our bed. Groggy, I just let her play. I dozed off but was awakened again by three strange, low mechanical tones. The sounds were flat and almost sounded like a bark. I thought to myself, “Was that Betty? Is she bark/talking?” I was half asleep, so a talking dog seemed possible.

Now I can barely see in broad daylight, my vision is so poor. In the dark, I’m blind without my glasses; I can’t even read the alarm clock that is six inches from my face. I peered down at her and could make out her whole body wiggling around and going to town on some toy.
“Betty, drop it and come back to bed,” I whispered. She would not even turn around. I put my head back down and shut my eyes. That’s when I heard the sound of organized notes from a musical toy, but not exactly a song. “What the fuck is that?!” I said. None of Betty’s toys make that noise. I wouldn’t purchase anything like that for this very reason: I don’t want to be awakened by nocturnal dog play.

I peered again into Betty’s bunk and I saw her with the Santa’s butt toy deep into her mouth so that only the boots and legs were sticking out of her muzzle. Then I heard the unmistakable notes of “Deck the Halls” rendered by fart noises. Truly the most horrible sound. And, very uncharacteristically, Betty refused to drop the offending toy. I pulled and pulled it from her, and the farting tune just kept going. She tried to run away with it and I knew I was going to have to chase her and perhaps bribe her with a treat to drop it. But I sat up too fast, and my vertigo sent me reeling and stumbling to the floor, scaring Betty into dropping the godforsaken toy from her mouth.

I scooped it up and shoved it in the nightstand. Betty sat by the nightstand whining for a while.
“Go back to sleep Betty. Christmas isn’t for another few weeks.”