Gerret Swirled

Okay, you see that dog? Not the one in the foreground, that's The Gerret. I mean the other one. In the movie. Up on the big screen. That's Marley, trying to teach his roommate how to go for a walk. Can the ridiculous get any more sublime? That dog is Marley and I'm here to tell you about him.

As you might surmise, today The Gerret is doing a review of the soon-to-be-released-on-DVD-internationally-acclaimed movie "Me and Marley," or, as it's referred to in various human venues, "Marley and Me."

Now why, you ask, would The Gerret be reviewing a soon-to-be-released-on-DVD movie? Simple. Some marketing dude named Scott sent me a free copy if I'd talk about it on my blog. I'm a dog. I'll do anything for a treat.

So here's the scoop. This movie deals with a dog named Marley, played as an adult by Clyde whom you might remember from his star turn as Fabian's dog in the 2002 TV mini-series "Dog Days."

Marley is basically a normal dog that does what normal dogs do. He chews things up, barks at strangers, greets friends with chest bumps, poops in the ocean, farts, runs joyfully all over when not restrained and hates lightning. No big deal. You've seen it a hundred times, right?

But what happens when this normal dog ends up living with two very neurotic, high-strung, undisciplined, unneutered humans? See? Now you have the makings of a searing story of drama and sacrifice.

The humans are played by relative newcomers Owen Wilson (the voice of Lightning McQueen in "Cars") and Jennifer Aniston (Jeannie Bueller in the TV series version of "Ferris Bueller"). Aniston is the meaner of two, as she tries throughout the movie to starve Marley to death, screaming at one point, "How many times have I told you not to leave anything edible where he [Marley] can get it?"

Unfortunately, there are long stretches of the movie that focus more on Wilson and Aniston than on our hero Marley. And because the two were never spayed and neutered they keep having babies, and of course anyone familiar with the Human Society literature knows what a terrible problem that creates.

But there are also moments of levity, and, dare I say, eroticism. This NSFW moment is why I'm not letting Maggie watch this until she's older, but hey, when you see that chemistry between Kathleen Turner and Marley it's hard to call it anything less than cinematic genius.

But I ramble. The bottom line is that this movie is great because it isn't based on a graphic novel and Clyde delivers an Oscar Mayer-worthy performance in the role of Marley right up to the end when he (***Spoiler Alert***) dies. (***Spoiler Alert over***) It could have been stronger if Marley had been given a love interest, but I guess the director was trying to avoid making a romantic comedy. At least we'll always have that tender moment of lust-in-the-sand with Kathleen Turner.

If you're looking for DVD extras, well this DVD has 'em. Of course there's some major Gag Reel stuff, which is typical of any movie with humans in it, but the coop-de-grass is the moment when Clyde, caught on camera, had just had it with the incompetent crew and pees all over the set. Shades of Christian Bale! A genuine DogTube moment!

In addition to the regular DVD movie, there's also a "Two-disc Bad Dog Edition," which I guess is longer than the first one, and even a "Three-disc Bad Dog Edition," which must be the 24-hour art-house version. And if you don't have electricity, there's the original book, or if you need something to keep that broken coffee table from falling over there's the hardcover book. And finally, if you're almost blind like Chigger, you can get the audiobook version, but I don't have a link for that. Click on the book link and you'll be able to track it down.

So what's the verdict? The Gerret, as always, easily impressed, just has to give "Me and Marley" four-and-a-half Gerrets.

Me and Marley:

The Gerret hasn't been writing much lately. I been going through one of those existential dark-night-a-the-soul things. Been listening to a lot of Nietzsche, Camus, Sartre, Snoopy et al. on audio books. Not much help. With the exception of Snoopy they all seem more concerned with human existence, and we all know how that turns out.

I was thinking it might be my mid-life crisis, but Chigger just snorted and said, "Keep going on like that and it'll be an end-of-life crisis for your sorry butt. It ain't a mid-life crisis you little turd, it's about a sixteenth-of-a-life crisis and that don't count for nothing." Then she farted one of those really bad old-dog farts. Gross.

So okay, maybe I'm just having some teen angst. Or maybe it's heartworms. But hey, at least I used to get just a little respect around here.

I mean look at The Gerret in that photo at the top - happy, relaxed and way cooler than doofus Maggie sitting next to me. That was last summer, when I pwn'd Maggie and she was basically my size. I ran, she followed. I barked, she cowered. I barfed, she licked it up.

Now look at this picture from just recently. It's like the doofus has been on DGH or something. It's a freak show. It's just not natural how big she is.

[Maggie: "To paraphrase Norman Desmond, 'I AM big. It's The Gerret that got small.'"]

How can I tolerate this humiliation? She eats my lunch. She drinks my milkshake. She knocks me over in front of guests. (And she still licks up my barf.) I even heard Chigger refer to us "Kip and Lafawndah" the other day.

Kip and LaFawndah! I mean when did Chigger ever sit through Napoleon Dynamite? She's like 86 in dog years. She's blind in one eye, she don't hear so good and she let's those terrible old-dog farts. And she's disrespecting me with Napoleon Dynamite references? Next thing you know she'll be writing "all your base are belong to us" in the mashed potatoes. Sheesh.

To be continued

Hi! It's me! Maggie! Again!!! It's like my birthday today! I'm a big girl now! No more puppy dog food for this teenager! And I'm sooooo super jazzed!!!! Because The Gerret is like soooo jealous and all up in my grill! What-evah! I used to think he was cool, but sometimes he's just soooo dorky!

Anyway, I've been like working on my first movie! Yes! Me making a movie! It's all done and it's totally awesome!!! It's called "Pup Fiction"!!! It's sorta like that other movie only different! Of course because I'm still the kid around here I had to use like the really really really old equipment. It soooo super sucks! It really blows chunks!!! So don't get all Ebert on me! Just chill out and enjoy it!! It stars yours truly and the other dog! And remember! It's my birthday!!!

Okay, so we got this new rooster named Wooster (or Worcester?) hanging around. He's still just a kid, and so young you'd have to get real up-close-and-personal to actually determine for yourself if he was a guy or a girl. But for some reason he's soooo important. You know how I know? Because he comes with his very own admonition. It goes something like this, "Ger-RET! Stop chasing the rooster!" There's often a couple of other words in front of "Gerret" that are repeated in front of "rooster" and that seem to be references to some human belief system that can provoke cosmic retribution, but they don't translate into dog so I ignore them.

In fact, at first I ignored the entire admonition because they never said "THE Gerret" so I assumed they were talking to some other Gerret. But when I politely inquired, "Are you talking to moi?" the answer was most demonstratively in the affirmative.

So that's where it stands right now. I chase, they admonish, Wooster (or Worcester?) runs like a chicken. I'm thinking that if I hold out they'll change their minds, because hey, it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks, right? Which segues nicely into the real theme of my post. The Gerret is officially post-puppytude! I'm now the old dog that doesn't have to learn new tricks! It's been pretty much seven dog years ago that Stump and Tweet came to the county lock-up, posted my bail and sprung me from the joint. (Yes, "Roscoe" was my prison name, but I was nobody's bitch. And I'll be getting to that "German Shepherd/Spaniel mix" stuff soon.)

And there ain't no way they're takin' me back. Now I got a warm place to sleep and one square a day. So who knows, maybe The Gerret will learn not to chase roosters. Just maybe. Cause I like it here. (But then I also like chickens. Fried chickens, barbeque chickens, roasted chickens, broiled chickens, boiled chickens, broasted chickens, original recipe chickens, stir-fried chicken, popcorn chickens, chicken tartar, chicken sushi, chicken nuggets, chicken casserole, chicken salad, chicken-fried steak and all those various wild animals that taste like chicken. Chicken aspic, not so much.)

It sometimes seems like Chigger is the only one around here who can stay focused. And these days she's verging on seriously grim. Today she wrote "35 human days until Barney vacates the Casa Blanca" in her dog food and then gave out one of those silent-but-deadly farts that only a dog who's been practicing for thirteen-and-a-half years can master. (It's a skill that The Gerret can only aspire to one day.) Yesterday she wrote "36 human days..." and the day before that it was "37 human days..." and on and on, like some sort of dog-autistic obsession.

So I says to her in a light-hearted fashion so as to brighten the surrounding atmosphere in which we both participated, "Hey Chigger, I didn't know you spoke Spanish."

Slowly she turned, step-by-step, inch-by-inch she approached me. She focused her one good eye on me in steely fashion, then squinted and coldly replied in a voice just barely louder than a whisper, "Don't get smug with me you little cat-turd eatin' mutt. I've lived through nearly 56 dog years of Barney this and Barney that. It's Barney-cams every Christmas and Barney-in-the-Rose-Garden every summer. Meanwhile football-player-induced dog-on-dog violence goes unchecked, foreign dog food is poisoning us, Presidential candidates are driving around with dogs on the roofs of their cars and a beagle wins the Westchester Dog Show. You hear me, a BEAGLE! Our entire species has become a laughing stock. It will take generations to undo the damage."

With that she pointed me to the following video and puked.

First I cleaned up the puke, a bold and boisterous gumbo of squirrel guts and roadside french fries with the delicate aftertaste of some kind of wild animal poop I just couldn't quite but my finger on. Then I watched the video.

(*"What You See Is What They Want You To See" from "Chiggerpedia")

Chigger is all over my butt to share this with y'all. She's gettin' on in years, especially dog years, and she normally doesn't get riled about much of anything excepting when The Gerret or Maggie gets too close to her food bowl before she's decided she's had enough. Other than that she likes to laze around and stare out the window with her good eye and bark at stuff that isn't there which gets me and Maggie all wound up and we blast outside through the dog door and bark like crazy and chase around the house a couple of times and stand out front and bark a couple more times for good measure just in case whatever Chigger saw is still within earshot and then we come racing back in and Chigger's curled up on the floor with what I swear is a smirk on her face and one of our dog chews between her paws.

Anyway, apparently she has some history with Barney, the White House dog. Not my problem, but you can see here and here and here that back in the day Chigger and Woody (rip) had a bit of an obsession.

Seems that recently Barney lost control and blew his cover. Yaaaawnnn. Just another boomer dog turning senile if you ask The Gerret. Chigger sees it all a bit more sinister-like. As she likes to say, "You can put lipstick on a Palin, but it's still a Palin."

Fo shizzle my nizzle, that Michael Felps dude don't have a clue what to do when he gets near a swimming pool in the summer time. You don't see The Gerret thrashing through the water, am I right? Ain't a gold medal in the world that tastes as good as some left over hamburger from the ol' barbecue grill. There'll be time enough for swimming after I'm too old to seriously scavenge the paper plates. When folks invites The Gerret over for a pool party, they expects no less. Piece out.

There's been some rumbling behind my butt lately that The Gerret is a bit of an elitist who's not all that in touch with the more, ah, "working class" animals around here. It's been suggested that I think I'm better than everyone else, that I think that everyone else's shit doesn't stink as good as mine.

So? What can I say? There's a reason my middle name is Alpha.

However, as Chigger has pointed out, this has created a bit of a dilemma for me, since not all the other animals recognize the reality of their lives relative to the reality of The Gerret and sometimes fail to exhibit the appropriate approbation. And yet I so desire to be a benevolent despot.

So after studying the lives of contemporary politicians, I've come up with a plan to win the hearts and minds of my constituents. I will pander.

To do this I'm initiating an occasional feature here called "Profiles Encourage" [them to like me]. I will flatter them. They will share their food with me. Pure genius. Today's profile is on Jane.

Jane is a chicken. She's been around here since before The Gerret was bored. Actually she's what they call an Easter Egg chicken because she lays blue and green eggs. (You have to take that with a grain of salt. They may be blue or green on the outside, but they're still white and yellow on the inside.)

Anyway, every day when Stump leaves the house to go to the office, Jane tags along, waits for the door to open. Then she goes inside, jumps up on the desk, finds her box in the corner and sits there, sometimes for hours, until she lays an egg. Pretty weird, but here's proof. Pay attention and you'll here the egg drop and see it roll around.

Argh. The Gerret has to admit that after that display I'm sorta glad I don't have to lay eggs.

Well, it's been a long busy week here at Lake Whoabethegerret.

Whinehouse stuck around for a few more days since the last post then split. She was looking a lot better after a few good meals and sneaking in through the dog door to crash on the sofa at night. But she wasn't going to be tied down, no way no how. I'm not sure running off was the best choice for her, but I wish her well. Maybe she'll find her puppies.

On the other hand, Slippers, the kitten, looks like she's planning on staying. Actually, it turns out that Slippers is a boy so The Gerret is taking some heavy-duty grief from the fellas down at the dog park who saw this picture in the last post. How was I to know? Really?

In her last post Maggie did briefly mention the six new chicks that had just arrived. Well that's been a bit of drama in itself. About the middle of the week one of the chicks disappeared, and soon after another one. There was much speculation and innuendo around the place that yours truly and Maggie had something to do with said population decrease. Accusations were flying and the atmosphere was becoming very, how you say, acrimonious. Stump and Tweet tried to make us 'fess up but The Gerret don't cop to nothin'. But I think they were using the ol' water torture on Maggie. She was pretty much ready to turn state's evidence. She hates water.

So just when it looks like Maggie and I are going to have to change our names to Connie and Blyde and go on the lam, Stump goes out to the chicken coop and discovers that now there's only THREE chicks plus one REALLY FAT SNAKE.

All along it was SLIM! That connivin' varmint! You might remember Slim from his starring role in "Snake on a Plain." Now he's just another celebrity gone bad, driven to self-destruction by a habit he couldn't control. Stump captured him and drove him way into the woods and released him. The Gerret went along to yell at him and tell him to not come back. Is he dead? No. But his career is finished in this town.

Three chicks hanging out, doing nothing.

This was also graduation week over at K9 Prep & Neuter. Maggie finished up puppy kindergarten and Tweet said she did real good. But her final grade was a 4.0, which if that's in dog grades, is really really low.

The Gerret was doing post-dogtoral work in the three "R"s, which is a class called "Really Reliable Recall." The whole point of RRR is to train your human to carry lots of very high quality treats at all times or else you won't come when they call. I was skeptical, but by the end of the seven-week class Stump seemed to have the fancy treat thing down cold. Now I just have to keep working with him here at home so he doesn't start backsliding. Sometimes he'll call The Gerret and think he can get by with a "good dog" or a pat on the head when I show up. Sheesh. You can't let bad habits like that get started.

But it's not all fun-and-games around here. The Gerret still gotta go to work. (Funny. I never see the cats having to go to work around here. What's that about?)

So anyway, this week I finished editing my evaluation video for the second installment of "For Dogs on a Budget." This was shot a while ago but because of all the film festivals and legal stuff I'm only now free to release it here. You can learn more about the series in this earlier post. And yes, that's Maggie acting as my assistant.

So granted it's not colorful as most store-bought dog toys, but there's just as much plastic, so I'm given the water bottle four gerrets!

Water bottle as toy:

And that's it from Lake Whoabethegerret, where all the people are lazy, the cats are annoying, and The Gerret is waaaaaay above average.

Hi! Maggie here again!! Things are just soooo busy around here!!!! I can't even keep up! Gosh it's been more than ten dog weeks since I wrote anything! Duh!!! You probably figured that out on your own!

But hey, we got new animals hanging around!!! It's soooo cool! That first picture, that's Slippers, she's a kitten, or maybe she's a he, what-evah!!! Slippers is awesome!!! Sooooo teeny-tiny! Slippers showed up on the road by our farm! She was with four brothers and sisters, but they wouldn't come and now we can't find them!!! Major bummer!! But Slippers loves it here!

But wait!!! That's not all! We also have Whinehouse visiting thanks to Gerret! Stump saw Whinehouse on the road twice but couldn't get anywhere near her, even though she didn't have any place else to go! But Gerret was along for the ride, so that after they got home the second time, Gerret ran off on his own, and a couple of hours later he returned with Whinehouse!!!! Totally awesome! My hero!!! (He's sooooo dreamy!)

Whinehouse is an older dog but a really really really tiny one! She's older than me but I could still play house with her as the baby! Har!!! And speaking of babies, Stump says that Whinehouse looks like she recently had some babies! But where are they? We looked and looked and looked but it seems that whoever brought Whinehouse out to the road didn't bring the baby puppies along!! Maybe that's why Whinehouse keeps going away and coming back! She's probly looking for her puppies!!! That's what I'd do! Awesome!!! But sad!

I call her Whinehouse because she stands outside and whines and then she sneaks through the dog door at night and sleeps in the house!!! She doesn't trust Stump and Tweet, so she hides during the day, but she comes back at night to eat and sleep!! Stump says she's probly a "puppy-mill dog" that's "outlived her usefulness" and "never been socialized with humans" whatever that means!! But we feed her and she's hanging around so maybe she'll be something else next!

I just don't know what it is with these humans around here!!! They take their cats and dogs out for a drive, let them out to run around, and then they forget to take them with them when they leave!!! Geez, it even happened to me!! I just hate it when that happens!! Bummer!

And speaking of bummers, that Slippers better watch herself or she's going to be sooooo sorry!! She's flirting with Gerret and that's just totally not awesome!!! He better get that dreamy look off his face or I'm going to have to kick his butt!! And I can! You believe it sistahs!!! But I gotta go!! Yours truly!!!

P.S. - I didn't even mention the awesome new chicks we have!!! Too late now!!! Later!!!