Wilbur, you stink.

     Thursday night was a three-book night.  I had to prop three books against Wilbur's rear end to muffle the stench while he dozed on the couch next to me. Clara had dumped bolognese sauce down the sides of her booster seat.  I saw it when I lifted her out, but while I went for paper towels, she went for the carpeted stairs, hands and face coated in sauce.  Wilbur, ever the opportunist, took advantage of my dilemma.  He offered to clean up the sauce.  What it did to his poor doggie tummy I have no way of knowing, but it made his gas weapons-grade.
     "Wilbur, you and I need to have a talk.  Consider this an intervention.  You need to work on some sphincter control.  Yes, I still love you.  Yes, I will scratch behind your ears.  Oh, yes, scratchie-scratch.  Such soft ears."
     Thursday he had burst through his doggie door reeking of something foul.  Where did this smell come from?  I wandered the yard, looking for a squirrel carcass or a dead bird he may have rolled in.   It didn't help that my brother and sister-in-law had recently regaled me with tales of their dog Bandit's glandular secretions. All I could find in the yard was the Kiwi bird puppet he'd stolen from Clara's toy box and killed over and over.
     "And another thing.  This whole digging things up out of the backyard has got to stop.  That chunk of cow bone thing you excavated from the flowerbeds is not something a dog of your civilized status should be troubling himself with."
     A friend came to visit and sniffed his fur extensively.
     "He just smells like grass and dirt to me," she said.
     "You mean burst anal glands," I thought.
     Wilbur jumped up on her lap and put his nose inches from hers, panting softly.
     "It's his breath," she said, scratching under his collar.  "He has bad doggie breath.  I know where you can get some doggie breath chews that are flavored like filet mignon."
     "Filet mignon is not something I associate with good breath."
     "Oh, but he's such a good boy."
     "Yes, he is a good boy," I agreed. "Look at that soft tummy and those big, sad eyes. He's a real good boy."