Jo is my feisty senior citizen pup! She’s a head-strong and sweet Australian Cattle Dog. For those who know about cattle dogs she’s a Blue Heeler. Which means she’s black with white specs and a white cross-shaped blaze on the top of her head. She’s twelve now and we’ve had her since she was a year old. Needless to say she’s an institution in Milly’s Realm. Well we had some laughs this week over the care and feeding of my…um… shall I say…slightly spoiled pup.

After a hair-raising run through the Club…I suspect it was more hair-raising for the other shoppers than for me, I digress…I brought home a rotisserie chicken for dinner. Now I do one of two things with the drippings and leftovers from these plump and juicy chickens. One of which Jo wishes I did every time. I either make a rich broth (that’s not what Jo wants), or I use the drippings and little bits of meat that don’t make it to the plate to coat her dry kibble. Oh Yeah! Mama! That’s what she wants!

In the morning I feed her a serving of dry kibble with her hip & joint treat. In the evening I add a bit of something to her kibble. Mostly it’s a little homemade broth (from past chicken leftovers) or a teaspoon of peanut butter. Which is actually her favorite flavor.

Well thanks to plenty of broth in the freezer, Tuesday night was a Jo night for the drippings. Now this was an extra juicy bird blessing our table. Once we had our bird prepped, I put her serving of kibble in the bottom of the container. Then, I realized she was going to get sick on so many drippings. So I added another serving of kibble. After mixing it up I put half of the food in a container. At this point she’s dancing on her front paws waiting for dinner. She can just smell it!

After feeding her, I pick up the container of dog food realizing it looked a lot like the other containers of leftovers already in the fridge. Now leftovers in my home get used. We eat them for snacks and lunches. There’s also the infamous leftover night when we’re desperate for dinner. I’m thinking, I better warn the guys. They’d be sorely disappointed opening the container and finding kibble mixed with bits of chicken.

I track down the guys in their respective caves. I show them the container as I issue the warning. “These leftovers are for Jo. Don’t eat them they have dog food in them.” I got one okay from the dear husband who has long ago stopped questioning my motives.

Then I get why not’s from the two millennial males in the house. I answered both of them with the same statement. “Because Jo will be mad.” Now you must understand these sons will take the challenge from me (the Mom) but, they adore Jo like they should adore the family dog. They will not make Jo mad by taking her food bonanza!

The funny thing, is my first son comes out of his cave later, looking for leftovers rather than the standard dinner fare. He pulls the container with the dogfood out and says to me “This looks good.” I look at the container in his hand then, shake my head smirking. He starts to laugh as he puts it back and says, “But Jo would be mad.”

Second son said to me the next day he kept pulling the container out thinking it would be good to eat. Then, he realized he’d pulled Jo’s food and he’d better not. All in all Jo was happy to have her chicken drenched kibble two nights in a row.

Your protector of the dog’s foodstuffs,

Milly.