The One-Eyed Dog Who Watches TV

By Mary McKinley

Happy News Citizen Journalist

I have a dog, Holly, free from a dog breeder. She is a full-bred brown and white Crocker who had been in a kennel. She was four years old. Holly is a special dog due to some children shooting one of her eyes out with a BB gun in an accident. The veterinarian told me that Holly would require that medication is put in her eye to keep down the inflammation and someday the eye would have to be removed.

When I was given that information I figured I could be a good owner to her because I teach special education to children. I was used to disabilities in students so why not a dog? I am also hearing impaired. So it was easy to accept a dog with a health disability.

Holly may be less than perfect, but she has a characteristic that makes her more unusual than her strange looking eye. She loves television. She watches TV for hours and will whine when she wants the channel changed. I have never figured out why she likes one program over another. She even has her own ideas about which films are acceptable.

She loves Western films. The more gun fights, horses, and noise the better. However, if a love scene comes on she slinks off to her bed behind my chair, and will only reappear when the bullets, horses or cattle come back on. I have a big screen television and have to constantly yell at her to stay down. I keep threatening her that I will write her an individual dog program with behavior goals in the document. She responds with a blank look and wags her tail, and then does just what she wants to do.

If she is out in the backyard and hears the television come on she tears through the dog door, the mudroom, and the kitchen. When makes the turn into the front room she runs into trouble. It is a hard for her to make a turn to going fifty miles an hour. Generally she flips over on her side and slides down the hall into the couch. She jumps up, shakes herself, and runs to the television.

Everytime I have company they want me put her out in the back so they can see her run and slide. Another thing this dog does is she takes the limelight from me. When people come to see me do they ask, "How are you? No, they ask, "Does your dog still watch television?"

Holly loves it when teenagers come to visit. Teenagers like to stay up all night watching television and that is her cup to tea. They get upset with her sometimes because she wants to watch a channel they do not. Teenagers generally do not like to view old westerns with John Wayne. When this happens she goes over to the remote and whines, barks and pouts behind the chair. If someone is holding the remote she sits up, and begs in front of that person.

The best way to find the program she wants is to start flipping through the channels until she stops howling. The Animal channel is one of Holly's favorites. For some reason unknown to anyone but Holly she also likes the information channel, and when a Dixie Chick's song comes on Country Music Channel, she dances to it.

I have solved the problem of her whining at me to change a channel by leaving Holly in the front room to watch what she wants to watch. I then go into my bedroom and turn to another program. When she wants the channel changed she runs into my bedroom door banging it open and whining and barking.

Holly is a totally unremarkable dog. She is untrained to do tricks. Holly is not a watchdog. Holly is not demanding stick with my one-eyed dog who watches TV. I have to go now, because Holly wants the channel changed again.

This story was produced by a Happynews Citizen Journalist.

For more information on contributing to Happynews, click here.