OK, I’m still on track with 18,516 words as of this evening. No sample today, at least at the moment, maybe later. Ok, here’s a sample:

Peter backed out the driveway and headed out towards the Safeway. It wasn’t the closest store in town, but it was certainly the cleanest, and it wasn’t Walmart. Louie hated it whenever Peter bought something at Walmart. So, for the most part he made the drive to Safeway, the least menacing corporate store in town.

“Did you hear the part about bacon?”, Smuckers woofed to Foxtrot.

“Yes, but I’ll be surprised if it’s actually bacon. I still don’t think I’ve ever had any”, barked Foxtrot.

“Well, I’ll settle for any kind of meat after that gruel they’ve been feeding us since we went to that house after we left the police station. What was that place? I never smelled a place so fruity and sweaty”, said Smuckers.

“I heard someone say that we were being rescued, from what I don’t know. The police station was a pretty nice place and that fat human always gave us bones”, Foxtrot said, licking her lips remembering a particularly meaty cow bone.

“Rescued, it was more like torture. All the humans were wearing tie dyed shirts and I’ve never farted so much in my life!”, Smuckers barked, letting out a little yelp.

Peter looked back to see if the dogs were all right, “You girls sure like to talk. You just keep woofing and barking.”

“We don’t talk as much as this human’s friend, the one with red hair, did you hear what he was called?”, asked Foxtrot.

“It was Alf or ER-Alf”, barked Smuckers.

“Appropriate for one who likes to bark a lot”, snickered Foxtrot.

Peter pulled into the parking lot and turned off the van, “OK, here we are. Any special requests? I’ll be back in a minute!” Peter jumped out and closed the door behind him.

“BACON! BACON! BACON!”, barked Smuckers, getting drool all over the inside of the window.

“Hopeless”, whimpered Foxtrot.

Peter picked up a bag of Science Diet for Senior Canines and then he went back to the meat department. He thought that they had bones out on the shelves sometimes but he didn’t see any. He looked around a bit more and then rang the bell for the butcher. The butcher was still in the back cutting up something bloody from the looks of his apron.

“Hey, what do you need?”, he asked.

“Do you have any bones that a couple of bloodhounds would like?”, asked Peter.

“Yes I do. Let me cut a femur in half. Just two pieces?”, he asked.

“That ought to get it”, said Peter.

He wandered around the meat department looking at all the big, red, juicy steaks. Since he had been having problems with high blood pressure, he hadn’t had a steak or alcohol going on four years. He had also seen his consumption of ice cream dwindle down to a mere shadow of its former self. Hopefully his new workout regimen would help his vascular health so he could look forward to a steak for a treat. “Only 30 pounds to go”, he thought.

“Here you go. I just put a price of two dollars on the label. Thanks!”, said the butcher.

“Thank you, I’m sure the dogs will love it”, Peter said as he turned to walk to the checkout.

Peter dropped the wrapped, but still fairly gruesome looking bones on the belt and the lady in front of him grimaced. He just smiled and put the little separator bar down. “I’ve got to keep my calcium intake high to prevent osteoporosis, it runs in my family”, he said to the woman, who just turned away.

The checker handled the meaty package gingerly and went to double bag it.

“Oh, no bag please. I’ll be opening those in the car”, said Peter.

“Do you have a hibachi in the car?”, asked the checker, eyeing the scraps of red meat still hanging from the bone.

“Oh, it’s not for me. I’ve got some really hungry wolves out there and they demanded some kind of sacrifice. There was some vague threat to the children of the town”, Peter said as straight as he could.

“Hmmmm”, the checker said, looking around the front of the store, “Do you need any help out? Or just some help in general?”

“They’re for my dogs. I’ve got two big bloodhounds in the van”, Peter said, sliding his club card and then his debit card through the reader.

He always liked to use his club card at the Safeway because he always made up funny names for the account. When he got his current card he filled in the application with the name Harold Knutsac, pronounced KUH-NEWT-SAH, and you could just call him Harry. Louise thought that the joke got old after the first time she had been to the store with Peter, but Peter always got a laugh when the checker read it. All the checkers were supposed to read the name and say, “Thank you Mr. Blah”, but most of them stumbled or gave up on Knutsac.

The new response was usually, “Thank you Mr., how do you pronounce your name?”, and Peter would say, “KUH-NEWT-SAH, Harry KUH-NEWT-SAH”, and tonight was no different. The checker thought about trying to say it, then fell back to the pronunciation question.

“What kind of name is that?”, the checker asked.

“It’s Scottish. You should see the tartan, it’s magnificent!”, Peter said grabbing the dog food and the bones.