Norm Stories: Norm The Landscape Architect

This is the story of a landscape architect. Named Norm. Norm The Dog.

In his younger days, Norm loved those rawhide chips. But he only liked the ones that were thin and crispy. When I would give him one of the noticeably thick ones, he wouldn't chew on it. He would carry it out into the backyard and bury it. Many times, months, even years later, he would dig up one of these extra-thick rawhide chips that had sufficiently fermented under the ground, bring the dirty stinking chip in the house and then, after it had been properly aged, chew on it for awhile.

Norm was meticulous about how he buried his rawhide chips. He did not simply dig up the rocks in the backyard, plop the rawhide in a hole he dig and re-bury it. No. Not Norm. After he re-buried it, he would use his snout to smooth out the rocks completely so that you absolutely could not tell where it was that he buried it. It was as if the rocks had not been disturbed at all. There was no sign that anything was buried underneath. No lump, no careless scattering of rocks. Absolutely perfectly meticulous levelling of the rocks that were concealing his buried treasure.

He even did this with rawhide chips he buried in the cactus garden to the side of the patio. I do not know how he could dig holes next to spiny, needly cacti -- and then smooth the rocks out afterward -- and not get a snoot full of cactus needles. But he did.

So what happened when he was once caught burying a rawhide chip in the backyard? That's the cliffhanger ending for a story that will be continued tomorrow.