Another Hero story

Two days ago, I decided to take Hero over to PetSmart. I put him out in the front yard for a moment so he could piddle while I got organized, knowing that he's such a mama's boy that he won't run off. Ordinarily he won't get more than about twenty feet away from me, and typically he pees, then comes back to the door and waits hopefully on the top step for me to emerge. But instead I heard frantic barking, and went out the door to see him racing into the cul-de-sac, yapping ferociously.

The reason? Well, there was a plane towing a sign right over the neighborhood. Hero doesn't like planes (or hawks) much, and a plane flying low over his yard and dragging something long and mysterious behind it was clearly a national security risk of the most dangerous sort, to his canine way of thinking. He raced in frantic circles around the cul-de-sac like a thoroughbred sprinting around a race track, zooming at his top speed and barking ferociously, glaring up at the plane as he ran. I called him to me, but as usual, he ignored my calls, because matters of security always take precedence over obedience in his weird Aussie brain. He is ordinarily pretty obedient, but if he thinks there's danger to his people, he will not stand down.

Before long the plane flew off, and fortunately he didn't race after it. He'd chased it away from his territory, and that was what mattered to him. He pranced back to me, proud of himself for chasing off the invader. He considers guarding the house his one true calling, and he was quite pleased with himself for doing such a good job of it.

Fortunately no cars came down the cul-de-sac during this performance, because he was so focused on the plane he might have run right under the wheels. I'll think twice before leaving the foolish beast out in the front yard again, even for a microsecond.