What the well-dressed puppy is wearing these days

Let’s talk puppy clothes. I find it becoming sort of an addiction. I think deep down I must be really perverted to be dressing a little dog like a doll in tiny clothes. It started in El Paso when we were driving back to Denver, and I knew it would be cold there and in Taos. We bought Lupita a cute little pink cable knit sweater since we thought she might get cold. After we got back to Denver and she had the surgery for her abscess, the vet wanted her to wear a t-shirt to cover the sutures. I thought the protruding ends of the suture material might catch on the sweater and be irritating. Esperando offered up the cut-off ends of a long sleeve gun-metal gray t-shirt. It was a humble homemade article although the neck had a nice finished look, with the cuff turned back at her neckline. I must admit the gray color didn't do much for her complexion. She wore that for a week until someone at the Landrover dealer commented on her “grunge look” when I went to pick up my car for servicing. Hmmm? My dog looking grungy?! That was not to be! Off I went to Petsmart to peruse the doggie clothing and found some really hot little numbers. Now my dog is better dressed than I am.

She seems to like wearing clothes. That is, she obliging pokes her nose into the neck hole and stands still while I feed her little paws into the sleeves. She seems to actually prefer some clothes over others and is consistently more cooperative in putting those on. As I child, I used to dress my cat up in my doll’s clothes, so it’s almost like returning to some familiar state of mind. I got a bad enough time in Vancouver when I bought a doggie raincoat for Sweet Pickle. Since he is large and has lots of hair it saved me from using up multiple towels to dry him off everyday when we came in from walking in the rain and snow. A street reporter doing a special on doggie clothes snagged me on a corner and wanted to me to explain why a big dog like Dash needed to wear a jacket? So I had to tell him about the facts of life which caused Dash to be propelled onto public TV in a newscast. How embarrassing!

Lupita is more fortunate than some dogs in that she has the money to work on her fashionista collection. So far she has three sweater vests, a gray and pink hoody with Canine All-Star written across the back, a small doggie Harley Davidison t-shirt, a really cute Rock Star t-shirt with a sequined guitar on it, and a fuzzy purple fleece jacket that has the words Princess emblazoned across the back. Unfortunately she considers the jacket be more of a chew toy. I am afraid it won’t hold up well to that kind of treatment.

I have seen some street dogs in Santa Rosalia wearing clothes. We are talking about dogs much bigger than Lupita who live in a hot climate. Unfortunately they do not have a change of clothes, and what with lying around on the street, their clothes could often use a good wash. What a silly world!