Bacon In My Pocket?

 My wife says I have bacon in my pocket. It’s why all the animals everywhere we go just love me. I literally attract them. Every cat and dog of every neighbor just wants to sit on top of me and roost. I don’t have bacon in my pocket or anywhere else for that matter. I give off some kind of animalistic “this guy is cool” vibe.  It's mystical or may as well be.  I can't explain it.

It’s almost as if I was kind to some mythical magical beast long ago who has since vouched for me to every animal everywhere. But that’s so not true. I was never cruel to animals growing up. I loved all our dogs and all the neighborhood cats (my family has always been allergic). But I tormented my dogs as a kid is want to do from time-to-time. I’d blow in their faces to get them to snap at me. Pull tails. Startle them to see them jump. Tease them with table food (I may or may not still do that one). So I can’t imagine having earned any clout in the animal kingdom when I was growing up. 

I'll spare you my life story and fast forward to where the Doolittle mojo gets a little freaky.  Let me set the scene for you.  My family and I are traveling full time.  We live in an Airstream.  I have a small gazebo popup tent that I use as an office.  It's a small tent.  Like 5 square feet.  I'm in a camping chair with a little fold-up desk type thingy.  I'm writing software furiously in the middle of the night.  

Ever since we started full-timing I had been wary of wild animal attacks.  I mean, you watch internet videos of bear attacks and whatnot, right?  It's dangerous out here (not really), so I'm already on high alert.  No bear or jackalope is going to eat me while I'm playing video games... I mean working.  Suddenly I see the shadow of some kind of beast just outside the door to my tent.  It's got like the shape of a pit bull with demonically pointy ears.  Then I hear it snort.  WHAT?  Is it a pig?  A DEMON PIG?  I don't know.  It's late.  I'm up way past my bed time.  It could have been The Queen of England for all I know.

Then I hear more snorts.  Sounds kind of like a small bilge pump trying to suck air through 10 feet of mud.  Can't be a pig.  Then I hear a jingle and IT RUNS INTO THE TENT AND UP TO MY CHAIR!!!  It's a French Bulldog!  Then I hear what can only be described as a Gatling gun of snorting and jingling as yet another frenchy runs into my tent.  The two of them are galloping and prancing around my chair like two drunken, naked, fat little fairies of Irish lore.  At first I was like, "Um, do I know you guys?"  They certainly were acting like they knew me.  "Oh well", I thought.  They're here and their adorable so may as well play.  And we played until I heard their owner next door looking for them.  Apparently they broke out of their RV to come play.  They did it twice more in 2 weeks.  Not for food.  Not for freedom.  They were simply slaves to the power of my pocket-bacon powers.

If that were the only experience with strange critters, it would be enough.  But it wasn't.  One night in my tent I saw a fat furry figure trying to keep a low profile juuuust outside the tent opening.  I figured somehow my puggle, Beazus (a.k.a. The Chicken) got out and was fatting around outside the tent.  It sticks its head inside the tent opening and looks right at me.  It wasn't Beazus.  It wasn't even a dog.  It was a really really obese raccoon.  Just casually standing there with its head inside the tent.  It was as if it was asking permission to come in and eat my trash.  What struck me wasn't that the raccoon was so bold but that it was so polite.  I don't know if raccoons can have a British accent but I think this one may have.

Then there's the cat.  Same scene, different trip.  I'm minding my own business in my tent in the middle of the night when this cat saunters in and, without hesitation or pleasantries, hops into my lap.  "Well come on in!" was all I could think to say.  I had to wonder if this kind of thing is like normal.  Do cats do this or is there some kind of cat conspiracy where they know they can't rattle you with fangs so they try to love you into shock?  No, seriously, this happened.  It was so absurd that I took a picture.  Here he is:

I guess it's better to be their friend than their enemy.  And I do love animals.  I just don't understand their scheduling.  Like, do they do it in the middle of the night so nobody will know?  If you ask them if they are hooked on Bryan in the day time will they deny it like I'm some guilty pleasure?  

Does it end with the domesticated animals?  No, no it does not.  How about mammals?  Surely my freaky powers only work on mammals, right?  Wrong:

Yep, that's a wild lizard.  I didn't catch him.  He caught me.  C'mon, man. I'm trying to work here.  "Well, surely your powers don't work on birds or farm animals, right???"  Yeah, nice try:

That's a rooster.  He's in my office.  Dude...  Wanna know how loud their cock-a-doodle-doo is at that range?  No, you don't.  When he did it I yelled so loud and jumped so high that I scared us both half to death.  Hey, thanks for stopping by mister rooster!  My wife says I'm not allowed to "see how far I can punt them".  Whatever.  Ridiculous little creatures.  I'm ok with dogs and cats and stuff coming in but I draw the line when food struts in and damn-near blows out my ear drums.  Chickens are jerks.

Finally boys and girls let me tell you a tail of moronic predation.  Out here in Southern California (where I'm currently camped) there are these naughty little canine-like beasts called coyotes.  I've been hearing them at night since we passed through Texas in December.  But I had yet to see any of them up close.  I saw one chase a deer at one point and was rooting for him.  I don't think the other campers at that camp ground liked that very much.  Whatever.  The deer in Texas are out of control.  Get some, mister coyote.  Anyway, here near the Mexico border the coyotes seem to understand that camp grounds are a great source for scavenging.  I haven't seen any raccoons here.  They're usually the dominant trash connoisseurs.  I guess the coyotes ate them.  

It's not odd to walk through the camp ground at night and see what seems like little dogs in people's camp sites.  Coyotes are really really cautious animals.  Like rabbits, they react immediately to any change in sound, vibration, or smell.  I figured that's why I'd not run into one since Texas.  I always hear them but never see them.  But something odd happened a few weeks ago.  I had to retire the tent in Texas.  The winds there tore it to shreds (that's another story).  So I'm out front of the Airstream right next to the front door.  It's pitch black out except for our small door light and the light from my laptop. I'm just furiously writing code for work.  I'm so focused, so dialed in.  Suddenly I see in the back ground behind my laptop screen a small dog run by.  It stopped inches from me right in front of the door.  It raised its head to look directly at the center of the door and went motionless.  It was like it was expecting something.  I wasn't alarmed at all.  I mean, by now I'm used to people's pets invading my space in the name of love late at night.  But something seemed odd about this "dog".  Its tail was too bushy and its coat too thick.  Now I'm a little alarmed.  It only half-dawned on me that it wasn't a dog when the only thought I could muster actually came out of my mouth:  "What the hell are you?"

As soon as I said it that little stink jockey jumped about 10 feet off the ground!  And when he jumped, I jumped.  I bet you didn't know you could jump using only the power provided by the clenching of your butt cheeks, but I assure you, it's possible.  So he jumped and landed in the familiar "let's play" ready-stance all dogs use and I jumped and landed in just a little bit of pee-pee.  Then he re-evaluated the situation and ran off like I'd set him on fire.  I wouldn't be surprised if his buddies tease him about being scared of The Dog Whisperer and send him back to cuddle.