Dogs

You don't get a shot like that often, 240, 240 big ones. You could get a river full of alligators for that kind of money. Alligators have—animals have a lot of sense. A lotta humans don't like dogs. I've heard people say, "Get that old dumb dog out of my way." I said, "Sucka, how could a dog be dumb when they can understand English and you can't speak dog?" And people today pamper their dogs, gotta have a certain amount of cod liver oil and certain vitamins over here and some more stuff, and some stuff for their coat. I had a dog eat spaghetti like this *slurp* during Depression—people didn't care much. During Depression we mighta felt good to find a dog in our neighborhood. Dogs seem like all of 'em knew what was about to happen and just start disappearing. I remember one time—good night, folks, do come again—you can't come, phone—our number is normal, OU812. During Depression, I remember in our Depression time, we had it rough back there. Christmas of 1931, our landlady got put out. My grandmother was standing by the stove fixin' to cook in case anything came. My grandfather was in the backyard trying to catch a gopher with his crutch. And he called my grandmother, said, "Helen, the garbage man's here." She said, "Well, tell him to leave three cans."