Stick Dog Dreams of Ice Cream by Tom Watson Page B

right, up and down. He sniffed continuously as he jerked his head all around. The other dogs had all slowed and stopped to watch this display.
    â€œWhat is it, Poo-Poo?” asked Mutt. “Do you smell something?”
    â€œOh, I smell something, all right,” Poo-Poodeclared. He inched closer to a large oak tree. “I just can’t put my paw on it. But it smells familiar.”
    â€œIs it hamburgers?” asked Karen with real hope in her voice.
    â€œOr frankfurters?” asked Stripes.
    â€œMaybe pizza?” Mutt asked.

    Poo-Poo answered all three questions by shaking his head. “Up in the tree,” he whispered as he stepped quietly toward the big oak’s trunk. “Squirrel.”
    This is what Stick Dog was afraid of. He knew that Poo-Poo could stalk a squirrel for hours. And it was too hot—way too hot—to be delayed by this.

    Poo-Poo circled the tree a few times, stopped, and peered up through the leaves and branches. He took a couple of short, quick sniffs. “There’s a fuzzy-tailed, acorn-munching chatter-mouth up there, all right,” Poo-Poo whispered. “If I could see him, I’d get him.”
    â€œCan’t you see him, Poo-Poo?” Karen asked.
    He shook his head but kept peering up into the top branches.
    â€œThen how do you know there’s a squirrel up there?” asked Stripes.

    â€œAre you kidding me?!” Poo-Poo exclaimed, taking real offense. “I can smell a barbecue potato chip three miles away. I can smell a smoking grill in the next county. I candistinguish whether a tortilla chip in a garbage can on the other side of Picasso Park is nacho cheese flavor or cool ranch flavor. You think I can’t sniff out a nasty, nutty-breathed tail-shaker?!”

    â€œOkay, okay,” said Stripes.
    Mutt didn’t pay much attention at all. He was twisting his tongue around inside his mouth trying to get the sock strings dislodged from between his teeth.
    Sorry. I just need to interrupt the story here for a minute—because this thing that’s happening to Mutt drives me crazy too.
    You probably remember from the previous stories that I need to make little comments here and there sometimes. I can’t help myself. And, umm, you’re not going to hassle me about it, right?
    Thanks.
    Anyway, I can’t stand that feeling of having something stuck in my teeth.
    Worst food for getting stuck in your teeth? Celery.
    I love celery. It’s crunchy and tastes pretty good for, you know, a vegetable. Dip it in a little peanut butter, and you almost forget that you’re eating something healthy and green.

    But it’s the worst for getting stuck between your teeth. It’s kind of stringy to begin with, and those strands have a special way of getting stubbornly stuck. And here’s the worst part: they’re a little bit slimy because the spit in your mouth combines with the moisture in the celery, and that makes the stringy parts impossible to grab. Believe me, I’ve tried. I’ve shoved my whole hand in my mouth tryingto get a celery strand out. I grip it real good and then—SLIP!—I can’t get it.

    It’s super annoying.
    So I can totally relate to what Mutt’s trying to do here with the strings from that old gray sock. While he did his best to get those strings out, Poo-Poo continued to circle the tree trunk as he stalked the squirrel. Karen and Stripes had found some shade several steps away, where they settled in to observe the whole affair.
    â€œThat sneaky, sniveling villain,” Poo-Poo muttered to himself when he stopped once to glare up into the tree for a moment. “If I could just get my paws on him, then I—”
    â€œPoo-Poo?”
    It was Stick Dog.
    Poo-Poo jerked around for a moment, surprised out of his squirrel-stalking trance. He snapped his head toward Stick Dog and then yanked it back around to stare up into the tree again. “Yes, Stick