141st Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show

Well, this is quite a step down.

The Faux coverage is awful, continually interrupted for commercials and focusing only on favored breeds. It fully justifies my attention to the UConn Huskies 100th consecutive victory last night in a game at Gampel which was closer than the score would indicate. There are 5 teams that could potentially deny them another Championship and I hope that none of them do.

I write a lot about sports, especially the marginal and weird ones. Believe me if there were a channel devoted to curling and croquet you’d be subjected to pages of arcana (did you know that “croquet” is the proper term for a shot that involves more than two balls? In curling you call the same thing a “blast” or “double”). Well Westminster is like that for me, as my activist brother says, “You only write about .01%er sports like Formula One and Yacht Racing.”

Hey, I do Baseball, Throwball, and College Hoopies too, but point taken- Javelins and Billiards may be Bar Games, but they’re not mainstream.

Likewise Dog Breeding. It’s hardly a sport at all really, if you want athleticism and training you watch canine agility championships. Dog Shows are a display of applied Eugenics and watching a Judge feel up a Dog is not the kind of bestiality I’m into (C’mon, what do you think this is? 50 Shades of Grey? Plain old reproductive sex is plenty erotic and icky enough for me.) I have trouble with cats in the bedroom (they’d eat you if you were small enough).

One of the reasons I’m not covering this event as densely as I have in the past is that I don’t have the same access. I used to be able to rip all the dogs and breeds direct from Westminster and link them right to the descriptions. I can’t this year and it might be my rig (slightly different software) or they could have changed the site. It doesn’t matter because it’s fundamentally frivolous, a mere diversion from more important things.

I have not suddenly decided to hate on dogs, first because I am one ((yup, guy in case you are confused) and second because they are loyal companions who ask for nothing more than your scraps, a little attention, and a walk.

If you want one I suggest that you bypass the puppy mill paper mongering pet stores and head down to your local Shelter where you will find one that loves you and wants to be your forever friend.

Even in Washington D.C.