Recently, the dog just stopped ...

Eating the food for which I've shopped

For quite a few long years now ...

Causing furrows on my brow



So a week or so back ...

I decided to try new stacks

Picking up one of each flavor

Of the gourmet two-for-a-buck saver



The first she didn't care for ...

So only fifty cents went out the door

But the other one she lapped up

Proving she was one hungry pup



Who really had not lost her appetite

(Something which always gives me a fright)

So yesterday I bought half a dozen more

Of the two-for-a-buck special at the store



All of them - the same flavor she'd liked

But the first she sniffed, then took a hike

Leaving me now quite at my wit's end ...

Not knowing how to use the little left to spend



Does it go on another fruitless exercise ...

Or do I return to the old standbys ... ???

... The food she used to eat by the score

Pedigree Chicken and Beef ... but no more



Or do I make one more attempt at the new choice

The one for which she promptly sounded her voice

It's called Sensational Gourmet Chunky Beef ...

... For which she'd been willing to turn a new leaf



Or do I give them both up and return to pet food stores

Where the food costs almost a buck a can, sometimes more

But which seems to be just as fruitless on the whole ...

For half the time, she doesn't eat that ... it just sits in the bowl



There has to be a simple answer to this problem, pressing

Knowing what ... baffles, and really keeps me guessing

She's probably tried now virtually everything in both stores

... Both the pet stores ... and the supermarkets galore ...



All over at least four of the counties in this very state ... 

And at least three in the neighboring one ... but, of late

There seems to be no store with dog food which appetizes

What we need is a dog-food taster, so there's no surprises



And then we could promptly avoid all of the pitfalls ...

And no more money would be wasted - as a rule

For one single person would use their own voice ...

So we consumers wouldn't have to make a new choice



- Tristram



(c) Christopher W. Thomas

8:35am Monday, Dec. 14th, 1998