When things get to you, and you feel sucked into the bog

You can take a break, and cuddle up on couch with dog

If she'll let you get that close - sometimes she's in a mire

... Gets grouchy when the Pedigree is so old it's expired



But we have no way of knowing it as they're not stamped

Or, if they are, you'd have to read it under a magnifying lamp

And, anyway - what the hell does 2708991742CETVH04 mean?

If there's a date there, I'm not sure at all how it reads clean



Maybe the 27th of August, 1999 ... but if that's how it's read

Then how come she won't eat it now, the same stuff sped

Very quickly from her dish into mouth and down throat

Just last week she seemed to love every bit of it like oats



Which, every once in a while - if I'm very, very lucky

A friend buys me in porridge or bread form - so ducky

But even when food for people has expired - we know

For there are so many ways we can tell - see, it shows



By moulds growing in corners of package or a discolor

Which we might deem inappropriate - even by an odor

But we have no way to check to see if pet food is past it

Because it's all sealed up in cans and boxes to protect



Either the contents of the packages or perhaps children

So they don't think it's people food and try and taste 'em

They certainly don't do it to tell us - the buyers - anything

The less we know about contents, the more they can sting



Us with old stock, or badly blended food which gives pets gas

Or makes them so totally hyper, they become a pain in the ass

When will the folks at FDA get on top of this stupidity and pillage

And make some hard rules to protect our pets from this outrage?



Christopher W. Thomas

1:45pm Friday 11/21/97