From Crazy Uncle Earl’s Attic: A Hump Day Chuckle!! Every March and November, we are forced to “fool” our bodies. We are told either, “Here’s an extra hour of sleep. Enjoy” or “Get out of bed, you waste of skin. The Sun’s been out for an hour!” In November, we say goodbye to Daylight Saving Time and hello to good old standard time. I love it, an extra hour of sleep. The autumnal time change is not all sunshine and unicorn flatulence. It has a major drawback: my dogs don’t grasp the concept of time changes. They have an internal clock that is so accurate the Navy could actually set their atomic clock by it. So my wife and I did not enjoy an extra hour of sleep. We start our day listening to our dogs whine and whimper at 4:30 a.m. We played all kinds of little games. We played the “If we stay real quiet, they’ll go back to sleep” game. Or the “If I reason with them, they’ll understand” (Hello, they’re dogs) game. Or the “If I scream loud enough, maybe you’ll shut up and lay down” game. After we played that game, we played the rock/paper/scissors game to see who was going to let them out. My wife lost. We have two mutts. One is about 90 pounds and is primarily a collie. His main purpose in life is to grow hair. Since he was a rescue dog, we don’t know how old he is, but our best guess is he is around 6 or 7. He is so docile, you could literally take food out of his mouth. My other dog is the exact opposite. She is part beagle, part piranha, and part badger. She is maybe 12” tall, but she goes a good 45 pounds. She looks like a ham on sticks. We believe she is around 12. Her main goal in life is to eat herself to death and has tried several times. She is blind and becomes the Tasmanian devil when she hears the food bowls hit the counter. She will ricochet off every piece of furniture, wall, leg, or appliance between her and the sound of her bowl hitting the counter. She is calorically motivated to say the least. My wife stumbles down the stairs with a “dust bowl” of dogs behind her and lets them out. They do their business and rush back in. When the chowhound scurries back in, she’s like, ‘Where are my frickin’ groceries?’ She will continue to bounce off everything until she gets kibble in her gullet. Meanwhile, I am still in bed thinking, “This CAN’T be good. They are eating an hour earlier this morning. That means they will want their dinner at 11:30 a.m. instead of 12:30 p.m.” Later in the morning, while watching TV, I felt someone or something staring at me. I peered over and there, both dogs were glaring at me. Why the blind one was looking at me is beyond me. I looked at my watch and it was 11:00 a.m. You got to be kidding me. Their internal clocks actually leaped forward a half an hour. I ignored the stares and continued to watch TV. Then it began. It was the thump-thump-thump of their tails wagging and hitting the floor. I can’t confirm it, but I think I saw the “ham on sticks” actually tap her wrist with her paw as to say, “Looking at my watch, it’s supper time, bubba!” Now being the good doggy daddy, I hollered out, “Janet, feed these rats?” Later that evening while watching TV, I noticed my wife taking a little nap. I guess she was catching up on her extra hour of sleep she missed out on that morning. I thought I’d let her enjoy her snooze. She looked so peaceful snuggled up in a blanket on the couch flanked by sleeping dogs on each side. It was snack time for me. I tiptoed into the kitchen to get a little something to eat. I found a box of microwave popcorn. I pulled the cellophane-covered envelope out of the box ever so gingerly as not to make any noise to wake my wife. I put the envelope in the microwave and hit the timer. As the bag turned around and around in the microwave, I could see the bag expanding from the heating of the air inside the envelope.