I Among Dogs

Chapter 12: Charade Antics - Part 2

"I don't want a frog card! I want the ballewina card!" Muffin exclaimed as she revealed the card, the image being a frog.

We were all at a loss for words. All Chris could do was stammer with uncertainty. I know Muffin's only three years old but she must at least know that wanting to do a specific card is against the rules since we already know what it is she's trying to pantomime.

"Muffin! You have to do the one on the card!" Bluey explained a little exasperatedly, face palming with both her hands.

"But I wanna do the BALLERINA!" Muffin suddenly yelled in protest, stamping her feet in ire.

"O-O-Okay!" Chris held her hands up to try and ease Muffin before looking over at Bluey. "Bluey, why don't you look through the box for the ballerina card?"

"Okay, Nana!" Bluey obliged as she slipped off the couch and started to sift through the many cards still in the box. Bingo meanwhile had gotten of the couch as well and started twirling around, doing more ballerina poses shimmying up to Muffin in the process.

"Thanks, Bluey!" Muffin said as she put the frog card on the coffee table. 'At least she has some manners.' I thought as I brought my attention back to Bluey.

"Hang on... Won't we know that Muffin is a ballerina?" Bluey paused her search for Muffin's desired charade card to ask this question. I was about to back up Bluey with the question and explain that it's against the rules only for Chris to quickly answer for her.

"Oh, yeah but..." She leaned a little over to Bluey and asked in a hushed tone: "We'll play along for the littlies, okay?"

"Oh, okay Nana!" Bluey replied in understanding before going back to searching through the many cards. To be honest, I couldn't really argue with Chris' reason to make the game beneficial for younger dogs who had yet to fully understand the game.

"I can't find it!" Bluey exclaimed. There must be more charade cards in that box than I thought. "Keep looking!" Muffin demanded with her arms crossed, her face making it evident that she was starting to get impatient.

"What about a car?" Bluey suggested instead as she pulled out the corresponding card, the image being a bright red car.

"Ooh, would you like to be a car, Muffin? You can do this!" Bingo explained before for whatever reason, got down on the floor on her back, curling up slightly and rocking back and forth a little before remaining still in place.

"That's a squirrel!" Muffin commented. What is with Muffin and her supposed obsession with squirrels? Chris meanwhile took the card box and decided to search for the ballerina card herself.

"That's not a car!" Bluey was quick to point out, only to get a rebuttal of "Yeah, it is!" from Bingo.

"You kinda look more like a pill bug on it's back." I said, admittedly confused on what Bingo was doing to somehow represent a car.

"A car's like this!" Bluey then explained before miming herself driving a car for emphasis only for Bingo to remark that it was a steering wheel. At this point, Muffin had finally had enough and started stamping her feet again and jumping up and down in a fit.

"I don't want to be a car! I want to be a...!"

"Ballerina!" Chris finished Muffin's sentence as she held the card up, having found it.

"Hooray!" Bluey, Bingo, Muffin and even I cheered before Nana handed the card over to the three year old heeler as she looked at it with a smile whilst Bluey and Bingo joined us back on the couch.

"Okay, off you go!" Chris encouraged as we waited in anticipation for Muffin to begin her charade.

...Only for her annoyed look to appear again.