This says it all: http://terrytaylor.posterous.com

People, you got to make up your minds. Which is it? In my world, everything is black and white. Literally. It's sort of black and white. Or so you tell me. Truth is, I see in vibrant colors. See my tongue in that pic up there? That's a beautiful shade of green, right?

Okay, let me explain, I know you'd call it kind of pink. But in my world, we call it green. Don't look at me like that. It's no different than saying salt is bad for you and then saying it's good for you. 

One of my Twitter friends dropped off a little gift. Thank you Ms. Clanton (aka WineWoman). Even though I look worried on the outside, I'm pretty excited on the inside.

                   – Rudy

My favorite mode of transportation, besides running, of course, is riding with the windows down, head protruding into the airflow, sucking down every aroma available. I can take up to about 40 mph before I have to ease back in to keep the wind from blowing boogers up my nose at 40 mph. My brain is back there somewhere, so that can't be good. But the view at that speed with fill your imagination with things that make the bugs smacking your jowls tolerable.

I zoom past dogs tethered to leashes, imprisoned by a rope around their necks. That's the law in these parts. But in a car, I don't need no stinking leash. I'm a four-legged Steve McQueen, my aerodynamic canine teeth slicing the air, my ears flapping to the sound of my own Jack Russellian soundtrack.

These poor dogs look at me. I look at them. They know I'm riding the big metal and all they can do is dream about chasing me. No way. I'd just smoke them. Gives me a little NASCAR jitter down deep in my sternum right around the area where food goes to wait.

When I read those little words, "OBJECTS IN MIRROR MAY BE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR," I just laugh. No they aren't. Those objects are disappearing faster than your home's value. 

I'm currently healing from what I like to call a sports injury (chasing fuzzy-tailed rats in my backyard), so some of my favorite activities, like the one pictured above from several months back, are limited. I can ride, to be sure, but I'm not allowed to shove my snout into the brisk December breeze just yet. Give me a few more weeks, though. I can already smell Christmas coming and I can't wait to get a face-full of it.

I had a rough week. Spent a few days and nights in the I.C.U of the animal hospital. Went down hard chasing squirrels, falling fifteen feet, smacking a big rock, catching me in the gut. After much care and many dollars, I am slowly on the mend. I've never been injured. I was untouchable. Then the bird showed up. This is hard to admit.

First of all, Jacks don't get hurt. We win. So the fall was like Kryptonite to me. But my bulletproof confidence was dented. Vets shaved my tummy and paws. I was subjected to humiliations beyond my ability to imagine, and just when I was down, animals tried to take over my joint. The bird was not the only one.

Squirrels, the very scum I took a fall chasing, covered the deck, cavalierly scrambling, chewing the house again, looking in the windows as if mocking me while I was prostrate on the floor, a hand sized purple splotch across my belly crippling me, holding me down. That's not the half of it.

The cat walked back and forth in front of the window, whisking his insulting tail, taunting me. It was hard to take, but I watched, moaning now and then less from pain than disgust, from my awesomely nasty, pink chair (yeah, I have a pink chair, long story). But the bird was the cruelest insult of all.

Wings fluttered through the back door and up the stairs and into the bathroom. I struggled to make it up the stairs in pursuit, grunting on each step. Exhausted at the top, I could hear the bird having its way with the curtains above the tub – the same tub I have hated from eight years of baths. Why do I need a bath? I smell great, 24-7. But I get my time in the tub with the scented shampoo. Geez, that is a slam, I got to tell you.

Standing in abject defeat, watching the bird dip and weave, I dropped my head and slipped under the bed, my face torn into a rictus of despair. In my mind, I knew I could fly and catch that bird. I knew it. But I had flown last week, far and hard enough to kill a lesser animal. And now I bore the wounds to discourage it. But I survived through the skill of canine medicine and the love of my peeps. Now under the bed, I listened as the bird was caught and the humiliation was complete. I am so ashamed. I could not help apprehend the fowl. I feel I have let every Jack in the world down. 

The next day, I stumbled onto the deck from which I had fallen only a week ago and gathered myself into a ball of bruised pain and Jack Russell determination and uncorked a bark into the sky that was clear and easily interpreted by cat, dog, human, bird or squirrel.

“I will be back!"