Walkie-Talkies

A year or two ago, my Dad got a pair of walkie-talkies when he opened a new bank account. (Rumor has it that he opened the account primarily to get the walkie-talkies.)



At first, it seemed that these GE brand walkie-talkies were of very poor quality. Their range was only about 200 feet. But that turned out to be due to weak batteries. Despite the fact that the battery meter showed they were fully charged, the batteries were in fact not up to snuff. With fresh (and warm) batteries, the walkie-talkies turned out to have a range of about half a mile.

But the question was: what to do with them? The answer was that they turned out to be useful on those occasions when my sister ran away. Of course, a serious dog like myself would never run away. What's that? Oh, I wish you hadn't mentioned that. That was a long time ago.

Mom and Dad take the walkie-talkies to the dog park. When one of us runs away--that is to say, when sister Juno runs away--Mom and Dad coordinate the search via walkie-talkies. They also come in useful when Mom runs ahead. (Dad also runs, but not at dog parks. He believes that running and dog walking are separate activities. I wonder if this is because Juno and I like to stop and sniff every 10 meters?)

Mom just got one of those new radio phones that everyone's talking about. I think they call them sell-you-all phones. Now she can call Dad on her own phone when Juno gets lost and Dad is not at the park with us. Previously, she used to have to borrow a sell-you-all phone from a stranger. Maybe Dad will get one of those phones too, some day. He says he's waiting for the concept to prove itself.