Hey Mom,

Just a quick update from your time-traveling pooch! I stumbled across a mysterious T-A-R-D-O-G-S booth today and ended up on a whirlwind adventure through the sands of ancient Egypt—was treated like canine royalty! Missed you and the simple pleasures of home, though. No place like Pawsburgh with you and my chew toys. Canine kisses and tail wags await!

Hugs and butt sniffs,
Otis 🐾✨

Well, isn’t life in Pawsburgh a wonderment, a genuine hurly-burly of tales and tails, that it is! Now, if you’re fixin’ to slide your gaze across this small narrative of mine, you might find yourself flabbergasted by the adventures that befell me, and that’s the honest truth. Otis, I was christened, and under the bluest skies of that doggone magical land, I tangled with time itself.

One balmy afternoon, the sun high and mighty in a robin’s-egg sky, I found myself roving ’bout Samoyed Square, sniffin’ the air that buzzed with the aroma of Husky’s Hotcakes. Had a hunger fierce as a March wind, but not for hotcakes, mind you. My world was fetch and frolic, and all the fetchin’ led me to the most perplexing contraption at Chestnut Cocker Courtyard—a gizmo that would whisk me off my paws and into the folds of time.

It stood there, brazen as you please, a booth that shimmered like a soap bubble in the sunlight. A T-A-R-D-O-G-S booth it was, if I can trust my eyes, and as I poked my snout ’round its door, I heard the whirring and burring of clockwork goblins, and a light, why it flickered like fireflies on a summer’s eve. Now, who but a bold dog would leap into such a kerfuffle? Otis, that’s who.

I’m not privy to all the mechanics of it, but no sooner had I set paw inside than, with a start and a jerk, we were off gallivanting ‘cross the eons, spiraling this way and that. I tells ya, I saw dinosaurs as tall as the sky, their necks stretching to nibble the fluffy clouds for breakfast, and knights of yore jousting under banners fair, their armor clanking like the turning key of a giant wind-up toy.

But the real humdinger came when I trotted plumb into ancient Egypt, and bless my bark, wasn’t I hailed as some Anubis incarnate! Pharaohs fawned and constructed sand sculptures in the likeness of my fine frame. But don’t let it be said that Otis lingers with vanity; I craved the simple joys of my raccoon toy and a succulent beef treat. Adventure is prime, but home’s embrace is ever sweet.

Yet, what is it about the unknown that nibbles at one’s courage? As Mark Twain himself might jest, courage is resistance to fear, not absence of it. I confess, the thunderous crack of Egyptian chariots had me quaking as if it were the vet comin’ at me with those ear drops of dread. And strangers reaching with alien hands caused me a shiverin’, no less than if a peculiar adult loomed near back in Pawsburgh.

Then, on a mere whim or by a tickle of fate, I felt a tug on my heartstrings, a call that whistled through time like the wind through willows; ’twas Angela, my human, my beacon. And isn’t love the mightiest of forces, more potent than any time-traveling booth? Fiery or not, back I must go to her side, to warmth and kinship eternal as stars.

I hightailed it back to that grand old T-A-R-D-O-G-S, which comprehending my silent plea whizzed me home to Powsburgh. As I sprang from its confines, I found myself atop our familiar backyard, sunbathing as if not a moment had passed.

So here’s to Pawsburgh, where tales are spun and wonders never cease. And if you happen by The Wagging Tail Bookstore or Paw-tisserie, and catch a whiff of adventure in the air, speak my name – Otis, the Border Jack with whimsy in her paws and time itself coursing through her veins.

The End.

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