How NOT to Train Your Dragon...

Especially if it's not your dragon... It's Daisy's.

This morning I heard a ruckus outside the front door.  I peeked out the stained glass window and saw the postman's truck roaring away in a cloud of dust...

I called Tessie.  "Are you expecting a package from anyone?"

She replied, "OH! It's the dragon!!!"

I was about to scold her for ordering on the computer without my permission again...

She knew what was coming and quickly started to explain... "Open the door fast.  He will get away! I got a letter from Daisy last night. She's sending a guard dragon to protect the cottage.  We have to grab him quick... He's not exactly trained yet.  I promised that I would do it while you finished the cottage... Is that OK?"

What could I say? The dragon was already on the front porch howling to come inside.

I opened the door, to see an empty box with a dragon lying on top.  He had chewed his way out and by the time that the postman got the package to the door, the dragon was nibbling on his fingers.  No wonder he ran!

The trip must have been terrible for a dragon that had only flown on his own before.  I don't know what Daisy was thinking.  Why didn't she just give him directions and send him off? 

I guess, being a young dragon, she didn't want to risk a solo flight.  It's a long way from Outer Mongolia, in a completely different century, to Tucson...

Anyway, we managed to get him inside and lock him in the nearest convenient lockable room... That was the music tower.  Thank goodness.  He wasn't hungry.  He didn't eat the cat.


We thought it best to move him...Just in case...

Tessie suggested the townhouse.  It was not far away and we managed to get him there without further damage.

He settled down on the couch and Tessie tried cookies.  No dice.  He doesn't like chocolate chips.  They make him sneeze.  And when he sneezes, the whole house goes up in flames...

Tessie thought it best to move him again.  I suggested that we put him where he belonged...Tessie started out wanting to keep him for herself...Now she can't wait to get rid of him...

She told me, "If we don't calm him down, everything including your house could go up in smoke!
Maybe I should read the instructions for taking care of him that Daisy enclosed...".

By this time, I was about to go up in smoke.  I turned and glared at her and asked, "Daisy sent directions?  What did you do with them?"

Now she tells me..."Gordon was trying to eat them and I snatched them away and hid them..."

I asked, "Gordon?"

She shrugged her shoulders and answered, "Gordon the dragon, silly!" 

Then she proceeded to tell me that the note said that his name is Gordon and he likes to smoke...

I thought..."Didn't we already know that?" Then I asked, "Where is the note and what else did it say....Since it sounds like you already read it and memorized every line.."

"OK.  Here's what we are supposed to do.  We give him a comfortable place to sleep...Preferably in Daisy's house."  She paused long enough to catch a breath and continued..."Then we give him a pillow and a hookah pipe full of Cherry Blend Smoking Tobacco... Nothing fancy. Plain tobacco.  Then we let him have at it and wait."

"Then what?" I asked. 

"Then nothing.  That's why he needs the pillow. As soon as he finishes the pipe, he takes a long nap."

"Is there anything else I should know?" I asked....

"Yes.  If he starts snoring, stand back... and poke him with a long stick." 

I was afraid to ask anything else.  I immediately went to the back yard for a long stick.

When I got back, this is what I saw.  Tessie singing Gordon a lullaby.  Zar massaging his wings because of the cramped quarters of the box and Spike sitting back in awe. 

I think that Spike is wondering how he can get that kind of treatment.

Dream on Spike.  The Terrible Two have a new friend.  It will wear of the first time he belches and sets Tessie's hair on fire or singes Zar's necktie.

I will see you tomorrow if the house is still standing....... "Walter!!! Grab the hose!!!!"