Since one of his two massive, unduly large yard snow globes deflated – dog bite — and since he has three children age 6 or less, Dr. Pickles had to make an emergency run to the Christmas ornaments store. All they had left in the blow-up department was a Christmas cow.

(Yeah, I didn’t know they made those either.)

The cow was immediately thrown into the mix, joining the surviving snow globe, the bursting snow flakes, the lighted icicles, the shrub netting, the plastic Santa, blinking deer, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Looks like the NBC Holiday Special.

So the next night Dr. Pickles had to bring supper home. He called and asked if Wendy’s would be OK. This not only confused his oldest son, it genuinely hurt him.

“But dad,” he said over the phone, “we just got the Christmas cow. You want us to eat hamburgers, and we just got the Christmas cow? What are you, some kind of …”

Dad hung up. They had pizza with olives.

Dr. Pickles has already promised his children that the family won’t eat lamb, ox or ass, at least not until the Christmas cow is stolen, stored for the off-season, or felled by a hunter with an inflatable gun.

God bless us, everyone!

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