Homer's Best Bets </MCC HEAD>

Story last updated at 8:56 PM on Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Homer's Best Bets

After countless hours cleaning up her messes and repairing untold thousands of dollars worth of damage she's done, your humble Betster is finally forced to admit what everyone else seems to already know -- my dog is the dumbest dog in the world.

Perhaps it's breeding -- or a lack thereof -- that's led my adorable little three-year-old husky-coyote-crocodile-velociraptor mix to terrorize the Betster family home in her relentless, but well-intentioned, way over the years. Or maybe it's the way she's been raised -- alternating between tough love and unchecked spoiling -- that drives her need to destroy shoes, clothes, carpeting, backpacks, camping gear, children's toys, computer equipment, automobile parts and small farm animals.

Photographer: McKibben Jackinsky, Homer News

Spring time Duncan Hughes finds a way to put a lot of spring in his dance step at Concert On the Lawn Sunday evening.

Whatever the reason for her ceaseless chewing, eating, spilling, bodily functioning reign of doggy terror, the situation is becoming untenable, as I realized last weekend when I spent six or seven hours replacing a pair of chewed-through seat belts in the family wagon to the tune of $90.

The rest of the Betster clan turned on the poor stupid mutt long ago, right about the time we dropped $350 on a vet bill to stitch up a huge, mysterious gash in her dopey face that she probably sustained while doing something stupid like fighting with a rabid pit bull or eating a beer bottle.

"Take her to the pound!" is now the enthusiastic refrain from the Betster's significant other anytime the dog -- whose name is being withheld to protect the guilty -- causes a problem or an unforeseen expense, like the time a couple of months ago when she ate one of the neighbor's chickens.

But I can't.

I just can't look in those empty but sweet brown eyes of hers and tell her I'm giving up on her. She's dumb and annoying and has probably cost us the price of a family trip to Hawaii, but she is our dog -- the Betster dog -- and we're keeping her.

So this weekend, while your forgiving Betster fills out a submission form for the Homer News' Pet of the Week section -- you know, just in case -- check out these Best Bets:

BEST TEE OFF FOR A GOOD CAUSE BET: The Kachemak Board of Realtors is sponsoring a "Golf Scramble" -- no, it does not come with diced peppers and a side of hashbrowns -- at the Fireweed Meadows Golf Course in Anchor Point Saturday at 10 a.m. All donations will help pay the medical bills of Homer realtor Scott Connelly, who recently had heart surgery.

BEST GARDENING FOR DUMMIES BET: The Homer Garden Club sponsors a lecture from "Renegade Gardener" DonEngebretson, Saturday at 10:30 a.m. at the Best Western Bidarka Inn. Don will be sharing, among other points of gardening wisdom, the "Top 10 Gardening and Landscaping Blunders and How to Avoid Them." Presumably, that list includes trying to convince your wife that the patch of dandelions, chickweed and pushki in the backyard qualifies as a "garden."

BEST BRAIN FREEZE BET: What better way to reward a bunch of super smart, eager-for-knowledge kids than to invite them all together to fill up on sweet, delicious ice cream. If you're one of the eager readers of the Homer Public Library's Summer Reading Program, come down to the All-You-Can-Eat Ice Cream Bash at Homer Middle School Saturday at 2 p.m., to claim your yummy prize.

BEST BANG YOUR HEAD BET: Homer-area indie rock fans are in for a treat Saturday night when longtime Anchorage rockers the Hoons, veterans of the Warped Tour and recent openers for Portugal the Man, team up with Alaska Thunderfunk for a 10 p.m. show at the Down East Saloon. Any band with 3,639 MySpace friends can't be half bad.