My childhood dog, Freya, was the gentlest and smartest of the lot I've owned. When the weird old woman down the street complained that Freya was killing her chickens, we laughed. It was unthinkable. Not Freya. Not the dog who endured so much teasing with such grace. We laughed and laughed, right up until she proudly brought a freshly killed chicken corpse into the family room.
For whatever reason, she loathed chickens. To her dying day, Freya vigorously denied that chickens had a right to exist. And she did everything she could to deny 'em.
That was the first time I ever saw an otherwise sane dog snap, but it wouldn't be the last. Joe, a female golden retriever (so named after Joe Montana, for defeating the Bengals in the Super Bowl in 1989), was a lovely animal too. Until she heard sportscaster Chris Berman's voice, at which point she foamed and snarled. If I so much as imitated him saying "He....could...go...all...the....WAY!", I would be bitten. At the very least.
That was curious, but what made Ed snap was not. The only person she ever hated was a glorified bar skank who climbed into her dog bed, cooing drunken baby talk at her. I can't say I blame her. I slept on the couch that night, myself.
Until this week, I had not discovered what makes Dex snap. Perhaps that's because I don't often sing the "Mahnahmahnah" song from the Muppet Show. By the time I get to my scat vocal stylings, she's trying to disembowel me.