Holiday sleepers and musings...

The traditions of Thanksgiving are many in the United States.

Chief among them is the nap, as demonstrated here by a chubby cocker named Inky and his feline friend, Poirot, the madcap cat.

Why do we own a sofa? So the animals will have another place to sleep besides the chairs and bed.

These two, Poirot and Inky, know how many Americans celebrate Thanksgiving:

Eat food, complain about overeating, tune TV to football game, nap.

Thanks, by the way, to all the good cooks -- they deserve the naps. But, of course, the rest of us, full as ticks, just can't stay awake. Try to hold the racket down while you do the dishes, please.

Yeah, we've got it really rough in America. Ha. For crying out loud we should realize we're living in a place where things are so good we ought to be happy not just to pay taxes but to kick in a tip for our favorite members of Congress, bless their hearts. Wait. I may have gone too far with that tip thing.

Back to reality: Some people have a tradition of getting up on Thanksgiving and running in a footrace -- in Dallas it is the Turkey Trot. There may be such Trots in other cities.

There probably isn't a Pigfoot Gallop for people who don't eat turkey but love a good ham and tend to waddle and snort when they exercise. And I'm almost certain there isn't a Tofu Trot for people who don't eat meat -- though an ideal name for a footrace for vegetarians would be "Lettuce Run."

For those of us who tend to be inert, there is television. Football, of course, and heartwarming motion pictures.

Some of you may be too young to remember a tradition that occurred as recently as the early 1990s. The movie, It's a Wonderful Life, had inexplicably wound up in the public domain. That meant that cheap broadcasters (Is there any other kind?) could show it over and over during the holiday season without having to pay royalties. So for years and years, until a clever lawyer found the pertinent clause in copyright law, stations would show It's a Wonderful Life repeatedly from Thanksgiving until beyond Christmas. Nowadays, only NBC has rights to televise the film. Of course, in the era of videotape and DVD, you can watch It's a Wonderful Life any time you want to watch it -- and you can not only watch it in the original black and white, but in a colorized version. Though, of course, black-and-white is the way to go. The traditional way.

Traditionally, we really celebrate Thanksgiving in the United States. Football, food, fun and family. And if you don't have a family the rest of the year, somebody will try to make sure you feel as if you have one. They'll yell at you for being insensitive or ungrateful -- wait, I'm kidding about that family tendency.

Now, another Thanksgiving tradition is that the holiday stretches for at least four days. Isn't that a good thing?

And in honor of that tradition, we're going to stretch our traditional weekend feature, Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cats Nap over the next four days, unless, of course, something newsy occurs and then we'll break in with an on-line bulletin.

My funspouse Martha and I might just take a couple of days and go to movies or shop or contemplate things such as the presidential election, the fate of mankind and the pitching hopes of the Texas Rangers. (That last one is mine -- Martha isn't all that serious about the hometown team and sometimes I'm not so sure that the franchise front office is serious, either.)

You'll note that today we've included some family photos: That's Inky, the Cocker Laureate of Texas, and his pal Poirot taking it easy on the family couch in a sunny window.

They are saving up their energy for their Day After Thanksgiving Tradition -- the madcap shopping spree that launches the Christmas buying season. Inky and Poirot love to hit the malls -- but afterward, all they do is complain about the parking.

On Saturday, they will nap some more, go over their checkbooks, take another look at their credit cards and get back into the fray.

And on Sunday, they will rest.

Speaking of rest, Hammy is a dog of several poses and you can see a couple here. He has the pink tongue-red sofa pose -- if you look carefully you'll see that the ol' gent has just a bit of his tongue nudging out of his lips as he dreams about being able to help serve holiday dinners. And, he also has that big green chair look -- that's what he looks like about midway through the first half of a Dallas Cowboys game. Can you relate? He just sort of falls over and assumes someone will wake him if something important happens.

The solid black cat is Annabelle Bob, direct spiritual descendant of the late Bob the Cat. Martha got Annabelle Bob six weeks after Bob died -- Annabelle Bob was a tiny kitten standing in the middle of Zang Boulevard as the traffic bore down on her. She ran off the road into a yard and under a bush. Martha did a Starsky & Hutch skid to a halt, got out, went to the bush, called for the kitten and she came out, Martha picked her up and they came home together. It was quickly apparent that Bob was back with the true love of his life. Too many similarities in personality and comfort with Martha to discount the theory of reincarnation.

You see Inky the Cocker Spaniel in assorted sleeping poses. "Sleep" seems to be his natural state, unless it's mealtime.

That is Rosie, the Chihuahua-mix sitting on the arm of the couch.

Due to my expert handling of the camera, she appears to be trapped in a dream sequence with Hammy and either Annabelle or Poirot -- can't tell from this angle which cat has curled up in a dream-sequence nap.

So, for this long weekend, these are the featured pals in our weekly spotlight of Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cats Nap.

They're not always enjoying a slumber. Sometimes they are awake and counseling us through our day -- after all, they are licensed. It is often wise counsel, i.e., "Never mind your petty problems, serve the food and move on with life."

Just like the theme of Thanksgiving and the entire weekend of leftovers. Serve the food and move on. Eat, nap, eat, nap, eat, nap. Exercise. Sorry, didn't mean to scare you with that sudden introduction of "exercise" -- the oft-ignored tradition.

Fortunately, I have insomnia, so I do get exercise -- from tossing and turning.

(If you'd like to have your dogs and cats or horses and goats or cows and pigs or any other family friend featured in Let Sleeping Dogs Lie & Napping Cats Nap, please send the photos and the info to dallrp@aol.com. We're proud to publicize your pals. And we always are envious of any being that knows how to embrace a good slumber.)