I had a dog named Ellie. She had this little whimper moan thing she would do when she wanted something, and you had to go through the The List™ to determine what it was.

“Is her hungry?”

“Does her want a to-to” (toy)

Et cetera.

She wouldn’t stop her whimper until you said the right item.

One time I had exhausted The List™ and was just trying random things because the whimpering was getting a little old at this point and I was desperate. So I asked “do you wanna go see the kitty balls?”

The kitty balls we a collection of stray cats at a Walmart we lived near nearly a decade prior. She had not been to see the kitty balls in at least 8 years.

She lost her fucking mind. Jumping up and down (not an easy task on an old girl with messed up legs from getting hit by a car), barking, spinning around. I loaded her up in the car and drove two hours so she could stare out the window at stray cats in the back corner of a Walmart parking lot.

I miss her a lot. And apparently, she missed the kitty balls