We have two yippy little Schipperkes at our house, fuzzy black Belgian dogs with pointy ears and a real commitment to defending their turf. Loki and Trixie are territorial barkers - if a life form strays too close within the Schipperke Zone of Protection they start loudly barking. This can be deeply annoying, particularly since if one of the dogs starts barking, the other dog will join in, even if it has no idea what the first dog is barking about. They're quite daft.

And yet sometimes, when I let them out in the backyard late at night to do their dog thing, I wonder... what the hell are my dogs barking at?

We live in a quiet neighborhood out in the sticks. At night it is very still and peaceful (except for my dogs going apeshit in the backyard). You wouldn't think there would be all that much for a dog to bark at, and yet bark they do.

But at what?

If I'm being honest, they bark at cats, raccoons, other barking dogs, and the occasional coyote. Nothing sinister.

And yet sometimes I feel a sense of dread when I hear my dogs barking in the night. What do their doggy senses perceive out there that I cannot? On some nights, when the wind blows and the dogs begin baying into the blackness, I think they are barking at John Carpenter's Vampires.

I have felt this way ever since we got the dogs. Everyone knows that dogs are excellent detectors of vampires, Terminators, and Batman. What if the next time I let the dogs out to pee late at night and they start to bark they are actually trying to warn me that John Carpenter's Vampires are approaching?

Those brave dogs could be buying my family valuable seconds to escape - if I listen to their warning.


Why John Carpenter's Vampires? I don't know. God help me, I don't know.

Laugh at the paranoid blogger with bad taste in movies all you like. But the next time your dog starts barking for no reason, I dare you to ask yourself: "Is my pet trying to warn me of an impending attack by (vampire/cyborg/Batman)?"

Probably not. But can you afford to be wrong?

And we're back. Sorry.

I am one of perhaps twenty-five people who saw Snakes on a Plane in a movie theater. Paid full price, even. Their marketing campaign actually worked on me. And yes, I was also one of the many people who cluttered the Internet with a wacky Snakes on a Plane parody. Sorry.

Here's the broadcast TV version of Samuel L. Jackson's famous line at the end of the film: "I've had it with these motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane." I am now going to use the term "monkey fight" whenever I feel like swearing in mixed company.

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