Mama Snark is coming down to house/dog sit on the front end of our trip to Hawaii, so CU and I are working feverishly to fix all the things in our house which could be potentially embarrassing…like this sad excuse for an “elevated dog feeder”.

There’s something about setting food & water bowls atop a random assortment of cookbooks that just screams Nouveau Trash Alert! I’ll take my dog to a specialist who only comes to Dallas once a month to have an EKG done…but I make her eat her food on top of an outdated George Stella cookbook. Thank God she’s blind. And, please don’t tell Martha and Paula. I don’t need the cookbook police showing up on my doorstep. I believe this little gem is also in the pile somewhere.

So I sit down at my trusty laptop and begin my Big Search Online for the ultimate raised doggie bowl feeder/thingiemajigger. Previous visits to PetSmart and Petco have been fruitless, as they assume all dogs are at least 12″ tall…same for IKEA…so I have to use my advanced search powers.

First stop? Why, Blingo of course…where I quickly locate this item, which is the perfect height but…um…NINETY SIX DOLLARS? I refuse to buy a feeder that costs roughly the same as a visit to the vet. Next.

Although the height is about right and the style of this feeder is nice…again it’s on the expensive side. I’m also a bit uncomfortable buying anything which has the words “a leg up”, “dog” and “feeder” incorporated into the item name. Now granted, we have girl dogs…but still. I assume “Sonoma” refers to the blissful feeling my dogs will get each afternoon when the breeze sweeps in off the ocean while they’re kicking back in their Adirondack chairs with a nice chardonnay.

Speaking of nice chardonnays…Cookie’s not really a wine gal. She’s more of a “get drunk and wind up on a Poodles Gone Wild video” kind of dog, which makes the BARK-A-RITAâ„¢ Gift Set - Dog Cocktail Toy Feeder Bowl Dish practically a shoo-in. But wait, there’s more! I could even pick up something for me, too! As much as I like the Bark-a-rita gift set, I just can’t send my money to someone who also deals in Japanese push-up bras.

So, back to Blingoing…and swiftly removing Mr. Stella’s book from our house.

**Update** We have a winner! And, I can get AAdvantage miles!