Dear Dr. La Oink,

First, I need to tell you that my human mother has been spending a ton of her time fishing this summer. She says that fishing helps her "think". I tried to tell her that having ideas is helpful to thinking, but I'm not sure she understood me. She said that I could use her column to write to you this month and explain my dilemma (I do not consider it a problem). My name is Tyler James (though my human mother tends to call me "Tyler James Dignified Pig" because she feels I needed a very big name when I was little). I was born a dwarf potbellied pig and was very small. In fact, your human mother saw me when I was only a few days old and she took video of me to send to my human mom. (Humans are very silly about their video equipment, aren't they?)

I've been living in Michigan now for over three and a half years. I truly love my home and the humans here. My oldest sister, LilyPig, was born here in Michigan. As you may know already, Louise and Garbo are from the same place I was born. I've learned how not to be afraid of cats here (good thing, there are eleven of them!) because I can walk up to any cat and get scratched for free.

My attitude has changed somewhat toward Louise and I was hoping you could offer me some advice...

She constantly likes to chase me, or nip at my bottom. Louise is like a hall monitor in school who has allowed the job to go straight to her head. This is what I've done this year to "remedy" the situation. However, my human mom says that just because Louise was being naughty is no reason for me to be naughty in return.

I wait until Louise tires of being a bully and decides to sleep in the pigloo. We have a fenced-in yard that is quite large and in the yard there are four sleeping homes, just in case my human mom happens to be out when it's raining and we need to get into our shelters. Picture it...Louise sound asleep and then I move in for my moment of glory...

I slowly and quietly walk up to the outside of the pigloo. Then I stand sideways to the opening of it (that's normally where Louise has her head) and start gnashing my tusks together (okay, they aren't big tusks, but they still make a lot of noise). Then I dance back and forth in front of the door and make my mohawk hairs stand straight up. I proceed to use my voice and complain to Louise very loudly about how she's been treating me that particular day. I don't chase her out of the pigloo, even though she chases me out of it all the time.

I just want you to tell me that you think I'm finally being a "big boy" for standing up for myself. My human mom says that since LilyPig doesn't even think she's a pig at all, she's not into being dominant pig. Louise took that job opening and ran with it.

What do you think, Dr. La Oink?

Sincerely yours,
Tyler James .