126th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show

Upper-class, oddly classified as a sport, slightly creepy, but fun. No, not badminton. It's the 126th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, for which Madison Square Garden laid down its finest odor-repelling Astro-turf, and the USA Network cleared six hours of its primetime schedule on February 11th and 12th, as it's done for many years.

Is this really a sport? Yes. Westminster is considered the second oldest continuous sporting event in the US after the Kentucky Derby, and it's often called the Super Bowl of dog shows. It's also co-hosted by former baseball player/announcer and random comment generator Joe Garagiola, whose obtuse quips were brilliantly lampooned by Fred Willard in Christopher Guest's Best in Show. Garagiola tries to work baseball into his commentary whenever possible, to head-scratching results.

Fine, it's a sport, you say. But doggies are cute. Where's the slight creepiness? Think of it this way: Who among us can claim that our ancestors were never prejudged because of their looks or heritage? Who among us doesn't get a little nervous when hearing terms like "purity of breed" and "genetic perfection?"

Yet this is exactly what dog shows are about. That's how a Dachshund can be judged against an Old English Sheep Dog. Each dog is compared to the judge's mental image of the perfect specimen of that breed. So, if the Dachshund is a more nearly perfect wiener than the Old English Sheep Dog is a big black and white mop, the wiener wins.

This year, there were 2,500 entrants representing 159 breeds — a completely mutt-free zone, and inbreeding at its finest. Taken one at a time, a pedigreed dog isn't creepy at all. It's beautiful. But looking at 159 differently shaped and sized breeds of dog en masse can be a little off-putting, especially considering their common source is the wolf. Lupine qualities are apparent in the Alaskan malamute, but unfathomable in the bichon frise. The Bedlington terrier looks like a lamb, and the Chinese Crested has hardly any hair. You can't call them freaks of nature — they're winners because they are the expression of genetic perfection as determined by a preconception of what a breed should look like. We all know what happens when someone gets the crazy idea to try this with humans.

But this year, the mutts had their day. In a show of patriotism 10 times classier than anything at the Super Bowl, Westminster included a tribute to the K-9 search and rescue dogs who worked so tirelessly at the World Trade Center and Pentagon crash sites. Many of these dogs are mutts and shelter dogs whom people gave up on, and were rescued themselves. After looking at a hearty shepherd mix in a FEMA coat whose paw pads are cut up from digging in rubble and whose eyes have seen all manner of atrocity, it's kind of hard to respect a blow-dried and manicured Pomeranian.

Yes, show dogs are better groomed than you, and certainly better than the nutty "dog people" who handle them. Women in sparkly baseball caps, men in plaid pants with Scottie embroidery, on-lookers wearing jingoistic "I [heart] my Puli" sweatshirts — the fashion faux-pas are abundant at Westminster, especially for rich people. But the final slightly creepy note is the complete absence of dog-like behavior in these dogs. They have astonishing self-control. Anything you expect from regular dogs — barking, leg-humping, butt-sniffing, flea scratching, licking of assorted parts (because they can!), the "world is my toilet" attitude — is rarely seen at these proceedings.

Of course, there are always exceptions, and the exceptions, combined with the beauty of the animals and Garagiola's comments, ultimately make Westminster fun to watch. At the 1999 show, after her promenade around the arena, a German shorthaired pointer promptly hunched, squatted, and took a liquidy dump. There could be no better reminder of the kind of pressure these little guys are under.

After being privy to the pointer's public poop, Garagiola quipped, "It happens to all of us."

Note to self: do not attend any public functions with Joe Garagiola.

— Karen Lurie (karen@flakmag.com)