Roog is a science fiction short story, a really, really short story by Philip K. Dick. I was wondering why science fiction stories and novels are called "science" fiction, so I looked it up:
Science Fiction is a genre of speculative fiction, typically dealing with imaginative concepts such as advanced science and technology, spaceflight, time travel, and extraterrestrial life. Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations, and has been called a "literature of ideas"
I guess it's shorter to write science fiction than technology fiction, or literature of ideas fiction, but I didn't learn any of this stuff in science class. I learned about dirt and clouds and what is inside of earth worms and things like that. I guess it is kind of like science fiction. I don't think I paid much attention in science class, because I can remember the time we were learning about what the earth is made of - I guess - and the teacher caught my attention by asking me what is beneath top soil. My logical answer of bottom soil wasn't right, but I forget what the correct answer was which goes to show how much I needed to know that. Anyway, we don't have to learn about dirt in our story, we get to read about a dog, the dog is our main character, and I love dogs.
Our dog is named Boris, and I feel sorry for the poor dog from the very beginning of the story. No one is happy with Boris, no one is nice to him, not his owners who are always upset with him for sitting in the yard yelling, barking, howling, whatever he is doing, "Roog" over and over again. His owner want him to stop making all that noise, or the neighbors will complain to the police again, so obviously the neighbors aren't thrilled with him either. And the garbage men wish he was far, far away too. This barking problem could be solved if his owners would let him in the house instead of letting him out in the yard all the time. In the chilly morning he is in the yard, if he wasn't he probably wouldn't even know when the "Roogs" were there, he is out in the yard in the heat of the day, he has to lay under the porch then. My dog isn't out in the yard right now, she is curled up on the sofa, tonight she won't be out in the yard, she will be sleeping in our bed under the covers between my husband and me. She won't know who comes to our house. Mailman, garbage man, electric meter reader, she won't hear any of them, the Roogs will be safe.
But at the house where Boris lives, the Roogs may not be safe, perhaps no one is safe. Each time they arrive, they are in a truck, bouncing and crashing against the rough stones. The Roogs leap out of their truck, come down the path, take the "metal cans", dump them in their truck and off they go. The Roogs are garbage men, right? Then why do they.....? Well, I've never actually watched what my garbage men are doing when they come for the garbage, but I am absolutely positive they aren't Roogs. Why won't anyone listen to Boris? Poor Boris. Happy reading.