Bulldogs are beautiful. Period. 

I don’t care that they constantly have shoestrings of drool hanging from their oversized jowls, bulldogs are one of God’s special little creature. These days people tend to favor the French bulldog—a petite version of the muscled up English or American bulldog which, honestly, seems pretty appropriate when you’re throwing around the usual jingoistic stereotypes—but we want to shower some love on all of these special little pups. 

I used to dogsit a big ol’ American bulldog by the name of Barrington. He had one blue eye and one brown eye, which is pretty baller if you ask me. He also had the snaggliest snaggle tooth I’ve ever seen in my life. This is the kind of thing that happens when dozens of generations bulldogs have been bred to enhance certain traits. To put it politely, it’s a pretty shallow gene pool, so much like all global monarchies, there tends to be more than a little inbreeding involved. While this earns bulldogs a ton of points in the cuteness category, it does lead to some health problems. 

I know this firsthand because our boy Barrington could not go upstairs. And to be quite honest, he was a real diva about it. As a dog, I’m sure you can get away with this with your owner, but when you’re being walked out of the house by some schlub dog sitting maybe, just maybe, don’t plop your ass down at the bottom of the stairs whilst said schlub is attempting to run up the stairs. If you may have gleaned, this is not a hypothetical. I was running up the stairs expecting Barrington to follow me, and as his leash became taut thanks to him plunking his 75 pounds down onto the ground, my arm was pulled back and I ended up faceplanting on the stairs. My nose exploded in a a rainbow of blood and the idiotic dog just sat there staring up at me, wondering why I wasn’t carrying him. 

The pain was extreme, the blood was plentiful, but as I stared back into those multi-colored eyes I felt no anger. Bulldogs are just too damn beautiful to stay upset with. 

If I hadn’t had this experience, I don’t think I would understand why there is a National Bulldogs are Beautiful day. But I get it. And the people with these amazing bulldog tattoos get it as well. Enjoy!