When Garfield was first introduced to Odie, his reaction was "What did I do to deserve this?" Odie
first met Garfield on August 8th, 1978. Odie was owned by Lyman, Jon Arbuckle's buddy, who
dropped in unannounced and uninvited, stayed a few weeks and then left. Much to Garfield's horror,
when Lyman left, he forgot to take Odie with him.

Odie is a very friendly dog and an extremely happy animal. He's constantly wagging his tail, panting,
and drooling, with his big red tongue hanging out of his mouth. He chases his tail, runs after cars,
barks idiotically, and is terribly uncoordinated.

Garfield has abused Odie plenty over the years -- tieing his ears in a bow beneath his chin, stuffing his nose into his mouth, and literally throwing him into next week. Indeed, Odie takes a lot of abuse from Garfield; a daily ritual for the fat cat is kicking Odie off the kitchen table. Odie doesn't seem to mind,
though; in fact, Odie doesn't seem to remember this little ritual from one day to the next. It's not that
Odie's stupid -- well, okay, it IS that Odie's stupid!

According to Garfield, Odie's so stupid it took him three years to learn how to breathe. His IQ is so
low, you can't test it; you have to dig for it. Garfield says Odie was bred to be a working dog --
specifically, a paperweight or a doorstop.

Still, there's no denying that, although he's no mental giant, and he drools on everything from the floor
to Garfield's beloved lasagna, there's something irresistible about Odie. He's lovable and loyal, and
even though Garfield will seldom admit it, he's Garfield's best friend in the whole world.