Labradoris

Cosette was driving me bonkers this morning.  I can't blame her too much, as she's got a good case of cabin fever.  It's as if some portion of her brain becomes overloaded and her synapses just start neurotically twitching, and screaming, "MUST JUMP AROUND AND ACT LIKE A LUNATIC" which then is transmitted to her back, her head, her paws, you get the drift.  Basically she's a whirlwind of black and energy if she has not been out for a good afternoon of activity. 

After I emerged from work, I determined it was HIGH TIME to get out of the building and get out to a trail.  The wind had calmed down, and although it was cold enough to still freeze nipples off, it was pleasant enough to venture out.

Quiz:  Can you spot the 5-year old?

Yesterday my doctoral program flung open its doors, let some sunshine in, and asked prospective students come for a visit.  We host this event annually, and the prospective students make camp at various current students’ residences.  Since I have a house with a spare bedroom, I tend to be more willing to loan the space so the person won’t have to sleep on a couch.  
Part of this process is to have a potluck dinner at the program director’s house.  She has a beautiful residence that lends itself well to hosting events, and we all bring dishes to share.  Joel and I planned to bring chorizo empanadillas, stuffed pimientos, spinach and feta hummus, and Russian salad, plus wine from local vineyards.  
I had made the Russian salad the night before in order for it to chill in the fridge overnight.  I cleaned up the kitchen as my guest arrived, and we chatted about her experiences in her master’s program and mine in my doctoral program.  The next day brought with it a busy schedule, and I left my guest with the open house commitments as I went off to teach and make some attempt at progress in my day.  
Joel and I went back to the house in the afternoon to make the rest of the dishes.  I had already forgotten the pita bread to accompany my hummus, so Joel volunteered to make a run to the grocery store.  I worked diligently on the two additional dishes I was prepping, and set the stuffed pimientos in the fridge to chill for two hours.  Joel returned back with the pita, and I took an entire package and began cutting the pieces into triangles, perfect for hummus loading.  I stacked them all neatly in rows, and left them on the cutting board so I could heat them up later.  
I walked to my office to respond to a few e-mails that were piling up, and then walked back to the kitchen to finish cleaning up what I wouldn’t use any more.  I glanced around the kitchen, and my eyes settled on the cutting board.  Only one row of pita was there, and it was knocked over.  I frowned, and looked around confused.  Had Joel already put them in the oven?  No.  I went and found Joel and asked, “Did you do anything with the pita?”  He confusingly responded, “Nooo…why?”  I wheeled around to where Cosette was standing in the doorway, watching curiously.  I extended my arm and pointed my finger.  “COSETTE?  DID YOU EAT THE PITA?!?”  She briefly wagged her tail and then stopped.  Her head drooped.  I turned to Joel.  “Cosette ate the pita.”  “She ate the pita?”  “She ate the pita.”  
I deduced that showing up to a party with hummus but without pita bread would not be acceptable.  I quickly grabbed my purse and my keys, and headed back to the grocery store.  I bought two packages, just in case the disastrous happened.  The newly-bought pita was again cut into triangles and added to the party trays.  The dinner was fine, and everyone enjoyed the various dishes.
Then, we came home.  Cosette bounced around wildly for about an hour, willing us to feed her dinner.  It was late in the evening, and I just thought, “You know, dog, you can deal with a later dinnertime because your tummy is full of pita!”  I ended up feeding her about a cup of dry food after she calmed down.   I undressed, and I took off my knee-high hose and placed them outside my bedroom door, as Cosette has a history of eating one or two or thirty of my knee-high hose.  I usually scoop them up in the morning and take them into the laundry room.  Last night, however, I put them outside the door, then went into the kitchen to drink some water.  I walked back towards my bedroom, and Cosette was nosing the hose.  I yelped, “No!” but it was already too late.  She had swallowed one of the hose and was licking the other.  I threw away the leftover sock, and ushered her into my bedroom.
At 1:45 a.m., I heard her beside my bed, starting with what sounded like farts but following with a squirty sound.  I rose from my slumber, my hair and limbs askew, and looked down where she was at.  I saw two dark puddles shining in the ambient light in the room, and I groaned.  “Pita diarrhea?”  I walked over to the door to grab my robe, and right as I was opening the door, I put my foot in something cold and runny.  I would have paid serious money to see the look on my face.  I hopped to the bathroom to run my foot under the bath, and looked at Cosette standing in the doorway.  “This is totally your fault, pita dog.”  I finished washing the poop off my foot, and took her outside, where she strained for several minutes.  She finally came back inside, and I put her in the (tiled) kitchen and pulled up all the rugs.  “Sorry girl, I know you don’t feel good, but I don’t want to clean up any more carpet messes and I think you are still sick.”  I closed the door gently and returned t o my bedroom to clean up the mess.
In the morning, we returned to the kitchen to find multiple puddles of vomit and diarrhea.   She was let outside, and then we let her lie on her dog bed in the spare bedroom while Joel cleaned up the mess with paper towels and Simple Green, which is a marvelous product.  I sat down next to her, stroking her soft fur.  Her stomach began heaving and she started to cough, and I urged her up and walked her over to the kitchen tile, where she vomited again.  We cleaned up the new mess, and then brought her doggie bed into the kitchen.  I sat down on it and asked her to lay down next to me, to which she happily obliged.  
I feel very bad for my dog when she becomes sick – for whatever reason – and much like a child, she seems more vulnerable and soft when she’s sick.  I covered her up in a blanket as I sat stroking her, cuddling up to her, telling her it was okay.  She’s currently curled up the kitchen, recovering.  Joel and I started talking about what was in her various piles in the kitchen that he had cleaned up, and realized she had thrown up the knee-high hose and a part of a rib bone.  Ouch.  It total, we figured out that she had eaten breakfast  of dog food that morning, about a teaspoonful of goat cheese, a bit of leftover teriyaki chicken (both things placed into her bowl – she is not allowed to beg), a rib bone, 5 rows of chopped pita bread (so about 50 pieces), a cup of dog food for late dinner, and a knee-high hose.  I don’t blame her.  I’d have it coming out both ends if I had eaten all that.  

My sister and I were on an international flight recently, and the plane began to encounter some strong turbulence.  We were on a large plane, a plane that seats about 9 per row, and usually larger planes are less affected by such turbulence.  As the plane rocked back and forth and did a little jitter dance in the air, it began to creak -- loudly.  I matched eyes with my sister, and across the row from us I heard two ladies begin to talk.  One turned to the other and said, "Wow, that didn't sound good!" and the other replied, "Yeah -- it kind of sounded like that creak in the ship right before the Titanic broke in half and sank."  My sister and I looked at each other and grinned wildly.  It had sounded like the Titanic!
Obviously, mostly because of the fact that I'm here writing this, the plane did not end in the same fate as the Titanic.  :D

Today I had a neighbor stare at my ass.  Cosette is my witness, she saw him do it.  I had decided to procrastinate on studying for a test, and what better way to procrastinate than to do yardwork.  The area I live in is fraught with sweet gum trees and balls.  LG calls these "fight balls" because they are full of spikes and  hurt when you step on them barefoot.  Trust me on this one. 

Since the snow melted, all the fight balls from my roof had fallen onto my front porch and walkway, which, combined with the leaves I didn't rake up last fall, were driving me crazy.  I prepared to fight the fight balls themselves with a rake and bags, and darn it if I didn't put up a good fight.

I tied Cosette to a tree so that I wouldn't have to keep a close eye on her whereabouts.  I've kept her loose in the yard before, and she knows where to go and where not to go, but her limits are tested if another human/dog walks by on the sidewalk.  She just can't help herself.  Hence, leash to a tree.

I was busy raking up the fight balls and wet leaves when I straightened up to stretch my back.  That's when I realized my 80+ year old stroke victim neighbor was standing at the corner of my yard with his itty bitty dog.  Cosette was watching them intently, as they had not yet crossed the grass.  I smiled and waved, and he just looked back down at his dog and muttered something.  I shrugged and went back to work.  I kept glancing up, though, and noticing him just...standing there and staring at me.  Occasionally he'd make a comment to his dog, and his dog would just look up at him solemnly.  I decided that they must be discussing the size of my ass; otherwise, if he was critiquing my leaf and fight ball raking techniques, I might have thrown the rake at him.

He eventually wandered back inside his house, without a word to me.  What a strange afternoon.

We decided to go hiking again this morning, and in a brief moment of clarity, we thought to bring makeshift sleds using plastic container tops.  We drove out to the same trail, excited and somewhat optimistic that the sun hadn't managed to melt the icy slopes we  had been on yesterday.

We arrived and saw that the trail was somewhat still covered in snow, but it had become crunchy and less suited for sliding.  LG could get going on some of the hills, but the adults had less luck.  We spent so much time last week getting stuck in various places in town that I wasn't wanting to venture out onto unpaved roads, but I think I might just chance it next time it snows.  The hills out on that trail are well worth it!

We went out hiking on a Saturday morning, and found the trail to be quite...icy.  The boys decided to go butt first, but I thought belly sliding sounded much better.  Enjoy!

Today I decided to get my dumb butt stuck in the snow.  We had planned on taking our usual Sunday morning hike, and with the sun out and the weather warming up, it felt like a good day to do so.  We decided to go to a trail that I hadn’t been to before – a short nature walk within a few miles of my house.  It’s not very accessible via walking, so we loaded up Cosette in my SUV and took off.

When we arrived, the turnoff is right off the main (read: busy) road, and we came upon it fairly quickly.  The road quickly descends into an open parking lot and I made the decision to turn into it, even though it was covered in snow and ice.  I quickly realized that was a bad idea.  After the momentum carried me down the hill and into the parking lot, my tires started to sink into the snow and I lost traction.  I pressed on the accelerator and my wheels just spun.  We looked at each other, grinned, and decided to just go hike and hope the sun melted the snow a little bit while we were gone.

We played around on the trail and on the frozen lake and had a nice hike.  We then returned to the car and attempted to turn it around.  Some cars had already done the same thing, but apparently they had come a few days before I had, when the snow wasn’t sealed with a sheet of ice.  We spent about 20 minutes taking turns rocking the car, reversing, pulling forward, reversing, pulling forward, but each time we would get the front tires stuck in a rut.  After we were both tired from pushing, Joel went ahead and reached in his coat pocket for his cell phone and dialed 411 for a tow truck.  He told the towing company where we were at, and the truck said he was already on his way.  I was standing outside the car and said that we might as well keep trying.  We did for a while, but no real progress was made.  Joel went to walk towards the street to see if he had given the correct street name, and I hopped back in the car.  The car door was still open, and I decided to reverse and see if it would take me anywhere.  I felt it reverse just up to the top of the rut, and I changed gears and pressed the accelerator.  My car drove several feet!  It stopped, but I was motivated, and reversed and tried again.  By this time, Joel was walking back to the car and said, “Woah, what do we have here?”  I had managed to drive it a few more feet when it became stuck again.  Joel got behind me and pushed, and I revved the crap out of it.  I started gaining traction quickly and sped up the snowy incline.  My left foot was still out of the door, so I pulled my appendage in and quickly closed the door.  I managed to reach the top of the hill, and when I did, I looked back at Joel and said, “Okay, get the tow truck on the phone!!”  Joel called the company and said, “Well, we don’t need you anymore.  My girlfriend insisted that we keep trying, and sure enough we got out.”  A few moments after he hung up, the tow truck drove by, waving.  We waved back.  Unfortunately, the top of the hill had just enough ice on it that I had managed to get stuck again.  We pushed and pushed, but it wasn’t going anywhere.  Luckily, a family in an SUV saw us struggling and pulled over to help.  The man and woman got out, and they looked like they were going to church.  I didn’t think they’d be able to push me out because they were both fairly thin, but three people combined was just enough to push me out and over the hump of ice.

Next time, I’m braking before I pull into an icy parking lot.  But I also know not to give up! 

And a special guest post from Joel, to finish up the post:

The door swung open, and the dog trotted up and into the house. The owner, an energetic, small-framed woman in her 40's, thanked me profusely.  She said they looked for an hour the night before and had put the other dog outside hoping the barking would bring Fancy, the dog, home. We discussed Fancy's night out and how she had led me back to her home. We were having a nice conversation when another woman in her 40's, let's just say not looking very feminine, comes out and makes sure I know they are together.  The first woman thanks me again and hurries inside. About 2 hours later animal control calls me (we had reported a lost dog the night before) saying that Kathy, the first woman, wanted me to call her. I do, and she thanks me again, offering to buy me something and expressing her gratefulness. I let her know it is unnecessary and that I am just glad Fancy is back home.

LG looked up briefly but then returned to his Legos.  Joel was curiously watching the dog.  In the light, I could look at her much better.  She was tall, about 6 inches taller than Cosette, about 80 pounds, and looked like a strange mix between a Irish Wolfhound and an Airedale Terrier. 

Joel looked up the number for Animal Control and left a message, letting them know the rabies tag number.  He hung up and looked up at me.  I smiled at the dog who had now planted herself at Joel's feet, and said, "Well, I guess she'll spend the night tonight."

We got LG into his pajamas and prepared him for bed.  Bedtime usually consists of a round of hugs -- dogs included.  Raymond hugged Cosette and pointed to the lost dog.  "Cosette, this is going to be your guardian for a few weeks."  I smiled softly at his tenderness and sweetness.

Joel and I talked on the couch for a while that evening, especially about recent challenges in the graduate program.  The lost dog just laid at our feet, content for a warm spot and a quiet house.  The dog was offered, and took, an extra dog bed beside the bed.  What a polite houseguest.

The next morning, Joel decided to take the dog for a longer walk because she had eaten a full breakfast but hadn't used the bathroom.  He set off down the road with her, and then the dog became insistent in the direction they were walking.  The dog gently pulled him in different directions down the road.  Right at the end of the road, left at the bend, up the road, and so on.  The dog, surrounded by snowdrifts, paused for a second.  When she heard a dog barking, she tilted her head and then set off in the direction of the noise.  She brought Joel to the front of house.  They went ahead and walked up to the door and the dog sat down.  Joel looked down at her and said, "Is this it?"  He wasn't sure if that was the correct house or why the dog brought him there.  Then, he saw a face poking through the curtains, and the door swung open.