The miracle

Yesterday the weather was pretty awful here in Braintree. In the morning and for most of the afternoon it rained off and on, with very high winds. Even when the weather cleared later on, the winds were amazing. I spent the day here at home. On the many occasions where I asked Mom to let me outside, I amused myself by chasing the lawn furniture as it whirled around our deck.

That's not the miracle. As you know, I have two feline siblings, Minette and Talisker. They haven't been very close, historically speaking. In fact, until I came along, I'm told that they couldn't be in the same room together without a whole lot of fur flying - mostly Talisker's. Anyway, yesterday Mom and Dad were watching TV in the bedroom and Dad came out to get a drink of water. "Come here!" he called to Mom. "It's worth getting up!" Both cats were on the kitchen table, right next to each other, contentedly dozing. It was amazing. They stayed that way for a good half hour!

It's always the little ones

Yesterday Mom and I went back to the Blue Hills and followed our customary walk around Houghton's Pond. A dusting of snow on Sunday made it a lot less slippery for poor Mom! Anyway, we'd gone maybe a third of the way around the pond when we met a tall, thin man and his little dog. I'm not sure what kind of dog it was, but it kind of looked like a little imp. Maybe it was a French bulldog? It was smaller than my head, whatever the little demon doggie might have been. At any rate, the little critter was snarling, hissing spitting, straining at the leash and making this horrible sound that might have been a growl and might have been the Beasts of the Pit trying to emerge and steal my soul. I didn't care. I showed it that I wanted to play, but its person just picked it up. "This one is very poorly socialized," he told my mom. Yeah, you think? A little later we met another dog. This one was very big, maybe a Boxer or Boxer cross, and was brindled with a bobbed tail. It hid behind its mom and did not bark.

So I didn't meet any new four-legged friends, but I did meet some two legged friends. A man was walking his two nephews in the park, and they were very young and very happy to see me. They liked dogs. They told me about their dog at home, who is an English Spaniel and barks "all the time." She also Does It on the floor. She does not sound like a very good dog.

Regarding sticks....

I'd like to take the opportunity to issue a formal complaint about the quality of sticks in Braintree these days. Yesterday my mom took me for a walk around the neighborhood. There were many sticks on the ground, so many that you'd think you'd died and gone to Heaven. These were good-sized sticks too, with lots of little branches. Some of them were longer than me, and quite thick besides. Every time I picked up a stick, though, it would disintegrate in my mouth. I'd be stuck with this little bit of stick no wider than my mouth.

I don't know what can be done to improve the low quality of Braintree sticks. I'm just a dog. But it is clear to me that something must be done or else there will be no sticks to carry!

I made up for the trauma of the disintegrating sticks last night. I have a tennis ball. It's a low-quality tennis ball, intended for dogs and not for tennis players, and I've pretty well wrecked it. The felt covering hangs off in little rubbery strips. Last night I brought the ball into the bed, grabbed one of the rubbery strips and swung it around. I managed to get Dad in three different bruises, and to get him in his computer monitor.

What a good boy am I!

Yesterday, Mom and Dad had something to do that required them to be out of the house all day. My friends Dwayne and Judith came to get them. I like them, especially Judith. She always wears black pants and lets me lean on her! Dwayne is fun, too. Even Big Sister Minette likes him, and she doesn't like anyone but Mom! Anyway, they all got in the car. Dwayne and Judith got to sit in the back seat, which is my seat, but I don't mind. I like to share.

Now, the day before, Mom and Dad went out to run some errands together. I went into my crate and they left. Imagine their surprise when they returned to find me greeting them at the door! I had escaped from my crate. Dad thinks that he just didn't close the crate right. Mom, well, she's seen me pawing at the latches to the crate, so she knows I understand what they're for. She knows I'm smart enough to get out on my own. They can't prove how I did it, and I'm sure not telling!

So yesterday, when they were getting ready to leave me alone for the whole day, they had a talk. I didn't wreck anything when I was loose and running around the whole house for hours. There isn't even any evidence that I got into the Little Chocolate Treats. When they go away for a longer period of time I usually stay in the downstairs bathroom, but they didn't want to leave me down there for as long as they were planning to be gone. So they decided that they would let me stay in the kitchen. My Auntie Laura had agreed to stop in and let me out later in the day.

What a good boy I was! I knew that this was an important step for Mom and Dad, letting me stay in the kitchen, so I made extra sure that I was good. I didn't wreck anything. I didn't Do It on the floor. When they came home I greeted them at the door, and I was so happy to see them that I crawled right into bed with them. Judith even brought me a little bit of Prime Rib as a reward! I ate it right up.

Two walks in 18 hours

Yesterday, Mom and I went for a walk at Blue Hills again. We followed the same route we did before, just in the other direction. We didn't see anyone, not even my friend Reggie. I think he'd been there, though. I sure smelled him all over the place, in that field by the parking lot!

Later that night, Mom was cooking and Dad decided he would bring me down into the basement to watch the Celtics. I cried and cried until Dad brought me back up to the kitchen where Mom was, where I lay down on the floor and watched her cook. I was so happy I didn't even get under her feet! Later on we went back downstairs, both Mom and I, and that was better. She doesn't like the Celtics half as much as she likes the Patriots, but she was happy enough to play tug with me and my Fling A Fowl.

Then this morning, Mom had to go to the bank. She decided she would bring me. They're going to be gone all day, and she wanted me to have a little fun and feel like I went someplace. She loves me very much! Anyway, it was bitterly cold, but guess what? Because of a holiday earlier this week, people had their garbage out on Saturday, and while I didn't eat any of it I got to sniff it ALL. We made it to the bank. Mom didn't think there would be anyone there, because it was so early, but there were people getting ready to open the bank. I was so happy! They were so happy! Everyone was a dog person, and the head teller even brought out a treat for me. They petted me, and let me lean on them, and rubbed my neck and scritched under my collar so much I thought I'd gone to Heaven. This was Citizens' Bank, for those looking for a bank with nice people who like dogs.

Mom had to get home, so we left, but we took a slightly different route. We met two new dogs, being walked by a man. These were little dogs. I don't know what they were. They looked like someone hit a Shih Tzu with a shrink ray. Mom assured the man that I was friendly (just in case there was any doubt.) The man says, "They aren't. They think they're pit bulls. They're my wife's dogs." It was true - they were snarling and snapping and straining at their leashes. I don't know what they thought they were going to do, they were smaller than the cats at home. I wanted to play with them anyway, but Mom thought that might not be the best idea so we came home.

Mom wanted me to add this thought. The man said his tiny dogs thought they were Pit Bulls. Mom says she used to live with a Pit Bull. He was a beautiful and wonderful dog, even sweeter than I am. He did not snarl and snap at other dogs, and he only strained at the leash if he thought you had ice cream. He liked to lie in the sun, climb up the jungle gym and slide down the slide. Maybe if these dogs thought they were Pit Bulls, maybe Tigger thought he was a Newfie? I don't know. I'll bet Tigger didn't need half as much combing as these two, though!

Homework for me

I haven't been to school in a while. This is apparently because there are supposed to be other dogs in the class and their people were on vacation. In the meantime, I'm supposed to be doing homework. I'm having a very hard time with "stay." I don't really understand this command. The school uses food as a reward. Mom stands there with a treat. She says, "sit." Sit I know. I'm good with Sit. We're old friends. I didn't even need to go to school to learn Sit. Then she says, "Stay." I look at her quizzically. She says "stay" again and takes a step backwards. So I take a step forward and sit again. She rolls her eyes and says, "No, stay." Sometimes I lie down and stay there for a few steps, and then I get a treat. Really, though I like to just get up and take the treat.

The Stars Have Aligned!

Yesterday the stars aligned just for me. It wasn't actively precipitating, it was cold but not dangerously so, and Mom was feeling well. Do you know what that means? She finished her coffee and got dressed, and then she put her boots on. I thought she was going to go someplace dull, like the supermarket. Then she grabbed my scooper, and I just smiled and wagged my tail like anything!

We went out side and brought in the trash cans. I tried to lead her back out onto the sidewalk, but she still outweighs me and was able to get me to go toward the car. I was so happy! I wasn't sure where we were going but I knew that I would love it. I always love anyplace we go in the car. She got me up onto the seat and I wagged my tail the whole way there. She had to turn up the radio.

We got to the Blue Hills Reservation, which was a frozen paradise. We got out of the car and were almost immediately greeted by a very excited English Springer Spaniel named Reggie. (Reggie's person gave a huge grin when he heard my name, but he and Mom didn't talk baseball. That could be dangerous in Boston!) Reggie and I ran around and played for a good twenty minutes. Reggie runs fast. He's about a year older than I am, and he's so well behaved that his dad doesn't need to keep him on a leash. Mom says we're working on it but I'm not there yet, but Reggie didn't seem to mind at all. He was content enough to stay where I could reach him. I loved playing with my new friend, and I made sure that I leaned on his person good and hard to show my gratitude.

After Reggie and I had played for a while, it was time for him to get going, so Mom and I went for a little hike. It wasn't a particularly challenging hike. We just took the trail that went around Houghton's Pond. Mom said that given how icy the trails were she wanted to stick to relatively flat terrain, and I can understand that. I was able to pull her along like a dog sled in a couple of places, which you'd think she'd enjoy. Two-legs - go figure.

The short, flat, icy trail didn't hinder our enjoyment much. There were plenty of things for me to do. Last week's ice storm knocked more than enough sticks for all the dogs in the metropolitan Boston area. One of the first ones that I found was a huge stick, with lots of little sticks sticking up off of it. I carried it around for a while. Then I tried to drop it, but I couldn't! Some of the other little sticks had gotten tangled in my collar. Mom was nervous - one of the was stuck across my throat, so she broke that one off. Once I was unstuck, I picked the stick up and trotted off with it until I found something else to sniff.

I also learned that the cold weather hasn't kept the horses out of the park either. One of them left a huge deposit. I tried to roll in it, because that would have been just the best perfume for the short ride home! It would have stayed in the car forEVER! Unfortunately, or fortunately from Mom's frankly incomprehensible point of view, the deposit was frozen absolutely solid. It might have been a rock. Oh well. I guess one can't really have everything.