I'm not always sure I love my little Alpha Bitch. When I adopted her from the shelter, she was mostly a little bear-like furball, and since I've always had a fondness for bear-like furballs, I wound up bringing her home.
At the time, I thought I wanted a dog about the size she's turned out to be, although since then, I've wished she were only about half as large. I've never been too fond of sweeping up dog hair, either, but that barely crossed my mind when I adopted a pound puppy that looked like a bear. So sometimes I don't like that too much.
She has a really strong protective sense so that she won't even let my sweet Miss Kitty up on the bed with me, and she's got a strong waking reflex so that if anything touches her when she's asleep, her autoresponse is to snap back. So far she hasn't hurt anybody, but it's pretty annoying if I move in my sleep and get snapped at.
But she's good at winning friends when I tell her to "stick ’em up" and she pops her front paws into the air until I tell her "Bang!" so she can roll over and play dead. She does some other tricks, too, which are pretty good for entertainment.
I'd never been much of a ball-player before I got her, and I didn't make a point of playing fetch with her when she moved in, either—but that all changed when her "cousin" Bubba (my Soldier Son's dog) moved in. I've written here before about how Bubba got started with fetch (although Number One Son correctly advises me that the way he plays, it's mostly "catch").
Shortly after NOS moved in, SS went out in the yard to practice swinging a golf club he had just acquired. He made a fine game of chipping the dog ball for the dogs to fetch, which worked fine until he chipped one over the fence into the neighbor's yard. We took turns going next door (the house was vacant then) to see if we could find it, but none of us had any luck with that. A day or two later, Bubba managed to slip out the front door into the yard and down the street with a ball just like it, but when we got Bubba back, we didn't get the ball. I was cranky that day, and I was ticked off that the two boys had managed to lose two relatively new, really nice balls just days after I had bought them.
NOS hopped in his car and took off to buy more balls to shut me up. (No, I wouldn't have been much surprised if he had brought them home and shoved them in my pie hole. Fortunately, by the time he got home, we had both cooled down a lot.) I grabbed a leash, took Bubba next door, and told him to find the ball.
At first, Bubba had a grand time sniffing around the neighbor's yard, and nothing he went near seemed to have anything at all to do with the ball. He finally got tired of exploring, though, dragged me about 40 feet from where the boys had said the ball should be, stuck his nose in the bushes, and pulled it out. The look on his face pretty much said, "That's enough now. Let's play ball!"
We started keeping a leash by the back door so that if the balls tipped out over the fence, we could put Bubba on duty to find them; we've only lost one ball since then, and that may have been because NOS didn't trust Bubba to find it in the dark; by morning, it was gone.
AB never seemed to think it was fair that she was stuck in the fence when Bubba went out to find the balls, so one day NOS let her go out with them—and she found the ball before Bubba did. In fact, even though we hadn't made any real effort to train her to stay close without a leash, we soon discovered that she normally would, so NOS started taking her to find the ball instead of Bubba, saving the effort of getting the leash.
In fact, one day this week, Bubba tipped a ball over the fence, and I just sent AB out to find it on her own. Bubba and I went back to the place where we'd last seen it from the inside, and seconds later, AB had the ball.
This afternoon, Bubba managed to get out the back gate. We don't know why it was open except that several years of sand buildup may have just pushed it too far, but when NOS let the dogs out, Bubba headed straight out the gate and away.
We've discovered that one way to get him back is usually to take a ball onto the driveway and bounce it, calling him to play. Until today, that's worked pretty well.
Today, he came flying down the street, caught the ball, and flew right on past NOS and into the back yard. He emerged a few minutes later from between two houses farther down our street. Without the ball.
NOS caught up with him across the street, where he was heckling the dogs in the neighbor's yard. I asked about the ball, and NOS was sure we'd never see it again.
Alpha Bitch to the rescue. I went to the backdoor, got out the leash, and started out. At first, I just pointed her to the backyard and told her to find the ball. She headed toward the usual places, sniffed under some interesting bushes, and tangled the leash around a dead branch. She worked her way somewhat erratically across one neighbor's yard, up to the front of the next one, and across it to visit with the neighbor who was setting up a lawn sprinkler. No ball.
NOS was back in our front yard, so I quizzed him again about Bubba's adventure. He had started in our back yard, so he could as easily have dropped the ball by the gate, which had long since been closed. AB and I headed there.
That didn't work, so I urged her again to find the ball. This time she followed more of the route NOS had suggested: behind our little barn, through the jungle the neighbor and I consider our back yards, and into the next yard over, this time without working her way to the front. There she stopped to nibble the grass—something she doesn't have a chance to do in her own barren yard. She really, really wanted to eat the little plant she was working on, but I finally dragged her away from the grass, reminding her we needed to find the ball.
This time, she cut across one more yard, working her way to a small, fenced side yard where the neighbors let their pint-sized dogs out to play. She leaned in to sniff at the fence, too curious about the hole under it to look much to her right or left. She might have if I had let her, but I didn't see a need to: she had taken me three houses away and found her ball!
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Seein' red
I got a wonderful note from a former student yesterday:
I loved getting this. What I loved more was his three mentions of the red ink.
I've been grading exclusively with pencil for almost 25 years.
A friend of mine... mentioned that he was taking a technical writing class taught by you. Upon hearing your name, I could not resist letting out a chuckle as I recalled the in red ink and the “rewrites” all over my undergraduate class reports from back in 1999.
The lessons I’ve learned through your courses have helped me immensely, not just in my work related tasks, but also in other areas as well. I hear your voice in my head every time I start writing – “news up front … news up front.” For all the less-than-flattering remarks, red ink, and time spent grading – thanks!
[signed]
P.S. I was a bit disappointed to know that the distance education students only see the black-and-white scanned copies of their reports and miss out on the full traumatic impact of the red ink.
I loved getting this. What I loved more was his three mentions of the red ink.
I've been grading exclusively with pencil for almost 25 years.
Friday, July 30, 2010
The only way you can turn is right
I love my town.
Partly I love my town because of its idiosyncrasies. I don't understand them, but they do give me a chance to chuckle.
My town lies smack-dab up against the university where I work, except that that's a different town. It starts just across the street from the end of my block, five houses away from mine. It wasn't that way when we bought this place three decades ago; I'm pretty sure School Town's city limits were where they are now, but my town stopped a few miles short of my subdivision; we lived here a couple of years before our little municipal utility district (I always loved that that made it a MUD) was absorbed into the city. The city limits sign out on the highway has "leaving" my town and "entering" ST on the same post.
That's not a new practice; I don't remember a time when we could drive from the house where I grew up toward the college without passing signs like that. The two towns—cities now—have completely separate governments, and that has manifested in different business models, but they've always lain shoulder to shoulder on the city maps.
But I'm never quite sure which way I'm heading here, and this week, that just got more confusing.
I grew up a couple of blocks from the most direct route from the downtown of my town to the college in the other town. That street is called South College, which my little-kid brain somehow interpreted as "South of the College" rather than "South to the College," which assured me that my house—and thereby my town—was south of the school. I never entertained the possibility that that didn't align with larger maps of our community as a part of our state; after all, half a dozen blocks from our house toward the university was a street—in our town, not the college's—called North Street.
So if we got on South College and headed toward the school, we passed North Street, so surely we must be headed north on the street that, obviously, had to be south of the college. That took most of my life to straighten out; even now, if I take South College toward downtown and pass North, I'm pretty sure I must be headed south.
The school once had gates all around it, and they were named for the relative sides of the campus: north, east, south, and west. The student bookstores and, later, eateries and bars lined up along the side called Northgate, which in my kid-brain meant it was the side of the campus north of my town. Mother's favorite fabric shop and beauty parlor was on the other side of campus, but I don't remember hearing that area called "Southgate" until I was at least old enough to drive.
"Westgate" has always been somewhat undefined in my mind; it may have been the campus entrance to the student center, but I couldn't be sure of that. "East Gate" has always been perfectly clear: it's the main drive that extends eastward from the main campus building to the street that was once the main highway through the two towns. I'm okay with that.
Our downtown area has its requisite "east" and "west" streets, too. I grew up thinking the "east" streets run east of the old highway and the "west" streets run west of it, although in fact they run pretty much southeast, parallel to—you may have guessed it—South College (and the "south" part of the old highway). So "east" and "west" streets parallel "south" streets, and at one point, because of the bend in the old highway, two "east" streets intersect. So how would anyone guess which way they're heading?
A few years ago, the city started a big new housing development near my neighborhood. The main drag from town to its main entrance is one of the east-west streets, which is fine with me since I've sort of figured out directions on my side of town.
The street into the subdivision runs perpendicular to West X, then splits into a horseshoe-shaped street so that the base of the U runs briefly parallel to West X. Logically, the two parts of the U should be "East U" and "West U" (since they run parallel to West X), but instead the developers decided to designate them as "North U" and "South U." Most of "North U" runs mostly eastward and "South U" runs to the south or west.
When these streets were built, North U joined up with the street at the top of our block that parallels West X but had an old family name. Since it has only about four addresses on it, the city decided to rename it to match the longer length of North U. So now I can drive west on West X, turn south on a stretch of highway, and turn again to the west on North U.
And people wonder why I stay confused.
Partly I love my town because of its idiosyncrasies. I don't understand them, but they do give me a chance to chuckle.
My town lies smack-dab up against the university where I work, except that that's a different town. It starts just across the street from the end of my block, five houses away from mine. It wasn't that way when we bought this place three decades ago; I'm pretty sure School Town's city limits were where they are now, but my town stopped a few miles short of my subdivision; we lived here a couple of years before our little municipal utility district (I always loved that that made it a MUD) was absorbed into the city. The city limits sign out on the highway has "leaving" my town and "entering" ST on the same post.
That's not a new practice; I don't remember a time when we could drive from the house where I grew up toward the college without passing signs like that. The two towns—cities now—have completely separate governments, and that has manifested in different business models, but they've always lain shoulder to shoulder on the city maps.
But I'm never quite sure which way I'm heading here, and this week, that just got more confusing.
I grew up a couple of blocks from the most direct route from the downtown of my town to the college in the other town. That street is called South College, which my little-kid brain somehow interpreted as "South of the College" rather than "South to the College," which assured me that my house—and thereby my town—was south of the school. I never entertained the possibility that that didn't align with larger maps of our community as a part of our state; after all, half a dozen blocks from our house toward the university was a street—in our town, not the college's—called North Street.
So if we got on South College and headed toward the school, we passed North Street, so surely we must be headed north on the street that, obviously, had to be south of the college. That took most of my life to straighten out; even now, if I take South College toward downtown and pass North, I'm pretty sure I must be headed south.
The school once had gates all around it, and they were named for the relative sides of the campus: north, east, south, and west. The student bookstores and, later, eateries and bars lined up along the side called Northgate, which in my kid-brain meant it was the side of the campus north of my town. Mother's favorite fabric shop and beauty parlor was on the other side of campus, but I don't remember hearing that area called "Southgate" until I was at least old enough to drive.
"Westgate" has always been somewhat undefined in my mind; it may have been the campus entrance to the student center, but I couldn't be sure of that. "East Gate" has always been perfectly clear: it's the main drive that extends eastward from the main campus building to the street that was once the main highway through the two towns. I'm okay with that.
Our downtown area has its requisite "east" and "west" streets, too. I grew up thinking the "east" streets run east of the old highway and the "west" streets run west of it, although in fact they run pretty much southeast, parallel to—you may have guessed it—South College (and the "south" part of the old highway). So "east" and "west" streets parallel "south" streets, and at one point, because of the bend in the old highway, two "east" streets intersect. So how would anyone guess which way they're heading?
A few years ago, the city started a big new housing development near my neighborhood. The main drag from town to its main entrance is one of the east-west streets, which is fine with me since I've sort of figured out directions on my side of town.
The street into the subdivision runs perpendicular to West X, then splits into a horseshoe-shaped street so that the base of the U runs briefly parallel to West X. Logically, the two parts of the U should be "East U" and "West U" (since they run parallel to West X), but instead the developers decided to designate them as "North U" and "South U." Most of "North U" runs mostly eastward and "South U" runs to the south or west.
When these streets were built, North U joined up with the street at the top of our block that parallels West X but had an old family name. Since it has only about four addresses on it, the city decided to rename it to match the longer length of North U. So now I can drive west on West X, turn south on a stretch of highway, and turn again to the west on North U.
And people wonder why I stay confused.
Wolf and Fuzzy
Alpha Bitch has been doing more than her share of barking lately. I'm not sure what has caused most of it, but she has somewhat exceeded my idea of warning me that something is moving around outside and veered right on over to irritating the bejeebers out of me.
A couple of nights ago, this went on to the extent that I sent her to her kennel for time out. She's been there enough lately that I can tell her to go into her time out, and she'll sit in it patiently until I have time to put down my laptop, slush across the room, and shoot the lock for her.
Tank usually gets the idea and climbs back up on the couch to wait for the end of her sentence, but this week he was loath to leave the window where she had been barking. He wasn't as noisy as she was, but he was clearly interested in the unusual activity, so he hung out for some time at the front windows.
After a bit, Number One Son went out to the front porch for a date with a coffin nail and came back reporting that two black Labrador puppies who didn't have collars or tags were the focus of the racket. "They're just puppies, Mom, but they're as big as Tank!" he said. "Do you have any idea where they live?"
I remembered hearing that a neighbor up the street—who doesn't happen to have a fence around his yard—had told me recently that his daughter had adopted a new black Lab puppy, and since Dad also has Labs, I thought two could possibly have moved in. NOS strolled up the street to ask about them, stopped at a house or two on the way back, but came up empty. Alpha Bitch stayed in her kennel.
Tank kept a fairly close vigil at the window, checking in periodically with the pups outside, especially when NOS went out later for another coffin nail. Tank has a bad habit of knocking on a back window when he wants in, especially at night, and after a couple of hours, the window knocking began. I fussed at Tank, who turned around to see what I wanted, but the knocking didn't stop; the mutts outside must have been doing it.
I hollered upstairs at NOS to get his help: "Come see what you can do with these dogs!" NOS is one of those people who just seems to know how to get along with animals, so I figured he could come up with a plan; we had already agreed that they had to belong in the neighborhood and we weren't about to call the animal shelter.
A couple of minutes later, NOS came scrambling down the stairs with the kids' friend Shrek, who is living with us while he settles back in from several months on a mission trip to Africa. Shrek grew up on farmland near the edge of town, where he frequently had to shoo stray or feral dogs off the property, and he was confident that he knew what to do.
The next thing I heard was Shrek making a lot of really ugly noises to frighten these puppies into leaving, so I followed the guys outside to try to negotiate a different solution. One of the puppies had taken off into the darkness, but the other was stubbornly still on the driveway, and I saw in a flash that NOS was right; this animal must have been pushing 60 pounds, but he was almost as raggedy as squishy stuffed toy. I wasn't convinced that he was a Lab, but he was definitely a big dog, and to me he looked lonely and scared.
Our dogs are perfectly happy to go to their kennels when we send them to time out, the office, or night-night, but usually they spend nights on our beds. While Alpha Bitch's kennel was occupied at the time, Tank's wasn't, and it was marginally big enough for two somewhat outsized puppies. I dragged it outside, and the boys set it up next to the curb behind Shrek's car where the puppies would be far enough from the house to stop annoying our dogs but caged up so they wouldn't take off toward the highway a couple of blocks away. If owners came looking, they'd be visible and safe.
These guys clearly hadn't been trained to get into kennels; we managed to grab enough of the first one's scruff to push, pull, and drag him into it. He wasn't eager to get in, but he seemed eager to please, and as soon as he was inside, he lay down and looked pretty comfortable.
By that time, Tank had let us know where to look for the other one; although Shrek had seen him take off in a generally easterly direction, I had sent Tank out to the back yard while I dragged the kennel out, and Tank's barks let us know the other pup had headed west.
NOS grabbed a flashlight in hopes of spotting a black puppy in a dark yard and was just about there when a neighbor showed up in the street with a pair of leashes in her hand. "Have you seen a couple of—?" was as far as she got when she spotted the first one in the kennel. "Omigosh! What is he doing here?"
A few seconds later, NOS came back up the driveway with the other pup in his arms. The neighbor explained that the dogs were part bloodhound and part setter and should reach 150 pounds or more. The daughter's boyfriend is planning to train them, like their sire and dam, to be search and rescue dogs, but mom and dad were puppy sitting with their big, fenced back yard. The fence didn't slow the puppies down too much; they had clearly dug their way under it and lost their special, see-the-black-dog-in-the-dark collars somewhere between there and my house.
"What are their names?" I asked her.
"Wolf and Fuzzy," she answered.
Go figure: exactly the name most people called my ex and the pet name I used for him.
He hates dogs.
A couple of nights ago, this went on to the extent that I sent her to her kennel for time out. She's been there enough lately that I can tell her to go into her time out, and she'll sit in it patiently until I have time to put down my laptop, slush across the room, and shoot the lock for her.
Tank usually gets the idea and climbs back up on the couch to wait for the end of her sentence, but this week he was loath to leave the window where she had been barking. He wasn't as noisy as she was, but he was clearly interested in the unusual activity, so he hung out for some time at the front windows.
After a bit, Number One Son went out to the front porch for a date with a coffin nail and came back reporting that two black Labrador puppies who didn't have collars or tags were the focus of the racket. "They're just puppies, Mom, but they're as big as Tank!" he said. "Do you have any idea where they live?"
I remembered hearing that a neighbor up the street—who doesn't happen to have a fence around his yard—had told me recently that his daughter had adopted a new black Lab puppy, and since Dad also has Labs, I thought two could possibly have moved in. NOS strolled up the street to ask about them, stopped at a house or two on the way back, but came up empty. Alpha Bitch stayed in her kennel.
Tank kept a fairly close vigil at the window, checking in periodically with the pups outside, especially when NOS went out later for another coffin nail. Tank has a bad habit of knocking on a back window when he wants in, especially at night, and after a couple of hours, the window knocking began. I fussed at Tank, who turned around to see what I wanted, but the knocking didn't stop; the mutts outside must have been doing it.
I hollered upstairs at NOS to get his help: "Come see what you can do with these dogs!" NOS is one of those people who just seems to know how to get along with animals, so I figured he could come up with a plan; we had already agreed that they had to belong in the neighborhood and we weren't about to call the animal shelter.
A couple of minutes later, NOS came scrambling down the stairs with the kids' friend Shrek, who is living with us while he settles back in from several months on a mission trip to Africa. Shrek grew up on farmland near the edge of town, where he frequently had to shoo stray or feral dogs off the property, and he was confident that he knew what to do.
The next thing I heard was Shrek making a lot of really ugly noises to frighten these puppies into leaving, so I followed the guys outside to try to negotiate a different solution. One of the puppies had taken off into the darkness, but the other was stubbornly still on the driveway, and I saw in a flash that NOS was right; this animal must have been pushing 60 pounds, but he was almost as raggedy as squishy stuffed toy. I wasn't convinced that he was a Lab, but he was definitely a big dog, and to me he looked lonely and scared.
Our dogs are perfectly happy to go to their kennels when we send them to time out, the office, or night-night, but usually they spend nights on our beds. While Alpha Bitch's kennel was occupied at the time, Tank's wasn't, and it was marginally big enough for two somewhat outsized puppies. I dragged it outside, and the boys set it up next to the curb behind Shrek's car where the puppies would be far enough from the house to stop annoying our dogs but caged up so they wouldn't take off toward the highway a couple of blocks away. If owners came looking, they'd be visible and safe.
These guys clearly hadn't been trained to get into kennels; we managed to grab enough of the first one's scruff to push, pull, and drag him into it. He wasn't eager to get in, but he seemed eager to please, and as soon as he was inside, he lay down and looked pretty comfortable.
By that time, Tank had let us know where to look for the other one; although Shrek had seen him take off in a generally easterly direction, I had sent Tank out to the back yard while I dragged the kennel out, and Tank's barks let us know the other pup had headed west.
NOS grabbed a flashlight in hopes of spotting a black puppy in a dark yard and was just about there when a neighbor showed up in the street with a pair of leashes in her hand. "Have you seen a couple of—?" was as far as she got when she spotted the first one in the kennel. "Omigosh! What is he doing here?"
A few seconds later, NOS came back up the driveway with the other pup in his arms. The neighbor explained that the dogs were part bloodhound and part setter and should reach 150 pounds or more. The daughter's boyfriend is planning to train them, like their sire and dam, to be search and rescue dogs, but mom and dad were puppy sitting with their big, fenced back yard. The fence didn't slow the puppies down too much; they had clearly dug their way under it and lost their special, see-the-black-dog-in-the-dark collars somewhere between there and my house.
"What are their names?" I asked her.
"Wolf and Fuzzy," she answered.
Go figure: exactly the name most people called my ex and the pet name I used for him.
He hates dogs.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Adventures in puppysitting
When my brilliant but slightly scatterbrained friend at work popped into my office this afternoon and asked if I had a key to her house, I told her sure, but it was out in my car; I sort of assumed she'd locked hers into her house and wanted to borrow mine to get herself in. I suggested that she could drive me to her car (she parks right behind our building; I park a couple of blocks away) to get it.
We had just gotten out of a lunch meeting, and I was firing up my computer to start my afternoon, but a delay to go get her key would be no problem. As we headed toward the parking lot, BSB launched happily into an explanation of the steps she takes to care for her two new puppies at lunchtime, and I thought she was on her way home to do all that. She mentioned briefly that she needed to be in her office shortly to meet with the luncheon speaker, so I assumed she wanted me to go with her to help her get into the house, care for two puppies, and get back to her meeting.
We piled into her car when it hit her: She didn't need me to get her a key; she needed me to go care for the puppies so she could stay on campus for her meeting. And I didn't really need to go to my car; she had a garage door opener that would get me into the house, and she didn't mind letting me drive her car. I shifted into the passenger seat and started the car (which is new enough that the "key" only has to be in the car to start it), shifted into gear, and stalled. The engine kept going, but the vehicle didn't budge. BSB realized what was going on: She had set the parking break and I hadn't released it. I realized I didn't have pockets, so I didn't have my cell phone on me in case anything else went wrong.
She came back and showed me how to release the break, pointed to the radar detector and said something I didn't catch, and headed back to her office. I bravely maneuvered her classy vehicle out of the parking lot and safely to her house a couple of miles away and reached for the garage opener.
Only I couldn't find it. I have two options for mine: a clip-on device that lives on the visor or a key-fob device I use when I drive my son's car. Hers didn't have either of those. I was sure she had an opener; I just couldn't find it anywhere on the the visor, the instrument panel, the console, or the headliner. Stuck in the street without my cell phone (her driveway is being repaved, so I couldn't pull into it), I hunted for buttons all over the radar detector, all to no avail. I finally found a row of little house-like icons along the bottom of the rear view mirror, so I systematically pushed each of those—to no avail.
Not quite ready to give up, I backed up the car, circled the cul de sac, and took one more shot at the buttons, pushing the first one down as soon as the car started to point to the house and holding it until, low and behold, the door started to open. I pointed the car into a space between mailboxes on the cul de sac and headed in to the dogs.
They seemed happy enough to see me, although they'd never seen me before and probably wouldn't have remembered me if they had. I snatched them out of their wire kennels and zipped to the backyard so they could potty, then sat down on the deck to watch them play. The boy puppy was the first to find a toy, but the girl was the first to run off with one. As soon as she did, he took off after her, and I distracted him by squeaking and tossing another toy for him to chase. My puppy at home is a couple of years old now, and I enjoyed watching these babies tumble over themselves and each other.
Knowing I had work waiting at the office, I let them play for several minutes then scooped them up to go inside to eat. BSB had told me she was in the habit of hand-feeding them, but I had learned that her previous "hand-fed" dogs ate just fine for me if I scattered their food on the floor; that worked pretty well for these babies, too. I found one puppy dish and then another, and as I dropped a couple of handfuls of food into each dish, they happily ate until they seemed full.
While they were eating, BSB's cat (who has not quite decided what to make of these puppies and who usually doesn't hang around the house when I am there alone) showed up at the glass door between the sunroom and the kitchen, where the puppies were eating. I twisted the knob just enough to let her in and slipped out of her way. She eased in far enough to stretch out just inside the door and observe the munching.
Girl puppy had brought a little squid-shaped squeaky toy into the kitchen with her, and when she finished eating, she picked it up and headed for the door. Where the cat was. Since these animals have not quite made their peace, the cat backed into a sitting position, almost daring GP to try for the door.
GP tried once, then twice, to push through the door, each time rebuffed by the cat, who gazed at her as if to say, "Surely you don't think you're coming through."
The third time, GP determinedly turned her head away from the cat, who gave in, turned her head the other way, and slithered into the kitchen. Boy puppy, who had been observing this interchange, realized that the cat was out of the way, GP had made it into the sunroom, and GP had a toy. He bounded out to her and, realizing she wasn't about to give up the toy, sat on her face.
I had located a water bowl, convinced them both to come back for a drink, then led them back through the sunroom for one more chance to potty before I left. Since they need to learn to use the doggy doors, I slipped outside first, held open the flap, and encouraged them to tumble through. They followed me out into the yard, romped and played and took care of business, and followed me back onto the deck. I squatted by the doggie door, opened the flap, and pushed them back inside.
I rounded up a handful of puppy treats and headed back to the kennels. A coupe of treats in GP's kennel had her inside in a flash, with BP hot on her heels. I backed him out, tossed treats into his kennel, and pointed him in. He somehow managed to bounce a treat outside his kennel, but I scooped it up and pushed him in after it.
I did much better at getting the car started, but I somehow clipped the curb on my way back out of the cul de sac. No apparent damage, but I think next time I'll drive my own car, even if it means I have to operate locks with ordinary keys.
And I'm wondering if I'll get a chance someday to own a tiny little Schnauzer.
We had just gotten out of a lunch meeting, and I was firing up my computer to start my afternoon, but a delay to go get her key would be no problem. As we headed toward the parking lot, BSB launched happily into an explanation of the steps she takes to care for her two new puppies at lunchtime, and I thought she was on her way home to do all that. She mentioned briefly that she needed to be in her office shortly to meet with the luncheon speaker, so I assumed she wanted me to go with her to help her get into the house, care for two puppies, and get back to her meeting.
We piled into her car when it hit her: She didn't need me to get her a key; she needed me to go care for the puppies so she could stay on campus for her meeting. And I didn't really need to go to my car; she had a garage door opener that would get me into the house, and she didn't mind letting me drive her car. I shifted into the passenger seat and started the car (which is new enough that the "key" only has to be in the car to start it), shifted into gear, and stalled. The engine kept going, but the vehicle didn't budge. BSB realized what was going on: She had set the parking break and I hadn't released it. I realized I didn't have pockets, so I didn't have my cell phone on me in case anything else went wrong.
She came back and showed me how to release the break, pointed to the radar detector and said something I didn't catch, and headed back to her office. I bravely maneuvered her classy vehicle out of the parking lot and safely to her house a couple of miles away and reached for the garage opener.
Only I couldn't find it. I have two options for mine: a clip-on device that lives on the visor or a key-fob device I use when I drive my son's car. Hers didn't have either of those. I was sure she had an opener; I just couldn't find it anywhere on the the visor, the instrument panel, the console, or the headliner. Stuck in the street without my cell phone (her driveway is being repaved, so I couldn't pull into it), I hunted for buttons all over the radar detector, all to no avail. I finally found a row of little house-like icons along the bottom of the rear view mirror, so I systematically pushed each of those—to no avail.
Not quite ready to give up, I backed up the car, circled the cul de sac, and took one more shot at the buttons, pushing the first one down as soon as the car started to point to the house and holding it until, low and behold, the door started to open. I pointed the car into a space between mailboxes on the cul de sac and headed in to the dogs.
They seemed happy enough to see me, although they'd never seen me before and probably wouldn't have remembered me if they had. I snatched them out of their wire kennels and zipped to the backyard so they could potty, then sat down on the deck to watch them play. The boy puppy was the first to find a toy, but the girl was the first to run off with one. As soon as she did, he took off after her, and I distracted him by squeaking and tossing another toy for him to chase. My puppy at home is a couple of years old now, and I enjoyed watching these babies tumble over themselves and each other.
Knowing I had work waiting at the office, I let them play for several minutes then scooped them up to go inside to eat. BSB had told me she was in the habit of hand-feeding them, but I had learned that her previous "hand-fed" dogs ate just fine for me if I scattered their food on the floor; that worked pretty well for these babies, too. I found one puppy dish and then another, and as I dropped a couple of handfuls of food into each dish, they happily ate until they seemed full.
While they were eating, BSB's cat (who has not quite decided what to make of these puppies and who usually doesn't hang around the house when I am there alone) showed up at the glass door between the sunroom and the kitchen, where the puppies were eating. I twisted the knob just enough to let her in and slipped out of her way. She eased in far enough to stretch out just inside the door and observe the munching.
Girl puppy had brought a little squid-shaped squeaky toy into the kitchen with her, and when she finished eating, she picked it up and headed for the door. Where the cat was. Since these animals have not quite made their peace, the cat backed into a sitting position, almost daring GP to try for the door.
GP tried once, then twice, to push through the door, each time rebuffed by the cat, who gazed at her as if to say, "Surely you don't think you're coming through."
The third time, GP determinedly turned her head away from the cat, who gave in, turned her head the other way, and slithered into the kitchen. Boy puppy, who had been observing this interchange, realized that the cat was out of the way, GP had made it into the sunroom, and GP had a toy. He bounded out to her and, realizing she wasn't about to give up the toy, sat on her face.
I had located a water bowl, convinced them both to come back for a drink, then led them back through the sunroom for one more chance to potty before I left. Since they need to learn to use the doggy doors, I slipped outside first, held open the flap, and encouraged them to tumble through. They followed me out into the yard, romped and played and took care of business, and followed me back onto the deck. I squatted by the doggie door, opened the flap, and pushed them back inside.
I rounded up a handful of puppy treats and headed back to the kennels. A coupe of treats in GP's kennel had her inside in a flash, with BP hot on her heels. I backed him out, tossed treats into his kennel, and pointed him in. He somehow managed to bounce a treat outside his kennel, but I scooped it up and pushed him in after it.
I did much better at getting the car started, but I somehow clipped the curb on my way back out of the cul de sac. No apparent damage, but I think next time I'll drive my own car, even if it means I have to operate locks with ordinary keys.
And I'm wondering if I'll get a chance someday to own a tiny little Schnauzer.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Ok, I wasn't expecting that....
After a long consulting session this afternoon with one of my graduate students, she commented that she liked my fingers.
Since my typical sessions entail sitting at a small desk shoulder-to-shoulder with the student and working through the assignment in question, I wasn't surprised that she had had opportunity to notice my hands, but let's face it: my square palms, stubby fingers, and erractic nails are not exactly model quality, even if you discount for wrinkles and age spots.
I was wearing a new silver filigree butterfly ring that I bought on the cheap a couple of weeks ago and another costume-jewelry ring that I've had for a couple of years—not things of beauty, but the only thing I could see that might have caught her attention.
"My rings?" I asked; she couldn't possibly have otherwise meant my fingers.
"No, your feet," she answered.
Fingers? On my feet? Okay, she is a lovely lady from the Middle East whose English, by her own admission, isn't strong, although her command of the jargon of her discipline is quite good.
But my toes? What could possibly draw her to comment on my toes?
I was wearing a new pair of Dr. Scholl's sandals that I kind of like, and I had recently trimmed and polished my toenails (mostly to hide the bruise under one of them). But I have the kind of toes that people make fun of because only very small children have shorter fingers, and I've pretty much always been able to pick up small objects off the floor with them—saves bending over.
"My toes? Are you saying you like my toes? My polish, maybe?"
"No, the fingers," she insisted. "You have nice fingers."
Turns out that somewhere in this world, toes that lie together as if they fit in a shoe rather than splayed out like a claw are worthy of admiration. Mine only fit in round-toed, double wide shoes, but they do all play nicely together.
But I don't think I've ever been complimented on them before.
Since my typical sessions entail sitting at a small desk shoulder-to-shoulder with the student and working through the assignment in question, I wasn't surprised that she had had opportunity to notice my hands, but let's face it: my square palms, stubby fingers, and erractic nails are not exactly model quality, even if you discount for wrinkles and age spots.
I was wearing a new silver filigree butterfly ring that I bought on the cheap a couple of weeks ago and another costume-jewelry ring that I've had for a couple of years—not things of beauty, but the only thing I could see that might have caught her attention.
"My rings?" I asked; she couldn't possibly have otherwise meant my fingers.
"No, your feet," she answered.
Fingers? On my feet? Okay, she is a lovely lady from the Middle East whose English, by her own admission, isn't strong, although her command of the jargon of her discipline is quite good.
But my toes? What could possibly draw her to comment on my toes?
I was wearing a new pair of Dr. Scholl's sandals that I kind of like, and I had recently trimmed and polished my toenails (mostly to hide the bruise under one of them). But I have the kind of toes that people make fun of because only very small children have shorter fingers, and I've pretty much always been able to pick up small objects off the floor with them—saves bending over.
"My toes? Are you saying you like my toes? My polish, maybe?"
"No, the fingers," she insisted. "You have nice fingers."
Turns out that somewhere in this world, toes that lie together as if they fit in a shoe rather than splayed out like a claw are worthy of admiration. Mine only fit in round-toed, double wide shoes, but they do all play nicely together.
But I don't think I've ever been complimented on them before.
Monday, July 12, 2010
My dogs won't let me play hooky
My dogs won't let me play hooky.
I really wanted to today, for at least an hour or so. I deserved it; Friday I stayed at the office until after 7 p.m. working with an online student who was having a problem with my class.
And I needed it. I didn't sleep well last night for reasons I don't know. My day yesterday was a pretty normal Sunday: worked on the computer until around noon; cleaned up and went to lunch where I read a couple of chapters of a fascinating book one of my former students left me in appreciation for my class; an hour or so at the grocery store. It diverged a little after that because instead of dropping in on the former in-laws as I have been doing for several months now, I came home to a phone call from one of their daughters laying out the plans for what could be the weirdest (but maybe the neatest) funeral I've ever attended.
About the time I finished off a note to the kids to update them on their grandfather's deteriorating condition, a friend from my high-school days showed up on the front porch to show me how to take care of a couple of problems with windows. Long story about how Jim reappeared in my life, but nice to see him again and catch up on his life, his wife, and the fact that we both seem to have turned out okay, in spite of being liberals in central Texas.
I fiddled on the computer a while before bed, but I wasn't terribly sleepy, so I did the Sunday crossword and snuggled under the covers. And my eyes flew open.
I had taken a couple of honest-to-goodness pseudophedrine tablets earlier in the day (in hopes that its stronger formula than the standard knock-off now easily available would help me breathe better), but I don't know of pseudophedrine keeping anyone awake.
Around 4 a.m., I got up and let the Alpha Bitch out to try to keep her from waking me once I finally dropped off, and when the alarm went off at 6:30, I let her out and left the door open so she and the cat and Bubba could come and go without me.
Bubba's routine is to come downstairs when Number One Son gets up around 7:30, and he's used to checking on me in my lounger, where I'm usually already settled into getting the day's work done—yes, even on weekends. I don't know whether he went out before he came to the bedroom to check on me, but before 7:45 I was well aware of his flat-footed presence next to my face: he was happily sloshing me off with his washrag tongue as if to tell me it was time to get up.
Alpha Bitch was right beside him, forepaws up on the bed, not so much as if they wanted to hop in bed with me as to let me know they thought I needed to get up.
Even when he wasn't licking me, Bubba was hovering over me, warm breath on my face to let me know he wasn't about to leave. I reminded them that the door was open and they didn't need me to go out.
I finally gave in—still not yet 8 a.m.—and dragged myself out of bed and into the kitchen. Bubba and Alpha stood guard at the refrigerator until I dragged out the milk and got out my morning vitamins.
I showed them the door and asked if they wanted to go out, but they seemed to be not interested. Instead, they went to the door to the dining room, and I followed on the way to my chair.
As soon as they had corralled me into the right direction, Alpha took up her post on the floor in front of me and Bubba draped himself across his favorite chair. They both went immediately to sleep.
Which was okay, apparently, as long as they were sure I wasn't playing hooky!
I really wanted to today, for at least an hour or so. I deserved it; Friday I stayed at the office until after 7 p.m. working with an online student who was having a problem with my class.
And I needed it. I didn't sleep well last night for reasons I don't know. My day yesterday was a pretty normal Sunday: worked on the computer until around noon; cleaned up and went to lunch where I read a couple of chapters of a fascinating book one of my former students left me in appreciation for my class; an hour or so at the grocery store. It diverged a little after that because instead of dropping in on the former in-laws as I have been doing for several months now, I came home to a phone call from one of their daughters laying out the plans for what could be the weirdest (but maybe the neatest) funeral I've ever attended.
About the time I finished off a note to the kids to update them on their grandfather's deteriorating condition, a friend from my high-school days showed up on the front porch to show me how to take care of a couple of problems with windows. Long story about how Jim reappeared in my life, but nice to see him again and catch up on his life, his wife, and the fact that we both seem to have turned out okay, in spite of being liberals in central Texas.
I fiddled on the computer a while before bed, but I wasn't terribly sleepy, so I did the Sunday crossword and snuggled under the covers. And my eyes flew open.
I had taken a couple of honest-to-goodness pseudophedrine tablets earlier in the day (in hopes that its stronger formula than the standard knock-off now easily available would help me breathe better), but I don't know of pseudophedrine keeping anyone awake.
Around 4 a.m., I got up and let the Alpha Bitch out to try to keep her from waking me once I finally dropped off, and when the alarm went off at 6:30, I let her out and left the door open so she and the cat and Bubba could come and go without me.
Bubba's routine is to come downstairs when Number One Son gets up around 7:30, and he's used to checking on me in my lounger, where I'm usually already settled into getting the day's work done—yes, even on weekends. I don't know whether he went out before he came to the bedroom to check on me, but before 7:45 I was well aware of his flat-footed presence next to my face: he was happily sloshing me off with his washrag tongue as if to tell me it was time to get up.
Alpha Bitch was right beside him, forepaws up on the bed, not so much as if they wanted to hop in bed with me as to let me know they thought I needed to get up.
Even when he wasn't licking me, Bubba was hovering over me, warm breath on my face to let me know he wasn't about to leave. I reminded them that the door was open and they didn't need me to go out.
I finally gave in—still not yet 8 a.m.—and dragged myself out of bed and into the kitchen. Bubba and Alpha stood guard at the refrigerator until I dragged out the milk and got out my morning vitamins.
I showed them the door and asked if they wanted to go out, but they seemed to be not interested. Instead, they went to the door to the dining room, and I followed on the way to my chair.
As soon as they had corralled me into the right direction, Alpha took up her post on the floor in front of me and Bubba draped himself across his favorite chair. They both went immediately to sleep.
Which was okay, apparently, as long as they were sure I wasn't playing hooky!
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