Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

A Do Over

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I hate to break this to you, but I don’t always say or do the right thing.  So many times, I open my mouth and insert my foot. (Too damn many times.)

What I really love about having a blog is the ability to write something and tweak it, until it sounds exactly like I want it to. No awkward, “oops, I guess I shouldn’t have said that.”  Because most times sometimes friends, I’m NOT politically correct and sometimes, I’m a bitch and sometimes I’m a bitch when I don’t mean to be a bitch and then there are times when I should be a bitch, but I’m not.

As any of you that read this blog know, walking my dogs where I live can be quite challenging. There’ve been a number of times when we’ve run into someone and their dogs where I should have said something other than what I did. Or times when I WISH I’d said it differently.

Times where I really want a do over.

So here’s what happened.

One sunny spring day on our afternoon walk, I heard a car start up and realized it was coming from the house we were approaching. I stopped the dogs to wait while the person backed out of their driveway.

The man backed out and started to move towards us and then stopped, rolling down his window. Delilah was sitting calmly beside me in the grass, while Sampson was dancing thinking he was about to make a new friend.

“What’s going on?” the man asked me.

“Nothing.” I replied.

“Well I don’t like the dogs on my lawn.”

I was stunned and at a loss, “I’m sorry” I managed to get out, “I was stopping to let you back out of your driveway.”

I walked away trying not to cry, it just felt so mean.

I’ve thought it over and over in my mind and if I ever have a situation like that again here’s what I’d like to say.

“Actually my dog is sitting on the ROW, also known as the Right of Way. It’s the first five or so feet of your property and in this case, it’s owned by the town in case they decide to add sidewalks to the neighborhood, or maybe widen the road.  I was being polite in not putting myself or my dogs in your way while you were backing out, but don’t worry, that won’t happen again. Next time, I’ll let you hit me. Oh and as for my dogs on your lawn, I wouldn’t let them on your lawn to piss on you if you were on fire. Have a nice day, douche bag.”

What's a douche bag?

What’s a douche bag?

My devious mind came up with a revenge plot but I won’t do it, because Karma really is a bitch, BUT I am actually going to use this exact scenario with my revenge in one of my books.

Do you ever wish for a Do Over? Given the option, what would your do over be?

The Sky Is Falling

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Sometimes I think the Universe has a weird sense of humor and I just have to laugh. No siriusly, if I didn’t laugh I’d probably cry.

What I mean is, it seems like I just get one thing ironed out and another wrinkle appears.

As long time readers may recall last year we struggled with Delilah chasing leaves. In fact, in one memorable adventure I wound up on my back in the road because Delilah thought a leaf was worth chasing. (From my point of view, it wasn’t.)

In the fictional story of Chicken Little a chicken is hit on the head with an acorn and starts a real fuss about the sky falling.  Now I was told that chickens were smart, so it seems to me this little chicken would do some kind of investigating, like maybe look up into the sky and see if a big ole’ chunk was missing, but she doesn’t. Instead she engages a myriad of other animals and together they all rush off to tell the King the horrible news that the sky is falling.

I know, what the hell does a chicken have to do with my blog?

We’ve had some lovely fall weather. I can’t complain, but the acorns, the acorns are intense this year. I’d go so far as to say, it’s raining acorns and has been for at least the past month.

Smashed, cracked or whole, we have acorns.

Smashed, cracked or whole, we have acorns.

We either don’t have enough squirrels in our area, or that little bastards aren’t doing their jobs, because we are practically swimming in acorns.

Sometimes it seems like the sky IS falling, and my own chicken little doesn’t understand that they are in fact acorns that are falling to the ground and rolling down the street.

When we step into the woods the first thing we hear is an acorn falling. We stop, the dogs stare at the spot in the general vicinity of where they heard the noise.

It sounds like someone's there.

It sounds like someone’s there.

I heard it too, it’s an acorn, I say.

Remember in the Wizard of Oz how the trees pitched apples at Dorothy and the Scarecrow?  It’s like that, except it’s acorns not apples and the trees aren’t actually pitching them at us.

Oh and it’s not just the woods. We have oak trees all around us, all up and down our street.

Sometimes they bounce off the roof or the deck and scare the hell out of you.

And then of course, there are the times when they drop 10 feet in front of you and start rolling and Chicken Little drags you across the street as you’re screaming, “It’s an acorn!”

Yeah, sometimes the Universe makes me laugh, but don’t tell her I said that. 😉

Rub a Dub Dub, Two Dogs in a Tub (Sort Of)

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I can’t remember the last time I gave the dogs a bath. Isn’t that awful? I’m not even going to guess because I don’t want to embarrass myself. Let’s just say, they were well past due.

I had a list of chores I wanted to accomplish on the long Labor Day weekend and giving the dogs a bath was at the top of the list.

My four-year-old granddaughter came and spent the weekend with us. My intention was to get her in her little bathing suit and have her help me with the baths, but that didn’t happen.

Her parents picked her up around noon yesterday and after I grabbed a bite to eat, the dogs and I laid down for a bit. (Okay, I might be smarter than a 5th grader, but I definitely don’t have the energy of a four-year-old!)

After a good rest, I went to the grocery store and then it was time for our afternoon walk. It was too hot for a long walk, or to let the dogs walk on the road, so I loaded them in the car and drove to the park. Usually it’s cooler in the woods, but that wasn’t the case yesterday. The dogs were hot and panting after 20 minutes and I was sweating pretty good myself, so once we got home, I thought I’d bathe them in the wading pool. Typically I would put them in the bath tub and use tepid water, but I figured since it was so hot, they wouldn’t mind the cooler water. Plus I could put my bathing suit on and cool down a bit myself.

Golden Labrador

Sampson doesn’t mind a bath. He climbed right in the pool and laid down.

Delilah on the other hand hates baths. Once she saw that the pool was doubling as a tub, she tried to go back inside the house.

That's not light shadows on her neck, that's shampoo suds.

That’s not light shadows on her neck, that’s shampoo suds.

Eventually it was her turn. She went willingly into the pool, but keeping her there was challenging.

Finally they both had been bathed, rinsed, dried off and let back inside the house.

If I run fast enough, I can get this water off me.

If I run fast enough, I can get this water off me.

Delilah likes a little post bath zoomies.

Rub a dub dub, let's wipe off the tub.

Rub a dub dub, let’s wipe off the tub.

Sampson prefers to rub it off on the carpet.

After that, they both settled down for a long nap.

At least I accomplished one thing on my list this weekend. 🙂 What did you do? Was your weekend as exciting as ours?

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