Tuesday morning we woke up to thin sheet of black ice, thanks to a Nor’easter that hit the east coast.  The driveway, deck, road, front steps, hell even the grass was slippery!  But the Dynamic Duo still wanted their walk. 

Hubby said, “It’s very slippery out, BE careful. I sanded the driveway and steps, but it’s still very slippery.”

I got Thing One and Thing Two ready for their walk and decided I should step outside first to assess the situation.  Damn good thing too.  I almost fell on my ass.

Did I ever tell you we live on a hill?  Well we do.  Not only is our street a hill and we are about 3/4 of the way up the street, our house also sits on a hill. 

The first obstacle was getting to the road.  I figured the best path was down the hill on the grass and so Frick, Frack and I started out.

Thank God one of us knew it was slippery out. 

Because we live on a hill (see above, in case you missed that) our walk is down hill one way either coming or going.  SO I decided the best way would be to head up the hill to start and down the hill for the return.  I was hoping the the ice would melt just a bit and make our return a bit easier. 

News flash, we live in New England and while the weather is titchy, (yes I said titchy and yes it’s a word) the ice hadn’t melted in the fifteen minutes it took me to walk up four houses. 

Fifteen minutes.  To walk four houses up.  It was that slippery. 

Trying to keep Beevis and Butthead on the grass was no easy feat. The town had salted/sanded the roads but that stuff is very bad for their paws and besides, it was only the middle of the road that was cleared.  My luck I’d find the only icy patch in the middle of the street, get pulled down by Dr. Evil and Mini Me and left there to get run over while they found their way home.

Well here’s the titchy (there’s that word again) thing about New England, sometimes the weather changes in a snap and sometimes it doesn’t.  Tuesday was one of those days when it didn’t.  We managed to make it back into the house with minimal slippage.  I promised the dogs we’d have a longer walk in the afternoon.

The Nor’easter turned to straight rain.  I’m not complaining, it’s better than snow or ice, but it was pouring buckets by the time I got home for our walk. 

Personally I love rain.  I’ve loved it since I was a child and sat in the Adirondack chair on the porch with my Grandfather on a warm summer night, a bowl of fresh blueberries and cream in my hands and watched the beauty of a lightening storm.  When my kids were small, we’d put on raincoats and go outside and jump in puddles.  I love the rain.

The Dastardly Duo however, hate the rain.  No matter how many times I remind them they are Labs, they still hate the rain.   BUT if we are walking in it, well that’s an entirely different story.  So I suited up, harnessed Pinky and the Brain and we started out. 

 

You’d have thought we were running a marathon.  Sampson kept trying to run and I can’t even begin to tell you how many times they shook themselves.  We managed to make it around the block in record time and I still had time to get their food out, stock the fire and dry them off before I had to head back to work.

 

 

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