Swede William to the Rescue! (another story of a senile servant)

Lovers

I did it again. I misplaced a dog. Not like the first Sad Story of A Senile Servant, which in keeping with the Blogoversary was posted the second week of this blog's existence, and in which I thought I had put Fat Charlie in the dryer with the wash. Nothing like that.

Lindy Loo is in season. This makes for a twenty-four/seven finely choreographed dance, in which our little lovers - Lindy Loo and Swede William - are never, ever partnered. We put a crate in the TV room. Either Lindy or William is in the crate. When one goes outside, the other is in. I worried about Bill keeping up with this, but the threat of puppies is a great incentive!

Last night at bed time, William wouldn't settle. He sleeps in a wire crate adjacent to Lindy Loo's VariKennel. He whined softly. I looked up from my book, (A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court). Their crates form a bank on the wall opposite our bed. William's eyes were glowing red Martian things, twice their normal size, burning holes in my forehead.

Well, the dogs have been passing a diarrhea bug around, so... "Come on, William," I said. "Gotta go out again?"

He ran to the TV room. (There's always a special chewy in the special TV room crate.) Then he ran downstairs, ran outside, took a warp speed pee, ran back inside, ran upstairs, ran to the crate in the TV room, and when I called him he ran into his crate in the bedroom and instantly recommenced whining.

It's only day eleven of Lindy's special time, and the real fireworks don't start until day fourteen or fifteen. "Hush, William!" I said. He tipped his head up to look into the strip of side window of Lindy's crate and looked back at me. His eyes were the size of a '55 Chevy's headlights, and were blinking RED - GREEN - RED like some kind of devil possessed doggy eye neon. It was rather eerie. He whined again.

Hmmm. Maybe he would rather sleep in the TV room crate with the chewy, I pondered. Maybe Lindy is especially alluring and it's too much being in such close proximity. "Come on, buddy. Let's see if you're happier in the next room." I took him by the collar so that he wouldn't think we were going downstairs and out again, and we walked into the TV room. "It's tough on a guy, isn't it, sweetheart," I said.

Well thank the good lord I had a hold of his collar because when I opened the TV room crate, out came Lindy Loo! WHAT? HUH? Uhhhh... But I had given her her biscuit in her bedroom crate??? Did I ... oops, get your sexy butt out of his face! Yikes, oh no.

I got my wits - what's left of them - about me and took Lindy and William into their proper crates in the bedroom. Lindy gobbled her biscuit, which had been sitting in her empty crate. William curled right up and went immediately to sleep.

He had only been trying to tell me that I had misplaced his Lindy Loo! What a good boy!



Hug your heroic hounds

Blithering Senile Idiot, Oh MY!

I think I was just a bit too ambitious;

All this poetry seems so capricious.

Our Kennel Club hosts our dog show tomorrow.

Do you have some energy that I could borrow?

I'm falling asleep between each of these lines.

I must be there by seven, dressed to the nines.

Not to show my dear dogs who love to be shown.

This idiot human forgot to enter her own.

So I'll sell raffle tickets and steward the rings,

I sold ads in the catalog for all kinds of things.

And I'll worry all day about Very Old Dog

He'll stay home with Bill and sleep like a log.

Cause today he got dizzy again and fell down

And I left the show grounds and zoomed back into town,

To sit on by his side til the drugs took effect.

I see him like that and I am quite a wreck.

But he's better tonight and he will be ok.

It just makes tomorrow a much longer day.

Enough of this blither, I must go to sleep.

I'd be ever so grateful if you would keep

A Very Old Dog in your thoughts and your prayers.

For sweetest of hearts, there's none that compares.

hug your precious hounds and sweet dreams

Nut Case

Thanks to everyone who's been shopping at my eBay store, and Bill's Etsy shop. I appreciate your business, and you are getting some great bargains! (I'm adding more limited edition prints of Bill's: Williamsburg, Philadelphia, Cape May, Washington, D.C. for starters.)

I thought I'd share our day with you. Tuesday, April first. I would love to tell you that this was an April Fools' joke. I would also love to tell you that this is one of my stories rife with exaggeration and hyperbole. (OK, that's redundant, but I just love to pair those two words; Bill would say that exaggeration and hyperbole are the air I breathe in and out.)

It is neither joke, nor yarn. It is my life.

The waking up wasn't particularly unusual. Oh well, it was, but it's too personal to describe here. I stumbled down our steep, twisting stairs, my hand in its routine death grip on Very Old Dog's collar to prevent his somersaulting down. That would be the most expedient route for him, crash, slide, bump, but certainly not the most comfy. With Very Old Dog are Maria, Fat Charlie, Delia, and Sam I Am. Maria barks from the time she gets to the top of the stairs until I put her breakfast dish down. I help Very Old Dog up the one step up into the kitchen, Bill holds the kitchen door open, and the first group zooms outside. I head up for the second group. Back upstairs, I get Mama Pajama, Luciano, Lindy Loo and Swede William. Down we go, celebrating the morning. The dogs are celebrating the morning. Me, not so much.

Apparently, without my strangle hold on Very Old Dog's collar to prevent him from falling, I was unable to maintain my own foothold, and there I went: crash, slide, bump and all. Wheeeeee! Luciano thought this was a very fun day, and Swede William gave me a happy shout out. "Ah-wooooooo!" (Roughly translated, that means, "Yipppeeeee! What a klutz! Let's jump on her head and smother her with licks and put our tongues up her nose!") Mama Pajama, ever practical, got the heck out of harm's way.

I said, "Ow."

I fed the dogs their breakfast, (ah, Maria is finally pacified) and then commenced fixing mine. Oh, rats. I had
neglected to get milk on Monday. Worse yet, when Bill had offered to go, I said, “No, no. I’ll get some on the way back from the post office.” And then I forgot. But I found a little thingy of heavy whipping cream that wasn’t cottage cheese yet, so that worked in the coffee. Bill had eggs and I had toast with the last of the home made raspberry rhubarb jam, which Laurie grew, made, and brought.


That turned out to be the highlight of the day.


Next, I went out with the dogs, and De-Pooped the Yard. Back we go upstairs to work, (hanging on to Very Old Dog's collar for the benefit of all). Five hours of frantic photographing product, editing, uploading to eBay (I know, the thrill is overwhelming) and then I throw Sam I Am in the shower, following right behind him. Saint Sam has gotten used to this. It's therapy day at the hospital. Or so I think.

Arrive with Sam at the hospital and see no little Scotty dog. Heather is a twelve year old terrier who has been visiting for years and years and is the darling of the eighth floor. And we meet her in the lobby. I ask the ladies at the information desk if Heather and her Cathy already went up. "No, but two big dogs did."


"Greyhounds?" I ask, thinking I might have the wrong day.


"No. Big hairy dogs."


That does it. Sam will surely bark at big hairy dogs and that is a therapy dog no-no and I must have the wrong day. I know it's the same week as Kennel Club meeting, but maybe it was Monday, not Tuesday. I take Sam back out to the van and decide to see Miss Phyllis and Maddie.


Only they weren't home. I leave a note on the back of an old armband number from the dog show last week. Charming. Sam I Am has suffered the indignity of a shower with a naked old human for nothing.


I go to the post office to mail the sold items, and then to my little gift store to stock the new items onto the shelves and bring some more home for eBay. Get home just in time to walk the dogs, in a 'get the walk done, no nonsense, move along, no time for dawdling' kind of way. Throw their dinner in their bowls. The second Tuesday of the month is Kennel Club meeting. The other Tuesdays, we have an informal conformation and obedience practice, and puppy socialization. I'm in charge of scheduling these and getting the building unlocked. I had emailed a non-member that we wouldn't be having class, since it was meeting night. I had arranged to arrive early before the Kennel Club meeting to help Ginia fix the ring for the upcoming Show and Go, but I forgotten that I had to go to the City Commissioners meeting.


I called Ginia to tell her I would set up the ring after the Kennel Club meeting because I had to go to the City Commissioners meeting. Ginia said, "What are you talking about?"


"The Kennel Club meeting tonight."


"There's no Kennel Club meeting tonight."


"Yes, it's the second Tuesday."


"Patience, this is the first day of April, how could it be the second Tuesday?"


"It's not Kennel Club Meeting? Oh Lord, then I should be having practice. Now! I'm not there. I'm here. I have to go to the City Commissioners' meeting."


"Patience, you have too much on your plate. Bless your heart." (That is polite Southern Speak for, "Patience you are one Hula short of a Hoop," and when your heart has been blessed in the South, well, it's like saying someone is too dumb to find their way out of a paper sack, in a very friendly, sympathetic sort of way. So to speak.) And Ginia was being kind!


The City Commissioners' meeting went from 5:30 until 8:00. The issue that I had to be there for (involving separately a Board on which I sit, and the Art District where we live) was the last on the agenda. We straggled out with four friends and went to the best restaurant in Paducah. We sat at the bar, Bill with a martini, I with my water, and had oysters Rockefeller and salad, and enjoyed friendship and laughter.


We came home to the dogs, and enjoyed a long welcome howl. We decide to have a treat of cookies and milk.

Only, I had forgotten to get the milk ... again.






Hug your hounds

Drawing today!!!

Oh NO!!! Yesterday was supposed to be the reader appreciation give-away drawing. But, and this will surprise not one person who knows me - I forgot.

OH GOOD GRIEF!

Let's see. Here are my excuses, in no particular order:

1. Bill's been gone for a week and gets home tonight!!! Yipppeeeee!! I like to think of myself as a strong, independent woman hear me roar, but without Bill as a daily presence in my life I'm a bit untethered. OK, so I am more than a bit untethered to begin with. The fact is, that Bill is my life. He is my breath and my pulse, the essence of my me-ness. He makes me laugh and he makes me think and he makes me better.
2. I am doing a book reading today! Fifty-three people have signed up to hear me at the Library. I'm more than a little nervous. I wish I could take Sam I Am with me for courage and inspiration! If you, dear readers, could send mesmerizing, powerful, irresistible "Buy... her... book..." thoughts to the unsuspecting fifty-three in the audience, I would be most beholden to you! And while you are at it, you could send me a thought of "you can do it" and "ha ha ha you are just so entertaining ho ho he he he!" Oh Lordy, I am just going to stand up there and bore fifty-three people into a deep coma and they won't have enough ambulances to handle them all and we'll have to call in the National Guard and it will make the national news and forever I'll be known as the most boring human alive and I'll be in the Guinness book of records and we'll starve.
3. It got cold again. My brain, that itty bitty piece of it that is still rattling around in the hollow space in my head where the whole thing used to live, is frozen. (It's supposed to warm up today.)
4. Since Bill has been gone, there are many more dogs sleeping in my bed. They rob me of my oxygen and dig toenails into my eye sockets and emit noxious gasses which drug my brain into a forgetful state so that right after I give them biscuits, my gassed brain thinks, "Hey! I need to give the dogs their biscuits!"
5. Forgetfulness is a sign and symptom of pasta withdrawal. (So is the five pounds I've lost this week!)

Those are my excuses, and I'm sticking to them. I'll go print up all the entries and do the drawing and post results.

hug your inspirational hounds

Dog Shows, Winners, Friends and an Award

Swede William, the handsome boy




We had shows this weekend down in Franklin, Tennessee, about a half hour south of Nashville. Bill is away, so I couldn't leave anyone home; we'd be gone way too long. Emmett, who lives with Heather and Jason and Baby Ben, was entered, and the exciting thing was that Heather was going to get to go and watch Emmett show for the first time in forever! We bemoaned the fact that since Heather would be present, the mean dog show gods would make sure that Emmett wouldn't win, but it would be a fun day, we would get to visit, and I would have help.

I loaded up the whole waggle, many of whom had assumed when I put on Dog Show Clothes in the dark that they would be left home and were thrilled to go and bounced and bounded and wooed and wagged and got ridiculously tangled and macromayed their leads between the gate and the van doors and celebrated life. We picked up Heather and Emmett and headed east and south. It had been such a long time since Mama Pajama had been in the crate behind my head, that I ate the whole muffin Heather brought without saving Mama Pajama a bite. I caught her look of utter dismay and disgust in my rearview mirror. Oh no!

We arrived in a quick three hours and walked the seven who weren't showing, gave them their biscuits and tucked them in, and headed into the building with the three show dogs: Emmett, Swede William, and Lindy Loo. It’s such fun to arrive at the whippet ring and to see whippet friends! And they were so relieved to see that I had brought my own dear helper. When I go alone with three dogs, then I have to rely on the kindness of people who wish they were strangers to hold my other two when I am in the ring with one. No big deal you say? These three dogs love to show. So when I am in the ring with one, the other two, erm, voice their displeasure at being outside of the ring instead of inside.

“There’s been a mistake! A gross error in judgment,” they scream. “I’m quite certain I should be in there! She’s utterly senile, you know. It must be my turn!” It’s not pretty, and eardrums have been shattered. Heather had been warned and was ready for the craziness.

Emmett went in first. He was very, very good, having neither shown nor practiced since August, for goodness sake. He got his first place ribbon, and his reward was for me to dash out of the ring, hand him in a blind rush to Heather, grab Swede William, and run back into the ring. The whole process took about twenty-five seconds.

[A little dog show primer – if you show, you can skip this. Dog show classes wait for no dog. If your class is called and you are not there, you lose. If your class is called and you are at the in gate fiddling with leashes and changing your armband number, you annoy your judge. Mightily. These judges are allotted about two minutes per dog and they might have 178 dogs to judge and they are standing in the heat/cold/rain on cement/mud/dirt and they have been doing it for about 100 years and if you are piddling around at the in gate and they are waiting oh they are not happy dog show judges and they sigh wearily and think unkind thoughts and bad words. There are several classes in each breed, divided by sex, for non-champions. The winners of each of the classes come back into the ring to compete against its sex for “Winners”. The one Winners Dog and one Winners Bitch are the only dogs of each breed to win points toward their Championship. The number of points they win depends on the number of dogs they defeat. Then the Winners Dog and Bitch go back in to compete with the Champions for Best of Breed. There is a language of dog shows: singles, majors, Winners, Best of Opposite, Breed, Specials, Group Ring, and on and on. It is baffling at first.]

We had found a wonderful volunteer to take Emmett back in the ring on the chance that William also won his class. He did. I stayed in the ring with William for Winners and the sweet volunteer grabbed Emmett from Heather (now Lindy Loo was really annoyed) and came in the ring behind William. Emmett thought he should be with me, but was a good, good boy. So we’re running around in the final go round and the judge points to someone behind me for Winners. The sweet girl who had Emmett passed behind me and said, “Sorry.” I thought she was leaving the ring, apologizing for Emmett wanting to be with me. The normal protocol when you don’t win is to quickly say congratulations to the winner and get out of the ring. Emphasis on ‘quickly’ and ‘get out’. I was confused. I paused. I looked at my friends behind me. “Who?” I asked. “Your dog,” they cried! “Not me, he didn’t point to me,” I said, looking as befuddled as I felt. “Your Bred By dog,” they yelled, pointing at Emmett and generously not adding DUMMY! I turned to see Emmett and his handler and the judge standing in the Winners spot and I jumped up and down. Yay! Yay! The dog show gods had indeed been kind and Heather got to see her puppy win! “Yay, oh yay,” I jumped and shouted and turned to smile at Heather! (The “sorry” had been for beating William in Winners, thinking that I had wanted William to win, which of course wasn’t the case, but was the source of my great confusion.)




“Get out of the ring,” shouted everyone else! Oops.

The drive home is always so much shorter when you’re laughing with a friend the whole way.

We had to leave at 5:40 the next morning, and I didn’t see why Heather should have to wake up at oh dark thirty simply to hand me her dog. She was staying home to enjoy Baby Ben’s Easter with family. Here is where Saint Dee comes in. Saint Dee went with me on Easter Sunday just to help. Saint Dee got up at oh dark thirty and spent six plus hours in the van and held the Screaming Meme’s ringside just to be kind. And this is not the first time she has done this. Saint Dee does not even own a whippet, though she is a dear beloved Auntie to the waggle. How lucky am I? How lucky?

Emmett, Swede William, and Lindy Loo doing zoomies in the yard

So, Emmett had spent the night on Saturday and he noticed that his sissy Lindy Loo had matured since he last saw her. And he had missed the whole thing. And he was a Very Horny Whippet. On Sunday at the show, Emmett did not mind not being with me. But he minded intensely being separated from his sexy (in his male adolescent brain only) sissy. Dee not only had to hold the screaming meme’s, she had to prevent ringside Consummation of Decidedly Unbrotherly Acts, which Emmett was quite determined to commit. And when Emmett was in the ring with me, he made it clear that he needed desperately to be out with Lindy Loo. And another friend took him in for Winners, but today was Swede William’s day and he won!

Each of the boys got a little closer to their championships, and it was a grand weekend and I’m indebted to good people. Sam I Am thinks I forgot him and he tried to remind me that he is the star and should be doing agility when we gave him a little walk around the show grounds before we left. I told him it would be his turn again soon. But all the dogs were so delighted to go, and I could not have done it by myself.

Today the dogs are sleeping it off. And I am writing this long story to say thank you.


And we got a fun award from our friend Koobuss! We are Totally Hip! (Clearly, this only applies to the whippets and not, after the above story, the Senile Servant!)



We are going to pass it on to Rudy, who is a Bedlington which is hip to begin with, and he does Agility, which is even hipper, and he takes in rescues which is the hippest!
And we would like to pass it on the The Canine Kids, with whom we are discovering we have a great deal in common, and if we are hip, they must be too!


Hug your hounds

The Sad Story of the Senile Servant

First, I simply have to thank you readers again!!! You are amazing! This collection of little stories is being read by more people than I ever dreamed, already. I have added a little box thingy on the side of the page so you can sign up to be notified by email when a new story is posted. And I do so much want to let you know how much I appreciate your sharing this site with your friends and lists and groups. I am stunned.

Thank you!

all the grateful best-

Patience

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The Sad Story of the Senile Servant

Multi-tasking was never a problem for me in my younger years. Shoot. I could talk on the phone, and cook dinner, feed the dogs, and help my son with his homework all at once, no problem.

If I tried to do that today, the dogs would eat chili, we would sit down to dine on some geometry problems, my son would have kibble and bits in his notebook, and I would have flushed the phone down the toilet.

And here's what I did last night.

Fat Charlie is a big lovable lump of a dog. Sweet and every bit as good as gold. You just never hear the words "no" and "Fat Charlie" juxtaposed. OK, he does hold firm the opinion that any food on any counter is his personal property, but we know that, so fair is fair. (Translation: you leave the three pound hunk of pot roast defrosting unattended on the counter, you might as well just hand it to Fat Charlie, because that's where it is going to end up. This applies equally to coconut cake, Asiago cheese, whole loaves of bread, and very expensive entire catered meals. But I digressed.)

He is quiet, undemanding, ever so soft, and always generous with smiles, wags, and kisses.

Last night, I was talking to my friend Laurie on the phone, answering some email, changing over clothes from washer to dryer, and putting the dogs to bed, all at the same time. I thought I had done a fine job of it, and happily went to bed.

This morning, after dragging my raggedy self out of bed at 6:10, brushing my teeth, and throwing on my walking clothes, I began the choreographed routine of letting the dogs out. I could smell the coffee, so I knew that Bill was already down in the kitchen. Giacomino was already... hey! Giacomino wasn't following the routine. He sleeps on the bed with us, and his morning part is to dance around in front of each crate as it opens to welcome its occupant to the day. (Or to say, "Ha, ha. I sleep on the bed and you don't!" But I think it's the former.) I opened Maria's crate, and Mama Pajama's crate, but Giacomino was staring at Fat Charlie's crate with his head pressed to its door. Then I saw Fat Charlie's bedtime biscuit lying in the front of the crate, untouched.

My un-caffeinated morning brain said, "Huh?"

Then it said, "Is Fat Charlie under his covers?" (The crates are full of quilts and comforters so the dogs can snuggle against our air conditioning.)

Then my synapses started firing and the connection was made: Fat Charlie was not in his crate when I closed it last night and gave him his biscuit.

Oh God, where was Fat Charlie?

What had I been doing when I put the dogs to bed?

Oh God, Fat Charlie was in the dryer!!!!!

I raced to the laundry room, in a full panic. No dogs were in the dryer, and just in case... Nope, no dogs in the washing machine either. I ran back into the bedroom to see if I had closed two dogs in the same crate. Nope.

By this time Giacomino, Maria and Mama Pajama were looking for someplace to pee, so I grabbed Beans and we all went downstairs. There was Fat Charlie curled uncomplainingly in the new fancy dog bed. "Good morning," he wagged.

I got the rest of the dogs out, and then apologized profusely to Fat Charlie.

"Oh buddy, did I lose you last night? Were you lonely? Why didn't you scratch at the door?"

Of course he wouldn't have. He would have just sat outside the bedroom door with his sweet head tilted, ears cocked, waiting for me to remember him.

I'm sorry, Fat Charlie! At least I hope he enjoyed the box of cereal he "found" on the counter.

Tim Caro photo copyright protected