So it seems the Amazing Adventures of Mavis Potato and Charlie Pumpkin (in which Mavis Potato learns she’s actually pretty normal!) have not been getting much play lately. That’s what happens when there’s another human adult around to talk to, you just don’t have to make up stories to tell the dogs.
But now we’re on to the Super Fun Times of Hippo Head Jones and Crocodile Bob! Hippo Head Jones is the calm, level headed leader of the expedition and Crocodile Bob is her short fused right hand man! Together they are sure to find themselves in many sticky situations!
Yeah, or something…
oh, what’s to say, I make up stories about my dogs, for my dogs.
A friend of mine is going to have a baby so we spent a lot of time looking at crochet patterns. I’m way more confident now about my abilities and will be making stuffed animals and booties. If the stuffed animals go well, I have a secret project that will make me giggle. If it turns out, I will share it with you.
My head is aswim with menu planning. I’m at the good point where I have too many things picked out and will have to cut back.
And I will leave you with this happiness. When Maddie came to live with us in June she didn’t play. She didn’t play with toys or people or Ghengis. Steadily she’s been playing more and more. I watch her and Ghengis making up games to play, she waits until he is watching her then she steals his toys and plays keep away. They wrestle together all the time. The happiest, though, is watching David jump around on the floor with the two of them. Maddie’s piggy little tail going a mile a minute while they jump and growl and retreat and posture. I laugh so hard my belly hurts and my face is stuck with a smile.
It’s a good thing I’ve got going here. That boy of mine and these two dogs. A pretty damned good thing.

Clear the goddammed ice from your fucking sidewalks or I will punch you in the temple two times, the second time so hard you will die twice and come back as someone getting punched in the temple a third fucking time. 2 times in one block I slipped and fell on ice hidden under the beautiful, bucolic powdery snowfall. Once I almost hit my face on a retaining wall. Both times I landed on my knees. I’m so fucking cranky right now.
To cheer me up, I will write about my dogs.
Ghengis: To get my attention and let me know that he REALLY wanted to go on his alk so he could get his poop on, Ghengis jumped on my arm, shoved his nose deep into my ear and inhaled as hard as he could. Go now, find someone you trust, have them stick a very cold wet sponge to their nose then have them cram this nose-sponge into your ear and breathe deeply. All I could do was stare at the dog in wonderment. Of course he returned my gaze with a look that said “I discovered something better than my own butt”.
Maddie: Maddie farts. She farts a lot, but lately her farts have become something completely beyond the realm of reality. Her butt whistles when she does. Whistles! Like a train in the distance, like a siren song for the emotionally unfit, like a beautiful undiscovered bird in the forest. She’s completely uninterested, she just farts constantly and the music fills the house.

Last night I went to wash and rebandage Maddie’s foot. I was concerned because it was still bleeding. It’s not easy to change the bandage on a dog’s foot, you have to get them up on the bed and start doing belly rubs so they’ll roll onto their backs. Then you cut off the old bandage, shoving the other dog away the whole time. Get the dog in the tub with only enough water to allow you to wash her foot. Wash the foot thoroughly twice to be sure you got everything.
Dog out, feet dried, follow her to the sofa and get her on her back. Put goo on a bandaid, shove the other dog out of the way again, apply band aid then medical tape. Pull off the medical tape because it’s too loose. Add more.
When you are satisfied, get into bed. Your dog will jump up onto the bed, walk up to you and shove her giant head into your neck as a way of signifying that she is upset and needs comfort.
Allow the wheels of guilt and uncertainty roll around in your head…the cut looks awfully deep…is it deeper than I thought?…is it healing?…should I leave it unbandaged so it can scab over or bandage it to prevent contamination?…she definitely is unhappy, perhaps this hurts more than I realized???
This morning, as I was getting ready, she kept laying the paw on me. She’d lift it up and put it on my lap. Oh god, she’s telling me it hurts!
Guilt plagued me all day. If I had a cut on my foot, I would go to the doctor. So I made the call and got an appointment.
Her foot is fine. It’s healing already, I didn’t need to go in. In fact, they complimented my bandaging technique. I love my vet so much. She loves my dogs, she remembers all sorts of things about them, she is completely reassuring. If I had not taken Maddie to the vet I would have worried the whole time her foot was healing. I didn’t need to go, but it put my mind at rest.
Of course I felt bad leaving early since I overslept and got to work late. I popped awake, realized it was far too light to be a good time to be getting up. I looked at the clock in horror and read 10:43!!! Crap! But it wasn’t light enough to be 10:43, so I woke david up and jumped out of bed and checked his watch. 8:43! Still late but not as late! I called my boss and got ready. Crap. I hate when that happens.
Took Ghengis, the little fella, to the dog park this afternoon. A bit of snow added some much needed traction to the sheet of ice and that made it easier to negotiate. I still had to employ the magic of penguin power, but it wasn’t so bad. There aren’t so many little dogs at the park this time of year, but ghengis managed to get in a lot of good running. He’s passed out next to me. Happy.
Finishing up the special scarf project and it is taking less yarn than i expected so I may have enough for special project number two.
chickpea and veggie curry for dinner!

Yeah, it’s another dog story…
Last night we go on our walk, something that is generally a quiet affair. 2 dogs, a girl, some poop, excessive sniffing. Easy.
Maddie has an arch nemesis. I’m not sure what brought on the nemesisitude with this particular dog. Surely, we pass a number of houses on our walk that have dogs, but this dog she hates. My first indication was only an indication of extreme interest on her part. This dog was never actually outside when we walked by but she always managed to save some tiny amount of pee to release on his fence.
I know dogs have some sort of fucked communication through their pee. I figure dog pee is the equivilent of an internet forum but more interesting and the dogs tend to stay on topic. I do wonder about urine based flame wars among the dogs, “u p like a n00b!”
If I was particularly lucky, she’d manage to save a crap and drop it by the fence. This was a particular pain since there’s a nice incline up from the alley to get to this fence and I have to go up there, secure the dogs and pick up crap. On days when karma punishes me, they both crap up there, but 4 feet apart so I can’t just grab them both.
Last night, things were going my way, Maddie evacuated herself early and seemed in a good mood. We rounded the corner and I stopped and made Ghengis go. In a few feet we’d be in the alley and with the exception of the yard of Maddie’s pee buddy, there aren’t so many options to poop. Let’s be clear, he’s had pleanty of opportunity, he just hasn’t taken it. He does his business and I am glad.
The easiest way to deal with 2 dogs while picking up dog crap is to put their leashes on the ground and step on the at the handles. I have the plastic handled retractable leashes. This allows me to keep the dogs with me but also allows me the freedom to pick up the poop in the bag without being jerked around because Ghengis has decided to play jackass rodeo on Maddie.
As I started to put the leashes down Maddie caught me by surprise and took off, pulling the leash from my hand. This is odd because when I walk her she rarely takes off after anything and if I do accidentally drop her leash, she immediately stops because the scraping of the leash handle freaks her out. Of course none of this mattered because pee buddy was out and I was to learn immediately that the exchange of effluvia between them had been done with enmity.
“MY NAME IS MADDIE!!! MY NAME IS MADDIE!!!”
“YOU! You pee on my fence and I have to go pee on it! Get off my yard! I am the boss of this yard! ME!”
“MY NAME IS MADDIE!!!!!!!”
“GET OFF MY YARD!!!!!! I hate you! I am the boss of my yard!!!”
“MY NAME IS MADDIE!!!! ME! MADDIE!!!”
This is what I imagine their barks translated into. At some point, Scooter’s owner (scooter is a dumb name for a dog so big, but whatever) stepped out on the deck to tell Scooter to shut up. He had no idea what was going on. Maddie let him know her name.
Now I have to abandon the poop and go get Maddie and shut her up. She’s announcing her name left and right which excites Ghengis and things devolve.
“MY NAME IS MADDIE!!!!!!!”
“OOOH hey! Maddie! Tell him my name too! Tell him my name is Ghengis!! Tell him my name! Tell him! Tell him I like rawhides and squeaky toys and my names is Ghengis”
“MY NAME IS MADDIE!!! MADDIE!!! MADDIE!”
“Tell him my name too!”
“GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY YARD YOU FREAK!! Stop peeing on my fence! I hate you! I don’t care if your name is Maddie or Fart Fume!!
What makes all of this more difficult, besides the fact that I am truly imagining that my dog is yelling and announcing her name over and over like the idiot that she is, is that she doesn’t run up to the fence on the normal, easy to access side. No, that would have been easy on her and me. She decides she needs to take the straight line through the terraced landscaping on the side yard. Yes, terraced landscaping filled with frozen, pokey, icy, sharp little evergreen shrubs. She’s so engrossed in saying her name and having him understand that SHE IS MADDIE that she won’t listen to me. I have to haul my fat ass up the terraced side yard trying not to ruin anything in the process so I can get her down.
And drag her back down the block so I can finish picking up the poop. Then I have to prepare them for walking by the house again as that is the way home.
We get home, I go to the bathroom and it is then, at the far end of the house from the front door, that I realize she has cut her foot. I learn this only because there is blood all over the goddammed floor.
David came up and he got her in the tub and we cleaned and assessed the damage, she probably cut herself on a shrub. We bandaged it up and she looked pretty miserable.
But she is confident that her name is Maddie.