Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Random Acts Of Canineness

Galloping horses couldn't have surprised us more. In one wooosh the canine had bounded across the room and ONTO THE KITCHEN TABLE. I screamed at this unprecedented strike against sane living. Lilah's jaw hung open. Even the pooch seemed a bit startled by her boldness, and she jumped back down, knocking over a glass on the way. I grabbed her round her upper chest and hauled her into her crate. It wasn't punishment, but a flailing for control. If not to subdue her, then to calm myself. Cheri's enthusiasm evidently knows no bounds. The trigger was her squeaky chick, a latex fascimile of a chick popping from an egg that cries for mercy as it is chewed. Examining it has led me to wonder who gets to design doggie chew toys. Now there's a job. The chick was $2.00 at Petco. But it squeaks louder than the expensive chew toys, and its squeak even changes pitch. Cheri has gnawed it, slobbered it and chased it around the house, but never before has it unleashed in her such a spirit of wild abandon as on that night. I should have checked for a full moon.

I know that if I look down right now, I'm likely to see a large slug sliming its way across our hardwood floor. They come in through the sliding glass door. I have never figured out how they do it without getting squashed, because staking out a slug portal to learn their ways is not something I'm keen on doing. We tried stuffing foil into the cracks of the sliding glass door, and that seemed to "foil" the slugs ---yuk yuk --- and keep em out. But Cheri just comes along and rips out the foil like she's doing us some big favor. One of the goals I set for myself each summer is to make sure that no matter how many times I run out to the driveway after dark in bare feet, to retrieve something from the car or put a bike away before it rains, I will never ever set foot on a slug. Well now my new goal is to make sure that no matter what, I will never have to watch Cheri eat a slug.

9 comments:

  1. I like this! Cheri is so amazing--she can jump really high! This post made me laugh. That a slug can somehow get into your house via the sliding glass door is a mystery--seriously, I wish you would do a slug stake out. Good luck on your goals!

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  2. yep, simone, i like this one too. especially the last half about the slugs. have you tried sprinkling salt across the floor by the sliding door? salt kills slugs. nasty things, they are. as for the pup...perhaps it's time to get her a silent chew toy,,like one of those big-ass bones that lasts forever. dogs love rawhide.

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  3. i was going to suggest salt too! it's worth a try.

    animals just amaze me sometimes with their joie de vivre. having a puppy is like having a 2-yr old

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  4. Yeah, a puppy is so much like a toddler. I find myself doing the same thing with Cheri I did when my kids were really small ---I would think, well, by next year she'll be such and such age and she'll be out of this stage.

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  5. simone, i just re-read the title of this post, and i must say it's very clever! could even become a whole 'nother blogsite on it's own, you know? have you ditched the squeaky toy yet?

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  6. No, that squeaky toy really comes in handy sometimes. But it was funny---last evening Roger was trying to practice some tunes he had to learn for a recording session, so he really had to concentrate, and Cheri started chewing on the squeaky chick and making an awful racket, like she was trying to jam along with him.

    We had bought her some bigass rawhide bones in the past. At first she liked them. Then stopped chewing them. Chew toys go in and out of favor with her. We had these other chewy bones lying around for weeks that she had not shown much interest in, then all of a sudden she starts going to town on them. Maybe it's time to try the rawhide bones again.

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  7. like you said...much like a toddler,,

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  8. HA! I was going to comment on the title too--Yes, very good!

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  9. hey! We had slugs magically entering through our garage door too. Nate just told me that he sprinkled salt along the door sill (?) and voila! No more slugs!

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