The Return of Sheerluck

Ray dug this up today. If only he was wearing his Sheerluck Hound costume.

Ah, yes. May I trouble you for a light?

I think I'll head out to the veranda for a leisurely smoke.

Hey! That's MY seat!

It was late Sunday afternoon. We'd been busy all day and I was more than ready to sit down and do some knitting. I gathered supplies and dropped them on the end of the couch, then collected all the stray newspapers to throw in the recycle pile. By the time I got back to the couch, Ray was there doing his usual nesting maneuver. He was digging and digging at the throw that I had draped over the cushions. (I think it offends him that I cover the couch.) I waited and watched until he was done. Usually, he curls himself into a tight little ball so that there's still room for me to sit down. But not this time. Ray stretched himself out the entire length of the couch then 'looked' in my direction. I swear there was a smirk on his face.

Gotta Go NOW

Why is it that when Ray has to go out at 2:30 in the morning because it's an 'emergency,' it takes him 15 minutes (with me following him around on the end of a leash) to find a spot to go?

I must say, it is lovely out at that time of the morning. Even when it is only 20-some degrees.

Mine, All Mine

Ray, Sleeping with His Toys

Patent Pending

As mentioned before in many of my blogs, Ray is a Yarn Hound. I don't think I've knit anything since I brought him home, it's just too dicey.

But this Christmas my BFF, Joanne, and her husband, Mark, made me a really useful present.

C.R.Y.P.S.

If you can't read the label, it is a C.R.Y.P.S. A Counter-Ray Yarn Protection System (patent pending). The system (nut container) sports a picture of the Yarn Hound holding a bag with yarn and needles in it (clevely photoshopped from a photo that appeared in the blog last year.) The lid has a hole in it, through which runs the yarn.

Since I have received these amazing C.R.Y.P.S., (I got two of them) I have knit a hat and a dishcloth. Not much, I know, but I was just testing the system. One of them works really well. I think the other one is broken. Everytime I try to use it, Ray comes by and tries to stick his tongue through the hole. Apparently, judging from the faint aroma that wafts out every time I open it, at one time this C.R.Y.P.S. was a peanut container. And, if you didn't know, like every dog, Ray loves peanuts.

Goodbye Grass

This weekend I mulched my backyard. "What's she doing mulching her backyard in the middle of winter?" you might ask yourself. Good question.

Sometime this fall, my grass packed its bags and left. It snuck out in the dead of night in small clumps, until all of a sudden, there wasn't any. I can't say that I blame it. It can't be pleasant being dug all to hell and constantly trampled by packs of wild dogs (ok, two wild dogs, it just SOUNDS like there's more). The grass made the smart decision to go.

So the "grassed part" of my backyard (as opposed to the "treed part") became a frozen tundra. Until Friday, when it started to thaw. Then it became the oozing mud flat. I decided drastic action needed to be taken. I headed to the Depot for some weed block fabric and bags of mulch (a temporary fix, but like I said, drastic action needed to be taken).

So on Sunday, when Murphy returned from her Winter break, the dogs had a brand new playground.

That night, I received an email from Rachel asking if I had seen Murphy's collar. Ray loves to grab Muprhy by the collar and try to rip it off her neck, so Rachel was pretty sure it was somewhere in the backyard.

The next morning Ray and I headed outside to search for the missing fashion accessory. I looked in the mulch and he searched the treed area. I pretty quickly found the item in question and bent over to pick it up. It was undamaged. Ray hadn't chewed through it, he had cleverly unclipped the clip.

When I picked up the collar, the tags gave a soft jingle. Ray went crazy, tossing this way and that searching for his friend. He couldn't figure out how she had snuck in without him knowing. I watched him, my heart breaking just a bit. (It reminded me of the time I took his sister, Lacey's, dog tags out of a baggie and he went bonkers). I stood still and shook the tags until Ray could locate them. I let him sniff the collar. He still wasn't convinced that Murphy wasn't somewhere around and spent a bit more time trying to find her. I palmed the tags so that they wouldn't jingle and went back in the house. Ray followed me a short time later.

He was walking through his office in the front hall when he (literally) tripped over his bone. Ray's tail started to wag and he joyfully picked it up and tossed it in the air. My heart stopped breaking as I thought of the flip side to being a blind dog. Everything is a suprise (sometimes a painful suprise but a suprise nonetheless) . When you find something that you didn't know was there, everyday is Christmas. Ray lives in the moment, and right now, at this moment, he was loving life.

RIP Superdog

Superdog