'Tis the Last Ice of Winter: Woe is Moi

Ice. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love your fat hills that caress my belly. I love that you capture the rays of the sun and still remain cold. I love your slow stubborn melt, your refusal to heed the calendar, your independent recalcitrance; I love that you return each winter after the summer sun’s smug assurance that it’s had the better of you. And even though you’ll soon disappear from the grass, I know you’ll return in the form of ice cubes from the freezer, in the steady exhalation of the air conditioner, and in that mango-strawberry smoothie Joan likes to sip so much. And, next winter, I’ll again slip and slide into your slick embrace. There. That’s how much I love thee.

Now, Shane. Forget it. Shane is the opposite of me. Shane just wants to be near Joan. He doesn’t care about ice or heat or indoors or outdoors. See him in the picture? Instead of perching on the last mounds of ice on this beautiful sunny day, he chooses to pant at the back door and beg for a spot at Joan’s side.

And you think a dog with a blog is strange? He’s far stranger than I.

Best wishes, Juno

White Ice & Closing Your Eyes in Reverse

At last, less than a week before the Spring Solstice, we’ve had snow I can lick, snow I can roll in, snow I can sink in. Ahhhh. Finally.

Well, it’s not really snow; it’s white ice. And, in a way, that’s even better than snow, because it can’t be shoveled. Shane and I watched from the window as Joan gunned her car’s engine and skimmed—sort of in a reverse zig-zag along the icy driveway trying to get enough power to crash through the wall of ice left by the street cleaners. We could hear Kyla telling her to slow down, but she couldn’t slow down or she would have gotten stuck. And, then when they came back, she had to gun it again to get the car up the driveway back into the garage. Sometimes in life, the only way to get through an ice barrier is to shut your eyes and throw the engine in reverse.

I did that this morning when I tried to negotiate the steps that were practically buried under ice slippery enough for a skating rink. Good thing I have these big-dog paws. Hey, I saw a picture of a Burmese Mountain Dog and have decided that I’m a mixture of a Newfy and a Burmese. Don’t you agree? Anyway, if Joan can be Etruscan, I can be Burmese. So, there.

All in all, it was a good day of slipping and resting on the high ice. Once again, Shane proved to be a Mommy’s boy, because he stayed in and watched some dumb Jane Austen story with Joan. La de da. He’s getting to be a regular authority on 19^th-century novels made into film. Next thing you know, he’ll be writing his own blog.

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day, Juno

Whoosh in the Night

In the middle of the night, I hear things. The other night, it was a crash that woke me and Shane—bang—out of our sleep. Joan got up to check. Then, the sirens came. But, there are other noises that awaken us. The wind, for example. The leaves still on the ground from last fall blow across the grass and make a shhhhhhhhing sound that’s easy on the ears—not like a crash; the opposite of a crash. Shane and I wake up and pant at each other. The shhhhhhhing lulls us back to sleep.

Then, there’s the distant parkway sound—the whoooooooooshshshshsh that doesn’t stop until around three in the morning and then picks up again at around five. Every now and then some yanker with a muffler-less motorcycle wakes up the entire world, but he’s gone in no time, so we just re-close our eyes and pretend he and his noise never happened.

The strangest nighttime noise comes from the ga-yowling cats. Wow, they can sing up a storm. Sometimes they tell a story with their snarly back-throated howling. I think they’re fighting over potential love interests. The meowing starts out all sweet and pussycat nice. Then it gets loud and switches between low-pitched and high-pitched duets, so you wonder if they really are singing. Then, it gets very very thin and trembling, and you can almost hear the slow extending of their claws. They seem to be swiping at each other with their screams. Finally, you hear their little paws cutting through dry grass and weeds. Then, maybe one last meow and it’s all silent. Well, if that’s love, I’m glad I’m out of the loop. Too much effort.

Shane hurt his leg yesterday. He limps around the house. I felt bad for him until I noticed that when Joan started baking pastel de tres leches, he didn’t have any trouble fast-footing it into the kitchen in time to get a finger-full of cake batter. We know that the sounds of sifting flour and creaming butter equal a cake or batch of cookies in the making. And, when that happens, you’ve just got to be in the kitchen. Our favorite time is when Joan drops things, because that’s where the good licking happens.

Best wishes, Juno

You Can't Be Full of Minus

If there's only one patch of ice left, it's MINE, all mine. I love ice.

Such an exciting weekend. I had another major bath with a very expensive bottle of “sensitive-skin” shampoo from the vet. I’m talking twelve dollars, and Joan used up the entire bottle on my big luscious self. Ah, but now I’m so clean and pretty smelling.

We had company and eggplant parmigiana and Chianti. Actually, I only got one lick of the Chianti when no one was looking. Joan doesn’t let me have Chianti because it gives her a headache. What kind of logic is that? But, I can’t complain because I had lots of love. It’s easy to love a clean dog, isn’t it.

But, what about the dirty dogs? It’s not their fault their owners don’t take care of them. Humans can be so full of indifference. Wait. You can’t be full of something negative. Like, for instance, there are minus seven calories in a celery stick. So, you can never be full of celery. Being indifferent is like being full of a minus. Well, I’m thinking like a dog. I guess I can’t expect you to follow my thinking.

Also, I wanted to say that Shane has been getting more relaxed lately. He’s not nearly so nervous. Maybe after eight years, he’s realizing that no one’s going to hurt him around here. It’s about time he figured that one out. Now, that's a plus, not a minus.

Best wishes, Juno