Take me for a ride in your car, car

Oh boy! What Adric hates, I love - car rides!
Here I am off to Crex Meadows
What could make a dog happier? It turned out to be a crisp and dry spring day, and the meadows are beginning to fill with life: some animals passing through on migration and others that are year-long residents but sleep all winter or spend more time hidden in the snow and ice. Swans, geese and ducks were a-sailing with otter and muskrats and many beaver. There was a loon bathing while swimming, a practice I follow. Harriers, the sleek hunters of marsh and field, swooped low in their aerial prowls. There were soaring and sitting eagles and stalking cranes and a porcupine crawling out on a branch. There were timber wolf footprints all along the roads and bear were there too but were hiding from us. Deer crashed from ditch to ditch, sparrows called, doves cooed and snipe whizzed overhead as the sun finally set on a long day.

Visiting Crex was wonderful and I was able to sneak a few hitch hikers in the car before we left - wood ticks! Those I didn't keep for myself I shared with my Person and my Best Friend. I can only say they are not gracious gift-receivers.

And now the part that made me happier than anything else. I got a double cheeseburger for my supper! Travel is a wonderful thing is all I will say.

Well, when it comes down to it, who cares about tulips! It is spring and if the wild flowers are up so am I. And the wild flowers are up - the bloodroot flowers were waving their petals at the sun today.

What a joy this time of year is! The birds that flew south for the winter are slowly winding their way up the mighty Mississippi River valley. Phoebes and bluebirds are back and there are freshly hatched little insects flying around for them to eat - just in time dining! And speaking of dining I ate my share of greening grass today.

Tomorrow I start my annual bluebird trail monitoring duties. Good thing I don't have to wear a uniform because I filled out a little this winter. I think that Tasha stole some of my exercise time. But look at me and my exercise program - I'm going to roll and shake until I am in summer shape!

Free and easy

After the storm comes the calm. Tasha went home to her People and I have to admit, I got bored. I love chaos when it comes right down to it. And Tasha is chaos with lots of fur attached.

Sure, I had the couch to myself and no one else is in line to clean the cat dishes but me, me, me. But things did seem a bit slow after two months of having a roomie.

Luckily my Best Friend showed up and we all went on vacation. And here I am watching some chaos - the water at Gooseberry Falls was falling, and falling hard. Imagine - the last time I was there I trotted out onto the very rocks that are now covered by the crashing torrent.

We stayed in a little cabin that had the best smelling lawn. And then I found out a wolf pack had been hanging around - bet I scared them away.

But vacation is a fading dream and the snow in all gone in my back yard. The spring sun is trying to warm up the sleepy plants but all it is doing is making me a bit sleepy too. Time for a sunny nap where the snow used to be. Maybe I'll wake up when the tulips do.

Jealous

There seems to be a key personality in any family group. I am happy for my Person to play that role, but lately I have to come way down on the list.

I think I am a little jealous of all the attention that others are getting. That Hurricane of Hair, Princess Tasha, gets treats every time she comes inside, she's allowed to bark whenever she wants and she gets chewy things whenever she spends time in her little kennel. Thank goodness she's packing her curling iron and heading back to her home tomorrow - I want to be top dog again!

And then there is the ongoing melodrama All About Adric. Sheesh, he goes for more car rides now than I do. I love car rides! My only solace is he doesn't seem to enjoy himself and he always has to leave the house in a carrier bag, howling all the way. He just doesn't know how to have fun.

The strange thing is that when he comes back from one of his car rides he always has a different color bandage on his leg. Today's color is royal purple. He looks pretty dopey but I know better than to laugh at him. My Person takes his side in all interspecies disputes, and today she even let him finish the milk in her cereal dish. That is one of my other favorite things, handed over to the Man in Bandages.

Maybe I am seeing a little green (actually purple). But I hope one of these days spring will be here, I will be the sole lord of my warm and sunny yard, Adric will quit being the patient that tries my patience and I will be the only one who rides shotgun in my Person's car.

United in fear

No trying to be tallest today. Today I am just trying to get off the floor and so is Tasha. My Person has been on some sort of a cleaning rampage, and all of us four-legged folks are a little afraid of the vacuum cleaner. Not that we see it that much ordinarily, but there is a lot of extra dog fur, suspiciously long fur I might add, floating around lately.

Next, my Person did the weirdest thing yet. (And that is saying something.) She washed the floors with tea. I have long advocated having food on the floor but it never occurred to me to spread beverages around. My Person said it was sort of an old wife's remedy for dull floors. Well, she is older than she once was but I don't think that explains this behavior. The tea seemed to have no effect other than to erase all the little dog footprints and to scent the entire house like a tea shop.

I prefer the scent of pet food shops myself.

But if this sort of madness is to continue I am going to suggest my Person clean the floor with a beverage we all enjoy. Maybe vanilla milkshake?

Tallest dog wins

There are no equals in the animal kingdom. Or so says Pico's vet.

People try equality all the time and they make a right mess of it. Not too many people are really willing to sacrifice their own higher positions to level the playing field for others.

In the dog realm we have a similar tough time being equals. And while being Equality Dog is almost impossible there are lots of ways to become Top Dog. Being the snarkiest can work. Being the toughest and most aggressive does as well but you sure are going to lose that congeniality contest and your Person will be giving you the evil eye every time you act like a bully toward another dog. Some dogs think barking the loudest is the best way. (I've tried it, and I just get yelled at.) Being able to run the fastest will get you out of trouble but it won't really get you ahead. So I have come up with the best way of all: I am going to be the tallest dog around.

It seems the Barking Hairdo of a Tasha is just not one of nature's able jumpers. But I am. So whenever that Tasha is around and starts competing with me, I'll get taller. And to do this all I need is some handy furniture.

Believe me, my Person has lots of furniture around to help me. Maybe she doesn't like lying on, sitting on and eating on the floor as much as I do. Or maybe she's trying to be taller than me! Maybe I need to find a new way to be Top Dog.

Good dog

No matter how good I try to be, I seem to get into hot water a lot. But right now I am not in hot water. I am in cold water. And the water is so cold that, like Bambi once observed, it is stiff!

This is me on my usual constitutional along the Mississippi River. Only this time I am in the river. Or on the river. Whichever. Up to my neck at any rate.

All I know is I am going to remind my Person of this the next time I accidentally get caught eating the homemade bread left out to cool, or knocking over the garbage, or eating Ollie's breakfast before he finishes or, well, being a dog. After all, who can be mad at a dog who can walk on water?