The Birthday Curse

You would think by now, at the ripe old age of (censored), I would know better.

Unfortunately, I decided to go against years of experience and invite a few friends over for dinner tomorrow night to celebrate my birthday. Now, any of you other February babies probably know what I'm talking about: but this is a lousy time of year to have a birthday. You, or everyone that you know, is sick or else there is a massive snowstorm that cuts off all the power and closes roads in a 1000 mile radius of where you live.

But, we weren't expecting snow, and I felt fine, so I called our friends Maggie-the-Human, her husband Martin and Cathy and asked them to come share prime rib and and couple of rounds of tarot. That was yesterday morning.

By yesterday afternoon I started to feel "something." I wasn't sure what it was, but it wasn't the way I usually felt. I ignored it, hoping that extra vitamin C would make it go away.

It was clear by today that I have bronchitis. Now, I NEVER get bronchitis. I can't remember the last time I had it, it was so long ago. But, I toyed with the curse.

JM has suggested that we make me a fake birthday in June or September... It may not be a bad idea.

Oh well. I guess we (and the dogs) are going to get to enjoy that prime rib all on our own.

Ciao for now.

Randy (cough, cough, cough)

Levis goes to the Bridge

Our friends, Bernard and Bernadette, who run the local news stand had to put their little poodle, Levis, to sleep yesterday.

You may remember that I wrote about them before.

On New Year's Eve, Levis was attacked by a GSD. Levis was on his leash, the other dog was not. It just surged out of the darkness and grabbed him. Levis was a miniature poodle, a senior dog, and clearly no match for his attacker.

The owner of the GSD was there, called his dog, beat it (nice) and took off without ever asking Bernadette if she, or Levis, was injured.

After a couple of very difficult days, it seemed as if Levis was going to be all right. Then, this week it became clear that his kidneys had been damaged in the attack but no one had realized it. Rather than let him suffer, Bernard and Bernadette did the kind thing and let him go to the Bridge.

JM and I are heartsick over this. It should never have happened. I know sometimes people think I'm odd, always keeping mine on their leashes. But if they injured another dog, or were injured themselves, I don't think I could live with myself.

Ciao for now.

Randy

Lost and found

We seem to be making up for lost time with the weather. The last few days it has been hard to believe that only a week or so ago we were complaining about the oddly warm temperatures. The nighttime lows have been running somewhere around -10 C (12 F) with daytime temps reaching a high of 0 C (32 F).

As you can imagine, dog walking is much less enjoyable in the early morning hours. Still, Attila the Shmoo and his minion Maggie the Good need to go out for potty breaks and exercise no matter what. I've been taking them on my own, because JM really doesn't deal well with the cold and it's easier to go alone than to worry about him as well as the dogs.

I do not like having cold hands. However, when I'm trying to get a tissue out of my pocket or give a treat to the dogs to reward them for something or try to keep them from going nuts when they see another dog (pack-like behavior that I'm trying to control), I find that gloves can get in the way. Yesterday, I just wound up putting my gloves in my pockets and suffered on.

But, we had several incidents of the Mongol Horde barking, jumping, pulling and going generally nuts. Unbeknownst to me, my gloves fell out of my pocket and I just walked on. After a few minutes, a fellow walker hailed me and handed me a glove. I did not realize that its mate was also gone, so I thanked her and went home. Of course, there I noticed that I was now the sad owner of a singleton. It was cold and I was tired, so I decided to heck with it and didn't go back to look for the missing glove.

Last night, I went on a different route, so still no glove as of this morning. However, I did take my usual road on our first walk of the day. As I got to about the halfway point, I noticed a purple object (mostly covered in frost I might add) waving at me from a bush. Some kindly soul had clearly found the escaped glove and rather than just leaving it in the path or taking it, they had put it where it could be more easily seen in case the owner returned. I was really struck by this. I imagined what would have happened in similar circumstances in Los Angeles. Certainly not that. Most likely the object would have been ignored at best, taken at worst.

I'm not saying this is a France vs. America difference. Most likely is a rural vs. city difference. The person who found it assumed (correctly) that whoever had lost the glove would eventually take the same path, and thought that they would make it easier for them to find it. I think that speaks volumes about the people of our village. I'm sure if the person had known to whom the glove belonged, they would have brought it to the house; in lieu of that, they at least made sure it would be found.

It's another reason that I'm happy to be living in a place where neighbors think of each other and do their small bit to be accommodating and helpful.

Ciao for now.

Randy