Here is a pic of a sign that is displayed at a convenience store here. (note my reflection in the background! LOL)
I am wondering what prompted the sign. Exactly what kind of animals do you think were brought in to the store before the sign had to be posted? A ferret? A snake perhaps? Usually it’s “no pets allowed.” But this proprietor was very specifc about animals. I’m just sayin’…..
Last weekend my sister and I took a trip to Long Island for my cousin’s retirement party. I informed my sister that we would be leaving promptly at 10 am on Saturday morning. Friday I suggested that we take one suitcase for the both of us, and I packed one day ahead of time. My brother-in-law repacked the suitcase, adding my sister’s things and packing the proper way that he has of packing which prevents clothes from wrinkling. I felt bad for him. Poor George must have been cursing as he fiddled with the tiny buttons on my blouses. He has a theory that if the shirts are buttoned, it helps in the wrinkle-free process!
I gassed up the car and arrived at my sister Pam’s promptly at ten. She was ready! But by the time we packed the car up and got on the road, it was 10:23 a.m. I was not stressed yet, partly due to the fact that I was barely awake. We stopped at the mid-point, in Brewster, NY and spent some time browsing for wine at a store there. We’d planned on going back to the hotel after the party, so we bought munchies and wine for those who would join us.
We then went to Subway which was crowded with a bunch of loud teenagers, and I ordered a chicken salad sandwich because it looked good with the grapes and nuts in it and so on. Well, ten minutes later that turned out to be a bad choice as I was driving and the darn chicken salad fell out of the sandwich on to my lap! Pam kept saying “you’ve got lettuce on your shorts!” The stress began. There I was driving with chicken salad on my lap, lettuce on my shorts, and God knows what under my fingernails from picking all that stuff off of me. Pam, however, thoroughly enjoyed her roast beef sandwich.
We arrived at the hotel with less than an hour of time to get ready for the party. First of all, the parking at the Marriott in Melville stinks. I dropped Pam and the luggage off with the bellman while I went to park the car a half mile away, then walked back to the hotel in the 95 degree heat!
We were on the 4th floor and I walked all around the mulberry bush to finally locate the room, which was another half mile away from the elevators! Quickly I ironed my clothes (even George’s wrinkle-free theory hadn’t worked on my outfit) and then decided to change the top and had to iron again. Finally we were ready to go when my sister starting losing it because she couldn’t find the bag with her shoes. Luckily we found them in the car, and they were not left back home as originally thought. Phew!
We arrived at the party just on time, which was a miracle. Visiting with the relatives was fun, and my “niece” and “nephew” (Robbie and Jacqueline) and my cousin Lorraine surprised all by showing up to say “hi” on their way to a wedding reception.
By the end of the party I was feeling quite tired. Pam and I went back to the hotel, but no one else joined us, so we went swimming in the pool. By that time the pool was loaded with kids (mostly teenagers) and HAIR. Everytime I swiped my hands to swim, I’d come up with hair on my hands! I was quite disgusted.
After showering off the chlorine, I finally sat down to have some cheese and crackers. But neither Pam nor I touched the wine. I was exhausted and fell asleep, only to be woken up an hour later. I looked over at Pam, who had fallen asleep with her glasses on and the t.v. showing some infomercial. I had a flashback to the days when I used to take my Dad on trips and I’d go to sleep but he’d still be up watching t.v. But this time instead of saying “Dad, get to bed,” I had to say “Pam, go to bed!”
Then an awful thing happened. I started to cough. It was more like a hacking thing than a cough. Nothing stopped it. I tried drinking water, drinking soda, sitting up and nothing stopped the cough! I was hacking away for over an hour while my sister pleasantly dozed in the other bed. I finally fell asleep again around 2 a.m.
The wake up call came at 7:30, which is earlier than I wake up for work each day! Up and at ‘em and into the shower I went. Pam got ready, we had our fake coffee from the machine in the room. Packed everything up and then made the one half mile trip around the hotel to the elevators. I left Pam with the luggage as I walked another half mile in the blazing heat to get the car from the parking lot.
Finally we headed out and went to the Diner to meet up with my friend Maurya and my cousin Carol (who retired). We had a great breakfast. After a brief stop at my cousin’s, a stop at Kohl’s, and then we were on the road again to Massachusetts.
The weather had been brutally hot and humid. Traffic on the Cross Island Parkway was bumper to bumper. As we were passing a park, I noticed the sky getting darker. Pam was sitting in the back seat elevating her legs and reading her History book for summer college. It started to rain heavily. I looked over at the park and noticed that a few people were having trouble keeping their umbrella’s from folding inside out. The wind had really picked up.
As we approached the Throg’s Neck Bridge, Pam looks out over the water and starts saying “there’s a funnel cloud!” She then calls my brother-in-law back home in Massachusetts and is talking on the cell phone and describing the scene to him “the leaves are turning upside down! Oh my God, there’s a huge funnel cloud!” I don’t know what George was thinking except maybe “better you than me,” but Pam was certain that a tornado was heading towards us.
So I’m trying to navigate in traffic and keep the car on the road over the bridge as the wind and rain were pounding against the car. We made it safely over the bridge and into more bumper to bumper traffic through the Bronx and White Plains until we eventually got to Westchester and the traffic eased up. Pam was still insisting that she saw that funnel cloud.
I said “You’d better call George and let him know we didn’t get swept up in the funnel cloud!” I was joking, but also wondering why George didn’t call us back to make sure we were okay!
After all of that we arrived back home safely. I went home and right to bed. The trip had exhausted me and I had work the next day.
In the morning I checked the news, and sure enough, there were confirmed reports that a tornado had indeed touched down in the Bronx at the time we were driving through there! So Pam was correct, she had indeed seen a funnel cloud and the leaves had turned inside out because of it!
It’s taken me three days and I’m still not fully recuperated from the trip. So it’s off to bed for me now and off to work again tomorrow. The whirlwind weekend including the funnel cloud are over. And now it’s on to more adventures!
Recently I’ve been walking my friend’s dog. I usually take my walk for exercise at a local park here in the mid-morning hours before I have to get ready for work. So I figured, “why not take the dog, too?” Surely, he’s just sitting there at home, lounging on the couch while my friend is at work. I’m sure he just hopes for someone to pass by the house so he can do that dog thing and be curious and bark and all that.
So the other day I stopped by the house. He barked once, but then recognized my voice, and sat waiting patiently while I unlocked the door and opened it. Yes, as stated previously, I do talk to the dogs. They may not understand what I am saying, but they know my voice and realize I’m just that non-threatening human who sometimes gives treats and almost always will rub behind the ears.
This dog’s name is Boomer. I call him Boomie, and sometimes even Boomerang, just because I can. He doesn’t seem to mind.
So the first day of our walking together, I brought him to the park and as soon as we stepped out onto the dirt track, it began to rain. Now, normally in such situations I would get back in the car and forego the walk for the day. But I looked down at Boomer. He looked up at me with the saddest expression, his eyebrows gathering together as if to say “Please, please, can we just please play?” And so there I was with the invisible SUCKER stamped on my forehead and leash in my hand and, well, I just had to stay and walk.
I am not a power-walker by any means. So most dogs have to get used to my pace and realize “oh, this is that slow but steady human here.” Boomer adapted well, and after five minutes we were walking side by side. The rain subsided after a few minutes and so we continued on. But then after the fourth trip around the track (I usually do 5 and 1/2 laps), Boomer started veering over to the side where the taller grass was. All of a sudden he just plopped down on that grass and wouldn’t move!
Ok, so now I’m thinking “what the heck is wrong?” I quickly bent down and felt his chest and belly to make sure he was breathing normally for a dog. He was. Then he rolled over and offered his stomach for me to massage, and I got to thinking “wait a minute.”
I tried every command I could think of to say to him, but Boomer was not moving. Now I was getting worried “Don’t die on me here, Boomer!” I frantically said to him. That’s all I’d need. Walking a friend’s dog for the first time and I kill her favorite pet! Boomer closed his eyes 3/4 of the way and I thought for a minute that I was going to have to do CPR on a dog.
After about 4 minutes, he lifted his head, jumped up, licked my hand and started trotting away as if to say “Psych! I got you!” We got to the end of our walk for the day and Boomer seemed happy.
The next day I picked him up in the afternoon, and it was quite hot out. We didn’t even get one lap around the track before Boomer did his “drop and plop” thing again. I looked at him. He looked at me. And I said “ok, Boomer. I get it. It’s too hot for you today.” So we spent some time just sitting in the grass. Boomer looked at birds and I talked on the cell phone.
Here’s a picture of Boomer checking out the birds in the trees:
Today I went to pick up Boomer and realized that he’s getting used to the routine. He greeted me at the door with tail wagging and seemed excited to go for the walk. It was mid-morning again, and I figured out that, much like me, Boomer enjoys that time of day. He wasn’t sluggish on the walk and was very playful through most of it.
But then about half way through the walk he began to veer off course again. This time he was headed for a mud puddle. I figured, “oh, maybe he wants a drink,” and so I let him go to the water. Don’t be grossed out, people. Boomer is a dog. He licks his privates and pees in the wind. So, yes, dogs do drink from mud puddles.
Just as I gave him some leeway on the leash, I saw what he was about to do. You see, I momentarilly forgot that Boomie is a MALE dog. And just like little boys, male dogs like to get dirty. A female would have tentatively placed her paw in the water and maybe lapped a sip of water. But not Boomer. Instead of putting his face to the water, Boomie jumped full on into the puddle, and sat right down in the mud! He would not budge for about three minutes, and then he bounded out of the puddle, shook himself off, and continued the walk. The next time around he did the same thing. I let him, just to see if he’d actually sit in the mud again, and sure enough, he did:
I couldn’t get too mad at the dog for having some fun on the walk. He is definitely breaking up my exercise routine, which I’m not too pleased about, but he is making the walk more interesting. I’m thinking that he may just get bored with the track thing, so I’ll have to think of other places to take him.
But you know that when I dropped Boomer off back home, he licked my hand and gave me that sad look as if to say “thanks for the walk, but are you leaving me here all alone?????”
“Yes, Boomie. Until next time.”
I wonder what he’d do if I jumped in the mud puddle and sat there with him? I just might try it. You never know….
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