Having a ball on Friday night. We had been out for a nice walk in the dark and were playing one of our favorite games, wherein she relinquishes the ball to me ("Drop it" means that she loosens her jaws to release it into my hand --- still working on actually dropping it in the usual sense) and stays where I put her while I back across the room holding the ball. The challenge is for her to stay where she is until called, then to come to me and sit (as opposed to jumping maniacally all over me for the ball) and wait for me to toss it to her. Then she catches it.
This is our current take on "fetch," incorporating some very-much-needed practice in self-control and impulse regulation. It's a good thing to play indoors because it doesn't involve a lot of mad running but does wear her out, because she has to exert energy to restrain herself from just tearing after the ball and snatching it from me. It's also a good thing to do right before bed: her need for attention and activity is met, but not in a way that winds her up too much. Right before I crate her, we play a few rounds of this, varying the distance I back away before calling her, varying the time before I call her, varying the time between calling her and having her sit, and actually tossing her the ball.
Then I tell her to "go to bed," i.e., go into her crate, and "stay there" while I go outside to fill first a Kong, then her food bowl, with her last meal of kibble, dividing the kibble between the Kong and the bowl, and stuffing the Kong with a pretty splinter-proof chew bone to make it harder for her to get the kibble out. That gives her another brain game to do while she's winding down, and once she's finished she's generally content to pass out until morning.
She went through a big separation-anxiety phase on our return from Norway, where after being put to bed she would bark and cry and bang at her crate door for hours, unless I came and sat on on the floor beside the crate (really fun when you're all jetlagged . . .). While I feel for her in these instances (it was also the Fourth of July, fantastic timing, so she also was out of her mind with terror over all the pops and bangs outside), there is no way in heaven or earth that I'm letting her out of the crate at night.
A) In this house we do not sleep with animals. No judgment on anyone who does, but a dog in our bed would be an absolute dealbreaker for my husband, and honestly, I really don't want to sleep with my dog, either. There's enough dog hair outside my bed. I don't want dog hair in it.
B) What she would do all night, were she not to be crated, is run up and down and cry and whine and bark and scratch frantically at our door, then if let in, proceed to pester us in bed. I know enough about her waking habits to know that not crating her at night will never be remotely an option. She does not settle well on her own. She can and does settle well in the crate. I use it for daytime rest periods, too, after periods of activity and attention, because the physical barrier signals to her that it's time to have a nap. We do work on self-settling without the crate, but it's always going to be part of her life and mine.
So anyway, we've spent the last week and a bit working on, once again, settling in the crate and not panicking because the beloved humans might disappear. The Kong toy filled with kibble in the crate really seems to help. I've been doing that for daytime naps, too. Our routine is
1. Get up (from overnight sleep or a nap)
2. Walk (long or short, depending on the time of day: longer walks in the morning and at night, short jaunt mid-afternoon, lots of sniffing on any walk)
3. Some kind of game, usually this ball game I've just described, or a brief training period (attention, "stay," etc)
4. Usually at least a chance to self-settle in the afternoon while I go back to work. If she pesters me for attention, as she often does, I'll do some kind of quick training thing --- make her sit, play the ball game for self-control, anything that gives us some distance between the pestering and the thing I'm ultimately going to do, which is re-crate her, having first made sure I've met some needs and given her a chance to do something right.
She's always crated while we eat, because she's a horrible pest about food, a thing we're working on. I don't let her out again until the kitchen is all cleaned up, so that there aren't leftovers for her to jump up and eat when our backs are turned (another bad habit we let develop and are now working to undo). Really trying to drive home the idea that our meal has nothing to do with her, and she might as well just take a nap instead of acting as though she's being deprived of something the whole time we're eating.
Anyway, whew, dogs. All that and hair all over your house, too. Speaking of which, today's real agenda is housecleaning. I've been putting it off and putting it off, and at this point I'm ready to run away and let the bank foreclose on my house while I live in my car. The less attractive option is to clean the house, but my husband seems still to want to live in it, and I want to live with him, so that's kind of clarifying.
I call this pose Dead Snake With Prey:
Which reminds me that I saw a dead copperhead (without prey) on the Park Loop road yesterday, ugh ugh ugh. Not that I think they're not out there, but ugh. First of all, there is nothing deader than a dead snake. Smashed possums, for example, do not give me the same frisson of horror. Second, copperhead. They are, objectively speaking, pretty snakes, with their muted colors and patterns, but that just makes them look that much more evil.
I'm not snakephobic, but I really hate copperheads, at about the same level that I hate water moccasins. Both are fairly aggressive, un-shy snakes, that do not at all go to lengths not to bite you. Rattlesnakes will warn you and, if possible, put distance between themselves and you. Not so these venomous denizens of the great southeast. They'd just as soon lie there until you step on them, then bite. I'm always over the moon to see the big black rat snakes that we also have around here in abundance, because they will kill and eat copperheads.
Anyway, ugh.
High today of 95F. So much for the break in the heat. I might not keep on what I'm wearing right now, which is this:
*Wool& Willow (M) in Wisteria, bought February 2023, last worn exactly a month ago, on my day out in Blowing Rock with my friend Zina. I didn't take this dress to Norway, so now I'm reuniting with it, at least for the morning. I mean, who knows? I could wear it all day. I wore it through the heat of the summer last year, so why not do it again? The color is light and fresh and cool, even if I'm not.
*Birkenstock Mayaris, bought in April, worn yesterday.
I keep seeing these things on Instagram about "wearing the dress" vs. "styling the dress." And I'm here to tell you: I am wearing the dress. Team Basic for the win. No nuance today. No little cool details.
On the other hand . . .
Maybe glasses are a style choice, especially if you have multiple pairs? I'm so used to thinking of them as simply part of my face that I usually don't consider that I'm choosing them. But in fact . . . I've had my transitions sunglasses on for several days running, because that's how I make sure that I'm wearing sunglasses when I go outside. And maybe little round silver glasses that turn into really dark sunglasses outdoors are a choice? Maybe they signal, as the Artgirl says, that this person is hella cool? I mean, we can hope, right?
I went with asymmetrical earrings today, too, just because I wanted a change.
So, that's a nuance, I guess. If I go out, I'll take my quilted dark-olive-green bag, which in fact goes with pretty much everything I have as a nice color combination, so that would be a styling move, without my even especially trying.
I could toss a linen scarf around my neck and, I suppose, be instantly elevated, but it is going to be 95F here, so come on. Not doing that shozzle.
I did do something with my hair, as you can see. Last night before bed I spritzed it pretty thoroughly with Not Your Mother's Curl Talk leave-in conditioner and combed that through. I'll wash it tomorrow, but today I'm just going to leave it, braided and folded up in my claw clip as shown. It looks honestly like not much --- I could wish that this updo were more interesting and graceful from the front --- but it's off my neck, which is key.
How do people take not-stupid pictures of the backs of their heads? How?
Profile shots are a little easier:
Anyway, the other things I really must do today are
*Buy plane tickets for the Artgirl and myself to go see my mother for a long weekend at the end of the month (not going to spend our long-weekend time on the road)
*Pick up and mail the Viking's ADHD-med prescription, which is in at the pharmacy
But otherwise, I have to clean house. I must, I must, I must. The time is here.
LATER:
I have vacuumed and dusted indoors, and done as much of a number on the front porch as I could in the heat: swept, vacuumed, got rid of cobwebs, washed the door, the windowframes, and the worst of the porch woodwork. The house is still getting to me, but I feel better.