Wimsey's Blog: Diary of a Manhattan Bloodhound #146

Entry #146

November 28, 2009

Hello Everyone, Wimsey here coming to you from the turkey laden Upper West Side of Manhattan—I’m hoping you’ve had your fill of seasonal goodies (like the ten pounds (!) of yummy home baked goods that arrived from my human Maria’s mother to prevent me from wasting away over the holidays And in the spirit of the holiday I am actually allowing Maria to eat her mother’s goodies too).

I myself kicked off the holiday in fine New York style by viewing (along with Maria’s friend Elizabeth) the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade balloons being blown up. And naturally, as with all my activities, there was a coterie of New Yorkers watching me watching the balloons. And as I felt compelled to vocally encourage the chaps blowing up the balloons it was hard to say who attracted the most attention, me or the balloons. (I really have no idea why some people are terrorized by my baying and somehow think that it’s directed at them. It’s like get over yourself, you’re really not important enough for me to bay at. Clearly these are people who have no experience of Hounds). Many in the crowd seemed to want to figure out which balloon was fellow Hound, Snoopy which made me think that given the amount of attention I receive and the amount of time I generously devote to entertain New Yorkers and their guests, there really should be a Wimsey balloon.

Thanksgiving Day Parade 2010

Matt Lauer: Hello everyone. Welcome to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. I’m here with colleague Al Roker to bring the magic of the parade to you live.

Al Roker: Yes, Matt and this year we have an exciting addition to the parade. There will be a Wimsey balloon!

Matt: How very appropriate as he lives only a few blocks away from the start of the parade. I suppose the city wants to honor him for spending the year arduously posing for photographs and being petted, fed and played with by tourists.

Al: It’s a tough job Matt. The City is grateful to Wimsey for taking it on. You know, people from out of town think New Yorkers are crazy but when the see this giant Hound roaming the streets of the metropolis they know that we are. He’s an integral part of the New York image, and confirms what the rest of the world thinks of us especially when they actually meet New Yorkers idiotic enough to live in a small space with a massive Hound.

Matt: Not only that, but to spend so much of their waking hours exercising the massive Hound in Central Park’s 800 acres. Rumor has it that he’s peed on every acre.

Al: It wouldn’t surprise me Matt, Wimsey has a prodigious capacity in that department. Also people see him in every corner of the park and think that New York is chock a block with bloodhounds, but really they’re all him. He can cover a lot of ground when he’s motivated to give his humans a good tow. And right now he’s particularly motivated as apparently none of his humans has pulled or broken anything or is seeing a physical therapist.

Matt: Yes, I hear he hates when that happens. He feels he’s let down his side.

Al: Anyway, Macy’s is introducing a Wimsey balloon and here it comes!

Matt: It’s enormous! Oops. It looks like he’s missing a few bits.

Al: Macy’s has a strict no nards policy, Matt and given the size of the balloon. making the bits proportional to Wimsey’s would have been overwhelming, although I must say he is much admired for those parts.

Matt: What’s that! It can’t be rain. It’s too sticky and the sun is shining!

Al: I heard they were trying to devise a way for the balloon to fling drool, so I guess they

succeeded. The Wimsey experience wouldn’t be complete without it. Here, have a wipe and an umbrella.

Matt: And I see they added a vocal capacity to the balloon also.

Al: What! I can’t hear you!

Matt: Look Al. The handlers seem to be having trouble getting the balloon to turn the corner. It’s almost as if the balloon wants to go in another direction. How can that be?

Al: It’s the Power of the Hound Matt. Even the polyurethane ones.

Anyway, every day is pretty much Thanksgiving around here-- my humans are always giving thanks that I am around to make their boring lives more “entertaining” and turkey is the number one bribing meat of choice and there are always innumerable reasons to bribe me. And speaking of my entertainment value, we all enjoy listening to comments about me that people make in passing—comments like “amazing,” “awesome,” and “what a cool dog,” etc. Well the other day a passerby commented that I was “a real New York City crime detection dog.” And of course he was right as at that moment I was in search of turkey cadavers. And in cases of such crimes against poultry it is essential to personally sample the evidence. Of course I also detect crimes humans commit such as unlawful possession of a bed or a sofa or felony hoarding of Dean’s pizza. Which reminds me that this week the TV show “Law and Order” was being filmed on Elizabeth’s block and my interest in one of the crew convinced his colleagues that he was “carrying.” Fortunately for him I am not a drug detection dog but am more of a sandwich detection one. And I excel at my job.

But I think in general I would make a very fine detective (except that I am always detecting things that no one wants detected, like juicy rodents or people who haven’t changed their underwear) and then there could even be a board game devoted to my detectival abilities.

Hound Clue

Player #1: I think Colonel Wimsey Mustard stole the Thanksgiving turkey in the kitchen using his hind legs to gain access to the counter.

Player #2: No. You are wrong. Miss Wimsey Scarlett shredded the priceless autographed Shakespeare First Folio in the library with her unclipped nails.

Player #3: I disagree. The culprit was Mrs. Wimsey White and she destroyed the 18th century Sèvres dinner service that survived the French Revolution in the dining room with her giant scimitar tail.

Player #4: You are all wrong. Mr. Wimsey Green blew out the windows in the conservatory with his potent sonic baying.

Player #5: No, I accuse Mrs. Wimsey Peacock of chewing the legs off the antique Chippendale side table with her teeth.

Player #6: Sorry to disappoint you all, but after all the destruction, Professor Wimsey, using his powerful brain, deduced that humans who live with Hounds ought not to be in possession of knives, candlesticks, revolvers, lead pipes, ropes or wrenches or any other potentially lethal instruments as they are inimical to the long term h

ealth of the Hound. So he stole them, dug up the floorboards and buried them under the shredded Aubusson carpet.

And speaking of brains, it turns out that because I tweeted about napping on a University of Chicago magazine (usually I like to take an afternoon newspaper nap, but none were available that day to make a nest out of so I was forced to squeeze myself onto the University of Chicago magazine), I am actually now being followed on Twitter by the University of Chicago! Clearly, unlike my humans, these brainy folks can appreciate a true genius when they see one, even if my head does come to a point. I probably should eat a few Great Books in the University’s honor—I hear Herodotus is particularly tasty- and also follow the Chicago School’s economic philosophy by taking steps to reduce my humans’ money supply.

And on the subject of the money supply, my humans apparently found one Black Friday offer too good to resist—a sale-priced Ruff Wear fleece winter coat that they ordered for me. Who knew they made winter coats that size that weren’t intended for smallish ponies. Apparently all this is because Maria has been seeing fat squirrels (is that like seeing pink elephants?) and is convinced that this means we’re going to have a cold winter. And as my humans have nothing left to buy in the outerwear department (except perhaps crampons for staying upright whilst walking a Hound in snowy weather) they turned their attention to me. And it seems this year all the neighborhood dogs are sporting coats at the slightest nip in the air or the lightest drizzle. And they wouldn’t want me to stand out or anything; I mean people would notice a giant smelly, baying drool flinging Hound if he were coatless, wouldn’t they? Anyway, so now the question is, does an oversized Hound in a green fleece coat trump a fat squirrel in the weather prediction department? My humans are convinced that their eagerness to display me in my winter finery virtually guarantees a warm winter.

But we have had very mild weather this week which means I’ve been out and about quite a bit to take advantage of it before the fat squirrels have their way. And after much baying and furious towing Elizabeth finally relented (furious baying and towing generally does lead to relenting in my experience) and let me visit the snack bar at the Conservatory Water (this is a large man made pond in Central Park where in Spring and Summer children sail model boats and I need to be restrained from diving in and helpfully retrieving them) where I stood on my hind legs and was fed treats by the counter man. The feeding fellow was quite amazed at how gentle I was whilst I was relieving him of these snacks and my soft mouth encouraged him to keep the feeding going pretty continuously. Another example of my manipulative brilliance, which I am sure is being studied by University of Chicago scholars even as we speak.

Anyway, my annual Thanksgiving promenade was an especial succes

s this year as we ran into my gal pal, Oreo the delicious Dane. I really have a thing for these tall lanky Scandinavian types. Of course I have a thing for females in general. Especially the ones who don’t bite me when I stick my cold nose into their nether regions and inhale deeply.

Well all this following by major academic institutions has gone to my head and I might have to eschew making fun of popular cultural institutions and board games and such and go back to cogitating on the role of the Hound in the more rigorous intellectual disciplines such as physics, history, art, literature and making fun of the French. But first it’s time to hit the books!

Until next time,

Wimsey, Thanksgiving Day balloon manqué