Wimsey's Blog: Diary of a Manhattan Bloodhound #270

Entry #270

July 20, 2012

Hello Everyone, it’s me, Wimsey coming to you from Manhattan’s Upper West Side where we finally have had a break from the heinous heat that has been plaguing much of the City in general and me in particular.  And true to my breed type, when I am a plague-ee I rapidly turn into a plague-er much to the discomfort and annoyance of my human Maria and her friend Elizabeth both of whom are on the receiving end of most everything I do.

 

Well the big news this week is the Landlordian Powers That Be have taken it into their heads to redecorate the hallways of Maria’s apartment building—my primary residence when I am not spending my afternoons over at Elizabeth’s minimizing her work time and maximizing my scratching time.  I have established quite a rapport with these decorators who, as they are usually eating lunch when I emerge for my midday walk, I find strangely fascinating.  

The feeling is mutual and although the verbal communication is conducted entirely in Spanish I understand their admiration perfectly. And of course it is important that Elizabeth, who speaks no Spanish (except for those words related to alcohol and food), has managed to master the one truly important phrase in Spanish (or in any language for that matter): “Mira el sabueso grande!”   This elicited flattering cries of “muy, muy grande” which I took either as a signal of approbation for my size or an indication that Elizabeth, who is small, looks ridiculous walking me, who is not.

Anyway, the reality of the decorating situation is that, owing to the current rainy and humid conditions paint is not drying on the walls and concrete and tile grout are not drying on the floors. This conjured up the image of a paint, and grout bespeckled Wimsey, so on Wednesday night Maria broke the news to  Elizabeth that I was hers for the night. More accurately speaking, she was mine as I decided that I required an extensive walk around the neighborhood before going to bed and then attempted to break into a closed pet shop on the way home.

And as usual Elizabeth took an Ambien (Stilnox for those of you in Europe) hoping to get at least some sleep.  But sadly they do not conduct clinical trials for sleep aids with large, deep chested and resonantly snoring Hounds next to the bed.  Especially not those that like to have dreams that involve tail thumping, running and emitting mini-baying noises.  But she did drift off a bit at which point it was 3:15am and time for some nice crunchy kibble and a loudly slurped bowl of water. I considerately alerted her to the forthcoming snack activity by engaging in some prolonged and vigorous ear flapping next to her head so she would be sure not to miss any of the proceedings. I also knew that she would want to rinse the drool out of my water bowl and refill it as I require. Starbucks owes me the big bucks.

 

The next morning was cloudy and cool and as Elizabeth was eager to get back to a project that she was working on, I decided that we should spend the morning in Central Park instead. It was lovely. And on the way home we dropped by Unleashed where after an exhausting round of sniff shopping I selected a rawhide.  I am very particular in the matter of my rawhides and if my humans purchase the wrong kind it ends up decorating my toy pile. 

In general, I have been spending quite a bit of time in pet stores lately as the search is on for yet another new food.  I began licking my paws which convinced my humans that I had become allergic to an old food that I had recently been switched back to. This resulted in a quick change to something completely new—Blue Buffalo Wilderness Salmon, even though its fat content has some serious gas potential. 

But after the licking problem persisted and following a quick chat with the vet it was decided that it is more probable that all the tush-related clavamox that I have been taking has made me into a rather yeasty fellow.  It was then that the ladies noticed that I did smell rather like I could cause bread to rise. Tomorrow we are all caucusing chez vet to figure out the best way to de-yeast me.  In the meantime my humans haunt the Internet and pet stores analyzing and inspecting foods.  I don’t really care what they end up choosing as long as it is very expensive and hard to get your hands on. Like me.

Anyway, much to my chagrin I did have to go home yesterday (Maria is a sound sleeper) but the decorating is still incomplete so I may be back with Elizabeth periodically.  And there is always our afternoons together where I like to enliven her telephone meetings with loud ear flapping close to the phone.  I mean if you have long, pendulous ears you might as well use them as Nature intended—to annoy people.

And speaking of annoying (and when are we not) I have to admit that the recent hot weather has not brought out my best side. When Elizabeth came over Sunday so we could all go out for our usual park walk together, I lay on my side so deeply pressed into Maria’s bed that my humans decided that I looked like a flounder.  It’s amazing how flat I can make myself when I am lying comfortably on a cushy surface in the air conditioning and someone approaches me with a collar and leash.  

Now I know that several of you have requested either a picture or a drawing of me in the character of this FlounderHound but Maria has so far been unable to capture the true essence of it. She will keep trying, however. Anyway, I had my revenge (and when do I not) by dragging the ladies on a scenic tour of my favorite Central Park water features.

 

And in some celebrity news not about me, Terry O’Quinn, who played John Locke on Lost moved into our friend Nancy’s building.  I don’t know that Nancy and her family should be getting on an airplane anytime soon.  Maybe not even on the elevator. If she gets taken to The Island who is going to feed me the contents of her daughter’s stroller? Anyway, I am hoping that I run into him at some point—sliming celebrities is what New York’s all about. After all one of the things that they say they like about living here is that they get treated like everybody else.

But now more about me.  Those of you who read this blog know that several weeks ago we had a visit from our friend Virve and her husband who are owned by a very handsome black and tan Finnish bloodhound.  Well we bloodhounds have our tentacles (and paws) everywhere, even in the northern reaches of Scandinavia; it turns out that Virve is a reporter for a bloodhound magazine—the kind that has pictures and stories about us, not the kind that we eat. We just received the latest issue and there is an article about me and some very good looking pictures—I especially like the one of Maria squatting down to serve me a bowl of water from a fountain in Central Park.  I think that encapsulates both the spirit of the piece and the spirit of our relationship. As Paul Rinehart the founder of my brewery, Baying Hound Aleworks so aptly put it, we bloodhounds don’t have owners, we have staff.

Well I think I will leave it there for this week.  I am off to brush up on my Spanish as in “Por favor Senor, fork over that lunch!”

Until next time,

Wimsey-- Spanish, English, French, Italian, German, Finnish, Hungarian, Dutch, Esperanto…etc. for Gimme That.