Entry #318
September 14, 2013
Hello everyone, it’s me, Wimsey, coming to you from
Manhattan’s Upper West Side where I have been lurking in weather-imposed exile
much to the consternation of my human Maria and her friend Elizabeth who would
prefer to have a Hound that actually walked outside instead of one who:
1. Casts a languid and unenthusiastic eye over his collar,
harness and leash whilst sprawled on his air-conditioned perch atop the bed or
the couch.
2. Demands to be fed turkey in order for them to have the
privilege of putting his equipment on him.
3. Gets outside, realizes that the temperature is not to his
liking and tries to retreat whither he came.
4. When cruelly prevented from retreating whither he came,
plots the shortest distance between his air conditioned apartment and
Elizabeth’s air-conditioned apartment and attempts to proceed there with the
greatest of celerity.
5. When cruelly prevented from both retreating whither he
came and following the shortest distance to Elizabeth’s apartment, attempts to
execute dynamic and robust forays into air-conditioned businesses, preferably
those like banks and pet stores where they feed him.
6. When finally
hauled, much against his will, to the leafy precincts of Riverside Park, lays
down in the field opposite Elizabeth’s building and refuses to move, let alone
exert the energy it takes to lift a leg.
So in short my week can be summarized as follows:
Saturday: It’s too hot
Sunday: It’s too hot
Monday: It’s too hot
Tuesday: It’s too hot
Wednesday: It’s way too hot (so much so that I had to wear
the dreaded cooling coat)
Thursday: It’s too thunderstormy
Friday: It’s cool!
You and what army of dog wranglers are going to get me to leave Central
Park!
This week has been even more proof positive that my humans
absolutely cannot win. But to be fair in
the evenings I did deign to walk over to Riverside Park and fraternize with
some of my canine buddies. Chief among them is Phineas the one-year-old Ibizan
Hound who according to his human is exhibiting a surfeit of “personality “ the
degree of which required Phineas’ human to enlist the services of a dog
trainer. Since the results of this
exercise are apparent to no one, including his human and certainly not to Phineas,
Elizabeth (who has experience training shelter dogs who are also not short
of “personality”) offered to work with
him. And I of course am a shining
example of Elizabeth’s training techniques!
Then there is the 15-month-old Portuguese Water Dog, Theo,
who also has an abundance of “personality.” Apparently Theo likes to steal food
and the fact that you are eating it has a minimal inhibitory effect on his
activities. His human opined that I
probably do pretty well in the stealing food department which forced my humans
to confess that actually I don’t steal food—I get them to serve it to me. And
not only that, they have to serve it to me in the preferred form. I reference
last week’s post about how I need to have my duck hearts sliced. This is in addition to wanting my yogurt and
gelato spoon fed to me and to having my pizza cut up into bite sized bits. I also will not eat apples—of which I am very
fond—if they are sliced. Rather I demand that my humans bite off chunks of an
intact apple and feed them to me.
And it is not just my humans who feed me. Complete strangers
on the street and dining at cafes also feed me.
If war is a failure of diplomacy then food stealing is a failure of
charm. Also, of baying and drooling. Humans generally find that it is easier
just to give me what I want rather than listening to ear exploding high decibel
baying (the Wimsey Vocal Technique calls for every exhale to be a bay) or to
deal with the copious quantities of Anticipatory Drool that I drip and fling
with abandon. For instance, when I want Elizabeth to cut up her pizza for me, I
position my head over her lap so that failure to feed me in a timely manner
results in her looking like she is badly in need of a shopping trip to the
Depends aisle of the drugstore. Thus, I don’t
steal food because I am well behaved-- I don’t steal food because I don’t need
to steal food.
Anyway, in other news, the nice people at Kuranda sent us an
email asking if I would like to compete in their “dog of the month” contest.
Since this involved sending in a picture of me actually on the Kuranda bed, my
humans had to politely decline. Wherever
the Kuranda bed is, I’m not.
Nevertheless my foolish humans continue to place it at various points
around the yard hoping that they will find the magic location. I like to lie down right next to it just to
annoy them. Or annoy them more.
And speaking of being annoying, yesterday was Friday 13th
a day on which Hounds get to show their humans how lucky they are to have us
around. For Elizabeth, who takes care of
me during the day, it went something like this.
Elizabeth: Hello
Wimsey! Do you want to go out?
Me: No. Scratch
my belly.
Elizabeth: I’ll
give you a nice big piece of turkey if you’ll go out!
Me: Pay the toll
to the troll and we have a deal. Hey! What happened to the weather! It’s
cool! I’m heading to Central Park. You
can come too if you like.
Elizabeth: Well,
OK, but remember, Wimsey, I have to work on my project.
Me: Did someone
say something?
Friday Park
Perambulations with Wimsey
So here I am heading north on the bridle path, which is in
the opposite direction to any park exit that will take us to Elizabeth’s. And when I work up an oppositional towing
thirst I simply signal my servant that she should fill the water bowl that she
so attractively carries about hooked to her pants.
Next I decided to explore the back regions and stage door
entrance of the Delacorte Theater. The
fact that we had to pass the snack bar was wholly incidental. We did see a good-looking actor heading in
for his costume fitting. He smiled his
approbation at me. I flung drool on him.
Next I explored this field under Belvedere Castle and
watered some flowers. I am now heading
east, which is once again the wrong direction for going to any of my
apartments. 
I have now climbed the stairs to Belvedere Castle which sits
on a promontory that has excellent air currents for me to sniff. It also had a
little white dog and here I am calling out to him to come and be sniffed by my
giant, vacuum cleaner- like nose. He did
not comply with my request (small white dogs seldom do in my experience) but my
enthusiastic attempts to induce him to come be inhaled caused me to be
photographed by the numerous tourists present which caused Elizabeth to have to
pay me me with fistfuls of turkey.
And here Elizabeth has cruelly prevented me from continuing
east so I have elected to make her wander in the Ramble. I delayed our westward progress by eating
some exceptionally delicious plants that she will have to pull out of my butt at
some future date.
I am very irate. The Stream is right behind me and I had
every intention of indulging in a nice muddy splash and a drink when I
discovered that the spot was being occupied by a photo shoot. I hate people who monopolize valuable real estate
to take pictures. Especially when they
are not of me.
Then I decided that having been prevented from a dip in the
Stream I would jump in the Lake. I
found this sign which I interpreted to mean “No Dogs in Water Except for
Wimsey” Also it said nothing about Elizabeth not joining me as I always attempt
to have her share the experience.
OK so here I have found a field on a hill which is a lovely
place to linger. The only thing marring
the experience was some background squawking about some project or other.
And finally 2 hours later I am on the path to leave the
park. But being on the path to leave the
park and actually leaving the park are two entirely different things.
So that was how Friday 13th went. We did eventually make it
back to Elizabeth’s where she prepared me a lovely lunch of yam, turkey,
pumpkin and kibble. I settled in for my nap at about 3:30. Sadly for Elizabeth’s project my nap lasted a
scant 2 hours as I found all the exercise invigorating and had an urgent need
to repeat the experience. Apparently it is difficult to work with a large Hound
squeaking a large Hedgehog in one’s face.
And Maria, who thought she could work late because I’d take a nice, long
nap, was forced to hustle home to accompany me on my investigations in
Riverside Park. So my humans are lucky
to have me because otherwise they would actually have to work.
Also notable, Friday the 13th marks the day in
1788 that New York was declared the capital of the United States. No one told anyone here that it’s not.
Until next time,
Wimsey, a Fall (en) Hound
1 comment:
That picture by the "no dogs" sign is the saddest thing I've ever seen! That's the most pitiful expression ever.
Post a Comment