Wimsey's Blog: Diary of a Manhattan Bloodhound #319

 

Entry #319

October 4, 2013

Hello Everyone, it’s me Wimsey, at long last coming to you from Manhattan’s Upper West Side where I continue to engage in my usual Houndish shenanigans.  I have been remiss about posting because my human Maria and her friend Elizabeth have been very engaged in professional matters and naturally require my assistance to not get things done. Maria took off to Chicago on a business trip for a few days leaving me in the full time care of Elizabeth; Elizabeth had been up against a project deadline and needed my help to understand that the importance of making deadlines pales in comparison to the importance of entertaining me. I deputized Hedgie my very vocal hedgehog to remind her of this every time she got on an important phone call.  Amazingly, most people are too polite to ask her about the racket although one day the tables were turned when a call was interrupted because the caller’s Shih Tzu decided to try to do battle with a neighbor’s malamute.  Elizabeth magnanimously accepted the caller’s apologies for the interruption.  Fortunately for her Hedgie and I were having a nap. And when not in the paws of Morpheus, I like to sneak up on her when she is too engrossed in her computer to notice me and then shove the keyboard return under the desk and replace it with my head.  It never fails to make her jump. Or to scratch me.

Maria meanwhile spent entirely too much time working late before she absconded to Chicago where she checked into a room at the W that was larger than our apartment. Unfortunately she was unable to give herself over to the full experience of actually sleeping in a bed (I’ve been monopolizing the bed quite a bit lately forcing her to sleep on the couch) because she found the W’s amenities did not include the piping in of noxious Hound gas and their sound system did not feature loud Hound snoring, both of which form an essential part of a comfortable night’s sleep.

And meanwhile back at Elizabeth’s, I continued my tradition of climbing into bed with her at 7am, drooling on her face until she wakes up and then going back to sleep whilst she gets ready for our morning walk.  I am then indignant about being woken up when she is ready and refuse to go out without a suitable interval of belly rubbing and a liberal application of turkey.  

I also decided to channel my inner Pluto—my French bulldog friend who Elizabeth sometimes hosts when his humans reluctantly abandon him for places that it might be inconvenient for him to go—like to Paris—and just like him become an exemplary companion dog.  This entails following Elizabeth around to all the critical places like the bathroom and the kitchen and sitting in her lap when she is on the couch.  Although I have to say that the couch in Elizabeth’s apartment displeases me greatly because unlike the extra deep one that Maria bought especially to accommodate my posterior, Elizabeth has standard size one that fails to meet my extensive tushly requirements. I guess it’s a lot easier being a companion dog when you are 30 pounds and not 130.

 

But even though Elizabeth’s couch is uncomfortable, it frequently comes provisioned with a large number of newspapers which I can appropriate to make a lovely nest for my nap. And since there is no danger of Elizabeth ever being able to read these papers since I sit on her and thwack them with my bear claws when she picks them up, they might as well be put to good use. 

 

Anyway, when Elizabeth finally finished her project I helped her celebrate by taking her on what she referred to as “an endless walk to nowhere” because it involved visiting nowhere that she wants to go, like a nice verdant park but everywhere that I want to go, like the bustling Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle and a number of scenic far West Side construction sites that I find exceptionally interesting.  And I know how relaxing she finds it to navigate packed Manhattan streets with an oversized Hound who is dripping drool and who considers humans in his way to be inconsequential obstacles to be shoved aside with abandon.  It was a wonderful way to celebrate! 

 

And of course I was very pleased when Maria returned from her trip.  But not so pleased that I allowed her to medicate my ears and my eyes or to make her not have to hide in the bathroom while Elizabeth medicates my ears and eyes because if she is in visual range I won’t let Elizabeth do it either or not to demand cookies on our walks and then to sequentially spit them all out because I want turkey or duck heart instead. Being pleased to see my human has its limits.

But no diary entry would be complete without a visit to the vet—in this case not my vet, but the little vet from the ASPCA who I used to regularly visit when she worked at the cat hospital in my neighborhood.  Of course I still like to visit the cat hospital but for entirely different reasons.  We ran into the vet in Central Park demonstrating once again that even though New York has 8 million people, it’s still a village. And as my humans know, it takes a village to adequately spoil me.

 

Which brings me to my frequent visits to Lush Cosmetics to be fed and feted by their accommodating staff.  On my most recent visit my favorite Lush Lady, Jen, materialized with the requisite bag of cookies and she asked if I could sit.  Well this is a ridiculous question:  Can I sit? Of course I can sit. Will I sit? No. Why bother when I get fed treats anyway and obeying a “sit” command is the thin end of the wedge that could lead to such horrors as “come” and especially “drop it.” But I am not unreasonable; there is a time and place for everything.

 

Occasions Upon Which it is Appropriate to Sit

When it is time to leave the park.

When humans want to go in a direction that I find personally distasteful, which is any direction in which I am not currently going

When a human is on the couch in a spot I wish to occupy.

When a human is on the couch in a spot that I do not wish to occupy but is attempting to engage in behavior unrelated to me such as reading a book, reading a Kindle, reading an iPad, reading newspapers, watching television, talking of the phone or trying to have a nap.

When I am at the vet’s and a thermometer or a rubber glove appears

When I am in the bathtub and it is time to wash my nether bits

When ointment is put on my tush

When there is an object that my humans want that I can prevent them from getting

When my bottom is messy or stinky and I can transfer the problem to a convenient foot or to the freshly laundered sheets protecting the couch

When I wish to pin a human to a park bench

When there is any circumstance in which my humans don’t want me to

So as you can see, I frequently sit.  Sitting is a lot like baying—there is a time and a place which is generally always when no one wants you to do it (like on a 6am walk or when I sneak up behind someone who has no idea that I am there or when there is a little dog that is hiding behind its human) and never when people want you to do it (like when you walk through Elizabeth’s building and the whole staff starts baying at you to encourage you or when people ask your humans to make you do it).  In fact, lately when I have been out and about in the neighborhood complete strangers look at me and bay.  They may not know me but they have certainly heard me!

 

And although we are now having a bit of Indian summer (and the AC is on to cool me off) it is the season where my humans replace and replenish their cooler weather Hounding gear—like ordering a new collection of t shirts (long sleeved for the fall) to replace all the ones that have those peculiar stains that won’t wash out.  This year Elizabeth decided to introduce a daring fashion innovation and purchase corduroy pants which I am greatly looking forward to her wearing.  I am already planning all the things that I can stick between the fabric ribs—drool, dirt, mud, grass, hair, cookie crumbs, turkey bits and what is known around here as “miscellaneous organic matter of indeterminate origin “of which I always have a copious supply.  It’s going to be a glorious autumn!

I think I will leave it there for this week.  I will be hibernating until the warm, sticky weather pattern from Tropical Storm Karen passes, and although I am not a fan of violent weather I do miss it when there is no excuse for Maria and me to camp out at Elizabeth’s to ride out hurricanes. She makes me lasagna.

Until next time,

Wimsey, a champion sitter