Dog, you are walking the line; or a Litany of Gripes.

Do you see this dog?

resting like a righteous dog, and not like
an early morning sleep-disrupting troublemaker.

He's watching the Australian Open with us, kind of. As if he did not come to the door of our bedroom this morning at 6 o'freaking clock, with his tippy happy toenails, doing the 'let me in' samba.

'No, Bruiser,' I said. With firmness.

Away he slunk, only to come back two point five minutes later, tippytapping like a bastard.

'No, Bruiser,' the historian said. Firmly, if sleepily.

Away and back again. Tippy tappy. The dog is persistent.

By this time, of course, I was awake. My brain was starting to think of things to be mildly anxious about. List-making. I got up, cracked open the door. I said, 'Wait Bruiser,' which is my strategy for getting back in bed and adjusting the covers so that I'll still have some by the time he hops up. But then he hopped up and I was left to fume and cling to the remnants of my covers.

So I got up and wrapped myself in a robe and faux fur blankets and fell asleep on the couch. I woke up late, later than I wanted to. Which always makes me feel like I've started the whole day behind.

DIGRESSION. I really need to get a hold of my attitude.

BACK TO MY GRIPING: So I made some pancakes (and order was restored!) and got myself ready for this agenda:

• purchase two items for historian's birthday
• purchase sundry items at Target
• write drafts of two poems

Believe it or not, I accomplished this agenda. Plus I updated my anxious list. Then we went out for Vietnamese food and Anomalisa, which was very good and also melancholy. 

Meanwhile, this is still going on at our house

I'm pretty sure it's coming down this week. -ish.

and also this:

were you aware of snow in the forecast? we weren't.

We need to take Bruiser out in the snow for a walk, I guess, and then a talking to about sleeping in his own bed until at least seven o'clock. But I admit, I don't have much faith in this strategy. In his whole life, Bruiser has never once been known to seriously heed a talking to.

The Hightouchmegastore Guides for Living #189: Sleeping With Dogs.

1. First, acquire a very, very very very large bed. The breadth of the bed should be akin to a broad savannah, such as where the lions roam.

2. Divide the bed into as many people and/or animals as will be sleeping in it. Preferably, divide these sections with something that a dog cannot knock over, when the dog inevitably turns over in the night with a giant sleepy sigh.

3. Get into your section of the bed. Let the dog get into his section. Drape a drapery across the dog, if that's how you roll. Adjust the covers. Turn out the lights and drift into a blissful, blissful slumber.

4. If you have a smaller bed, you are screwed.

5. Wait: if you have a smaller bed, you must not allow your tender and sentimental heart to be stirred by the sweet sight of a sleeping dog.

6. If, when you gently call the dog's name to rouse him from his evening rest, to entice him to another all-night sleep location, if at that time he opens one eye in bewilderment, as if to say, what's that now? but I was sound asleep! do not be turned from your rightful path.

7. You may give the dog another five minutes. Ten minutes tops. In fact, as you plan this whole sequence of events, take the "first a warning, then a five-to-ten minute wait" factor into account, so your own slumber will not be delayed.

8. After five minutes, ten minutes tops, speak to the dog in a firm but gentle voice. Tell him whatever lets you feel okay about yourself, but say it and get the dog off the bed, out of the room, and moving on to his new sleep situation.

9. Don't give up, now. Sure, he looks cute there all nestled into the bed, like he belongs there with the pack, you, the alpha, and him, the doggy beta. Just think of the middle of the night when he will be immovable and you will be awake, plotting how to get just six inches more of the covers and scheming about how to turn over without losing all the covers. Keep that thought uppermost in your mind as you make that dog get off the bed and leave the room.

10. No, he can't stay for just a little while longer. Just a little while longer? No, he cannot.

11. Is he out? Good for you. It shows strength of character and resolve. You are the boss of that bed and of the sleeping you do there. Now settle in, finish the crossword, turn out the light, and take a deep, calming breath of the cooling air in the room and the almost-disappeared redolence of a dog who is now sleeping in his proper place, i.e. and to wit: not with you.

Dear Sunday,

Despite my intentions, I woke up early today. The dog was at the door. That sounds like a metaphor, but it's not: Bruiser sleeps elsewhere, i.e., not with us, because he's a big guy and likes to sleep sideways.

But at some point in the early hours, he always comes to the bedroom door and requests entrance. We should just say No, Bruiser, because if we do, he'll retreat for awhile, and we can sleep a little longer. But usually one of us lets him in. That person tries to make it back to the bed, flipping the covers back over with great haste, so that the B settles between us but does not upset the overall sleep ecology. But I think you can see: it's an iffy proposition. It's always possible that he'll beat you to the bed and you'll be making do with the short shrift this arrangement offers, covers-wise.

So I got up, went out to get the papers. Came in, made breakfast. Began to read the news, bad and good news in whatever today's proportions seemed to be. Seems like a lot of bad news lately, doesn't it, Sunday? But Sunday is the only day that I can linger over a newspaper, so I always do.

I caught up with the bit of sleep I might have added to the night's later this afternoon. I lay down with my current novel, read a few chapters and sank into some dream set in the same strange country as the novel. Woke up, relieved that I hadn't slept as long as my epic dream seemed to indicate. The light slanted in the window at an approximate afternoon hour. I got up.

That's how it's been today, Sunday. Desultory and not particularly productive. Sleepy. Rainy. After a decidedly action-packed Saturday, I was pretty glad that you and I came to this agreement.

still resting,

htms

The end of July.

(--although not the very end, obviously.)


Anyone else feeling it? The doldrums, the dog days? The heat?

July is where, in terms of summer, the real collides with the myth, and it is brutal, that collision. Everyone ends up in the ER, where they don't have enough ice and the AC is busted.

Our swamp cooler, which right now is just bringing in the night air on the vent setting, sounds like it is making ice cream or something strenuous like that. It sounds effortful. It sounds earnest, and to be frank, it sounds a little sweaty. That, the people, is synesthesia, the synesthesia of summer.

Here's what we have in the house: no popsicles.

Here's what I want to do: lie on my bed, under the fan, and do crosswords. And reach over and grab my sweaty glass, and take a swig of ice water or lemonade on ice. And complain, let's not forget that. Complaining is my cardio.

Tonight, we went to Brewvies and watched a movie about which we had previously asked ourselves, every time we considered it, "Do we really want to see that? It might be terrible," and when we sat down in the theater, after having downed some lemonade and ice water and pub food, we said to ourselves ahhhhhhhh. On account of the AC. Which was stellar. The movie was not half bad, either. You know, for a summer movie.

And now it is time to walk the dog. In the dog night of summer.

Change in the weather.

The wind felt like it was blowing from the north, with us walking into it and it blowing incipient rain or snow in our faces.

I wore something warm, but not warm enough.

In the west, the sky was red or orange or rose--something in that vein--at 10:30 p.m. What's that? we asked ourselves. Was it wind or traffic we heard, or was there a beating of rotors out there? was that light sweeping across the sky?

The dog gallivanted. He raced ahead, dove deep into the yards we passed, turned back on us to play.

The snow is supposed to arrive at midnight. At midnight, there is supposed to be snow.

Two words.

Harry Potter, and "Strange Dog Adventure." If you counted five words there, I'm going to have to ask you to take that counting outside the premises, because it is bothering me.

1. Harry Potter was perhaps the most satisfying movie of them all, so far. However,

2. "Strange Dog Adventure" is not my favorite episode in this genre ("Lost Dog for Which We
Feel Responsible" is a genre, yes?). For one, when we called the numbers on this nice, unfixed, large male dog's tag, we got messages for two businesses. At which I left detailed messages, which for two, have not yet been responded to. And for three, ugh. Why is the dog roaming? why do we feel responsible? why don't I feel okay just dropping the dog off at the after-hours dog-drop-off place at the Animal Shelter? why won't the owners of the several odd phone numbers return the call? why? Anyway, the dog will be spending the night in an enclosed (undisclosed?) space in our house tonight. Bruiser, needless to say, is a wreck.

I said I would blog, and I did. That is the extent of it for tonight, the "Strange Dog Adventure" night. In homage to the Strange (nice) Dog: Grrrrrrrrrrr.

New regimen.

Raise your hand if you think it's unreasonable--improbable--to go to bed at 1 a.m., with a little ancillary chatter before actually falling asleep, and then get up at 7 a.m. to take the dog for a walk and get ready for, y'know, work.

Since school started, it's officially summer's over time, even if the equinox isn't for a few more days, but we have nonetheless been keeping summer hours around here. Why? you may ask. Well, we ask ourselves this same question. Is it because it's still a little hot? because there are 21 year olds playing Beatles Rock Band in the basement? Is it because we're rebelling against our own selves and our better judgement?

(It should be noted for the record, although you probably already guessed it, that that last "rebelling against our own selves" item is only about me and not the historian. Obviously.)

Anyway, on our way into work this morning, we had the following conversation:

Me: We should take Bruiser for his walk at 10 o'clock, not 11 or 11:30. That would probably help us get to bed by midnight instead of 1.

The historian: Right. I should probably just mention it at 10, instead of waiting for you to mention it.

Me: (to myself: Is he implying that I'm the foot-dragger in this situation? IS HE? Because he's probably right. But still!) [pause.] Yeah, probably.

Later today, while we were riding our bikes in the dusk:

Me: 10 o'clock! And none of your foot-dragging.

The historian: I beg your pardon! [not his real words.]

Me: Just kidding. I know I'm the reluctant foot-dragging one.

All foot-dragging aside, we did take Bruiser for his walk at 10 p.m. And we're on track for an early bedtime. Early for us, anyway.

My agenda.

1. Grade.

2. Lunch with birthday boy grandson.

3. Consult with 3 students.

4. Grade.

5. Scavenge dinner.

6. Grade.

7. The Office.

8. 30 Rock.

9. Walk the dog.

10. Grade.

TAGS: tedious

Bruiser dreams of spring.

Snow day.

The gender identities of dogs: a colloquy.

Yesterday when I came home from work, I found Bruiser dressed in a flowery tank top (size: XS), dating no doubt from the days when make-up artist daughter lived at home. After I had removed the offending garment and soothed Bruiser's wounded pride, running son and I engaged in the following text message exchange:

ME: Don't dress Bruiser in girls clothes ever again--it confuses his sexual identity.

RS: Sorry but he looked good in it

ME: Do you want him to grow up to be a drag queen? do you??

RS: if the bra fits . . .