2000:   If Wishes were Horses
 2001:  How Do I Love Thee? Let Me Count the Miles
 2002:  Deck the Halls
 2003:  Brave New World
 2004:  Giving Pleasure
 2005:  Ho-Ho-Ho, Merry Christmas

My 2006 Holiday Letter

IN MY OPINION
"Probability Theories
and Match.com"

Books Read in 2006
(Updated 12/1)

HIDE AND GO SEEK

3 December 2006

Tho sun barely shone
It was OK to play
So the puppies went out
to the back yard today

I sat there with Walter
We sat there, we two
And we thought oh how nice--
They have something to do!

It's no longer wet
They can go chase a ball
While we sit in the house
and do nothing at all.

Yes, we could just sit there
  sit
    sit
      sit
        sit
And we really liked it
More than a bit!

No puddles to mop up
No big piles of poo
We had one shining moment
With nothing to do!

Yes, I got brave today.  It was really colder than I wanted to sit out in the open air on a cold plastic chair, but the puppies have fur coats, right?  So I took them outside.  And I left them outside, unsupervised, except for their two four-footed, furry babysitters.

It seemed to be a great success.

They could run across the patio or the dirt without having their feet slide out from under them.  They could wander as far as they wanted.  They could pee in the dirt and poop in the grass.  And I put out a blanket by the house, where countless other puppies have napped in times past.

I took advantage of the time when they weren't whining or begging to be picked up and were out playing to get some stuff done.  I felt like my mother must have when I was a kid and she'd say "go turn off that radio and go outside and get some sun!"

Then I started thinking about writing a clever Seuss parody for this journal entry and realized that for it to be effective, I should go outside for a bit and take some cute photos of puppies cavorting happily on the grass.

I went out the door and immediately saw Blue on the blanket looking not too happy, but then Blue has a "blue" expression much of the time anyway, so I didn't look too closely at him because I was looking for the other puppies first.

Only they were gone.  All three of them.  They weren't on the grass or in the leaves at the back of the yard or anywhere.  And I could hear whining.  I thought it was Blue.

I went to Blue and noticed that he was shivering terribly.  Poor baby!  I picked him up and cuddled him and brought him inside and called for Walt, to tell him that the puppies had disappeared.

Earlier, the puppies had followed him to the back gate, when he had snuck in to police the yard and make sure there was nothing there that they could choke on, so he headed to the front of the house to see if maybe they had slipped under the fence, but they weren't there.

I was looking under bushes and realized I could hear whining.

Then Walt checked the big bush on our patio and there they were.  There is the skeleton of a wooden chaise lounge which has been there for years and there, on the cross bars of the chaise were the three girls, huddled together and looking very unhappy.

I had left them outside too long.

We brought them all in and snuggled with each of them while they calmed down and warmed up.  Blue, the only puppy who never begs to be picked up and who gave up sucking on my finger long before the girls did (they still love to do it) began sucking frantically on my finger, as if his life depended on it.  After he sucked for awhile, I gave him a puppy biscuit and that seemed to settle him.

They all went down for naps in the nice, warm playpen.

And Walter and I did not know
What to say.
Should I tell you
The things that went on here today?

Should I tell you about it?
Now, what SHOULD I do?
Well...
What would YOU do
If your readers asked YOU? 

PHOTO OF THE DAY

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