Jack Sparrow

If you’ve read anything in this blog, you’ll already have realized that we live with cats. For about a year, we also lived with a sparrow, named Jack Sparrow.

Jack lived in the garage and the husband person and I tried on a daily basis to shoo him out of the back door and into the wide blue yonder. The bird would fly from one corner of the garage to the other, but never out the door. He’d come close enough to the door to presumably see and smell the great outdoors but he would never quite leave. He did come close once, flying outside only to flit back inside before I could slam the door shut.

There would be days when I wouldn’t see him and would feel sorrow since I was certain he’d ended up as one of the garage cats’ snack du jour. About that time he’d flit back into the garage from the North side cat house and crap on the dryer – usually on the load of laundry I had just folded.

Not long after we acquired our two legged, twin wing, self-propelled bomber, I went into the garage to find him on the side of the cats’ food dish, scarfing down kitty kibble. As Cressida, Darth Katti, Jingle Bells (AKA Captain Ballsy since he has yet to visit the vet for …ahem…the operation) and Mr. Tibbles were also scarfing down kitty kibble, I figured that was either one soon to be dead sparrow or one really dumb sparrow. Rather bird-witted, actually.

You know how you drive by a car accident and don’t want to look, for fear you’ll see something horrid but you look anyway? That was how I watched the silly bird chomping kitty kibble. Rather than realizing his foolhardy proximity to bird chomping machines, the idiotic bird jumped down into the middle of the dish of kitty kibble.

“Oh crap.” Thought I. “That damn bird is toast.” But he wasn’t. The cats totally ignored the bird as they continued eating. Cressida even swatted Darth Katti when he came close to where the bird was eating.

I waddled at a trot back into the living room to call the husband person from his chair. Right. Remove the husband from the chair after he’s been on his size 9’s for about 12 hours straight to see what was probably a figment of my imagination? Dream on. But eventually I lured into the kitchen (quite falsely, I might add) by the lure of brownies (well, we might have brownies, or fairies, or kobolds, dwarves, leprechauns or some other critter living with us). He cast his eyeballs out onto the garage. I hissed in his ear, “Do you see the bird?”

He grunted once. That usually means “Yes” or “No” or whatever I interpret at the time. This time it meant “Yes, dear, I see the damn bird, now let me go sit back down and watch the 2,394^th showing of the same idiotic law and order program from the inside of my eyelids.”

Captain Sparrow got along with Cressida particularly well. It was not unusual to look in the cat room to see her sleeping, curled up around the bird, or the bird picking at her fur. Talk about strange bedfellows.

I had to put a shallow basin of water out at the cat/bird feeding station so the bird could bathe and not drown in the cats’ deeper water bowl. Since the bird obviously took umbrage at me invading the joint cat/bird space, he’d either crap on the clean laundry or take a bath in his basin, which usually involved a lot of splashing of water which naturally would end up all over me. After a while I learned to watch the cats. If they fled for the safety of the cat house, that generally meant Captain Sparrow was about to take a bath. I also learned how to speed fold clothing with one hand whilst flapping the other around in the air to disrupt his bombing run.

Carl and I were very careful to keep the door between the garage/cat house and the kitchen tightly closed. Despite the glasnost between cat and bird that existed in the Northern Cat House, the cats who dwell in the kitchen and other areas of the house were not so kindly disposed toward birds. I had formed this opinion based on the number of times that one of the non-bird loving cats would ram their catly heads into the windows when a bird landed on the shrubs outside. Also helping me form that opinion was the fact that one of the cats, Luna(tic), is absolute death to mice. Unlike our neighbors, we have no problems with mice, thanks to the valiant efforts of our resident rodent exterminator, Luna. A Tonkinese mix, Luna has dozens of mice, voles, moles, lizards and one particularly slow grass snake to her credit. If it has invaded the inside space, it's hers.

As the Kitchen Cat Crew never evinced a desire to explore the garage or Northern Cat House (AKA Kitty Domicile Number 2) and they did not mind the occasional visit from one of their northern neighbors, Mr. Tibbles, Darth Katti and Jingle Bells would often stroll in for a friendly visit. I suspect they also came for a bit of feline gossip and naturally informed the other cats of the bird in residence. As Sneaky Pie Brown, co-authoress of some of my favorite books once said, “Death To All Vermin!” Luna agrees, especially if the vermin has two legs and wings and tastes surprisingly of chicken. Luna adores chicken.

Unfortunately, one day I did not quite shut the garage door behind me and turned around to see the door open and Luna standing there in rodent chomping position. I screamed at her to move and tried to shut the door, but Captain Sparrow flew in. Luna had him on the floor and his neck broken in less time than a scream. Should I admit I cried or would that seem a little sappy? I guess it is, but I did cry. I also didn’t let Luna have the bird.

Before I could get a paper towel to wrap the little body in, Cressida had come into the kitchen. Cressida has never entered the kitchen before, nor has she since. She picked up the bird and returned to the cat house. I went out there to take the bird from her; after all, one does not eat one’s friends after they have outgrown their bodies. But instead of eating the bird, she was curled around him, pushing him with her nose. The little head flopped back and she curled around him even tighter. I used the paper towel to wipe my eyes.

Over the rest of the day, she’d carry him around the cat room, gently prodding him with her nose, making a little trilling sound. At the end, she carried him to the feeding station and put him down next to the bowl. Cressida looked at me, gave the bird a last push of her nose and returned to the cat house. In all her years, this was the first and only time she has made eye contact with me. She watched as I wrapped him carefully. Carl buried the little body outside Cressida’s window while she looked on.

Goodbye Captain Sparrow. She misses you still.

Death Of A Washing Machine

Death of a Washing Machine
After 25 years of faithful service, our old Maytag washing machine has gone to that Great Big Appliance Store In The Sky. In our 42 years of marriage, we've had 2 washing machines, both Maytag, and the first was a used model. So off we hopped to the local appliance places to price out new washers.

HOLY CATS! Both Carl and I are frugal but believe quality gives us a lot longer service than cheaply made things. But YIKES, the prices were enough to make me think maybe continuing to do the laundry by hand wouldn't be all that bad. Of course it cost us $50 ONE WEEK to send Carl to the laundromat with sheets, towels and blankets because I am too wimpy and old to wring
them out by hand any longer soooooo....

The first time we looked, I actually had to leave the store. Talk about sticker shock, yikes. Looked online, compared prices and things and decided another Maytag would suit us, so back to the store we crept, hoping that the prices were a joke or a misprint. They were neither.

The engineer in me started looking at each machine (Carl hid the prices). For the first time in all our married life and living with Maytag, the quality just wasn't there. The agitator wobbled around and was of a rather cheap feeling plastic. The case was a good, solid, heavy steel but the guts didn't pass any of my tests. But still, it was a brand we've lived with a long time, so I dithered over my decision. I fell in love with the Electrolux front loader in cobalt blue but no way, no how, noooooo nooooooooo noooooooooooo, I cannot bring myself to spend over $1,200 for
just the washer. Nope, can't do it. For one reason, we pay cash and do not have/want/use credit cards and it would take the better part of a year to save that much up, especially with him doing $50 a week at the laundromat.

Returned home without a new washer, again. More online research narrowed my choices down to four machines. I ruled out every machine with electronic heavy control panels. They usually go out first, about three millisecond after the guarantee expires and costs the most to repair. (IMExperience) We went to the Tifton, GA Lowes as the one in our home town leaves both of us
cold. The people at the Tifton store are great to work with and know what they are selling. If they don't have an answer, they will do everything they can to get the answer for us right then - even if all I am buying is a filter for the room ac. They also do not act as if they are doing us a huge favor by helping us or answering a question (which they never know the answer of.) One fellow in the paint department of the Albany store even refused to let us have the color of paint we wanted to do the house in - I guess he was the self-appointed Paint Police.

The young man in the appliance department steered me away from the really expensive units and told me exactly why he wouldn't feel good about selling us those. He also didn't talk down to me, which I really appreciated since most people selling tech stuff or appliances see an old lady and not someone who might actually know a little something about the advanced mechanics of washing machines, house construction and such. I narrowed my choices down to two units - both
GE, which shocked me because our last encounter with a GE appliance was extremely negative and went with the one with the least fancy schmancy controls, a huge 4.1 cubic foot stainless steel basket and no agitator. It even came with the hoses. (Cheapy plastic which we changed out before installation. ) It was $498, which was $200 less than was in the appliance budget, so I bought the new coffee grinder I've been lusting for and several Christmas presents, including a bright red, 6 quart crock pot.

Since there is precious little my husband cannot do, we carried it home and he had the old one out and the new washer in, hooked up and ready to go in about 30 minutes. It would have been shorter had the old washer not been full of frankly skanky nasty water that he had to bail out in order to move. I was absolutely no help since the smell made me sick and my stomach decided
I had to leave the room.

On super size, I was able to do 7 towels and 2 sets of queen size flannel sheets in ONE WASH. This washer takes a lot less water and electricity. Carl was out front looking at the water meter and I was watching the electric meter. It still has a few too many choices for my preference, but the manual controls are a lot more robust than electronic ones, IMExperience. It even did both of our large pillows without having indigestion or trying to walk across the floor. The pillows took under 40 minutes to dry, so I love the extra spin" cycle. But honestly, someone explain to me why I should actually want or use 23 wash settings? Good grief. Give me warm water wash, cold rinse, super heavy load, extra rinse and extra spin - keep all the other crap. Silk setting? They're kidding, right?

I suspect there is a Cosmic Law that states if one thing in the house dies, at least one other thing has to go kaput, and that happened here as well. I have a bit over one TB (terabyte) total of data on my 6 internal, one external drives in my computer. When I heard that dread noise which I know means a drive is on its last legs, I was not happy. Naturally it had to be the drive with the operating system on it and also naturally, since my sons had me convinced that I was crazy to have mirrored drives (which protects data well), I hadn't mirrored that drive.

DUMB. I should have listened to myself. So I started madly migrating data off of the wonky drive, but the other drives were slammed full with just a hundred or so KB of room on each. I spent hours burning DVD's filled with applications, documents and stuff, praying that the failing hard drive would hold on just a little longer. I keep my copy of Win XP pro in a lock box, (so it isn't turned into a kitty Frisbee, but couldn't find the key at first, of course. About the time Carl got back from Wal Mart with a small drive just for the OS, the drive had died with a heart-rending screeeeeeech. Didn't even get the blue screen of death, it just died.

Installed the new drive, praying that it would play nicely with the other drives, mobo, processor and RAM. Got a pulse, installed the operating system (Windows 2k pro is my preferred - tried the new thing, not impressed - too much junk) and started reinstalling dozens of programs and updates. I got to bed about 3 this morning, but everything was happy in computer land.

Made a huge pot of navy bean soup on Friday and put enough for our evening meal on Sunday in a pot, covering it with aluminum foil and the lid. Unfortunately for me, the dratted cats got the lid off and the foil didn't slow them down and they ate the whole quart of soup.

Also unfortunately it gave them gas. Ya'll really do not want to know what it is like living with two dozen farting cats. You really don't. As about ten of them insist on sleeping with us, I slept with the covers over my head One time I stuck my head out for air and to check the clock, I could swear there were mini atomic mushroom clouds all over the room. Linux ripped a
huge one and he jumped about a foot, ran around the room like a banshee was chasing him and glared at me from the top of the shelves - as if I had made him eat all that bean soup!

Other than all that, the weekend went fairly well.

Pookie

Pookie, part I
When Pookie showed up on our doorstep, I was outside saying goodbye to a visitor. Pookie walked around the corner of our house, up my legs and back and curled up around my neck purring madly. She was a scrawny runt of a cat, weighing in at barely 3 pounds. Pookie was an unremarkable gray tabby without a bit of white; completely without any redeeming characteristic other than pure, unadulterated adoration of her chosen humans. Even after twelve years of good feedings, living inside, having all her shots and being spayed, she never gained an ounce and always looked frankly ratty. Others thought she was ugly. I thought she was beautiful and loved her even when those 18 hell claws were inserted into my flesh.

She was also The Cat In Charge. When I walked into the house, wearing my cat boa, she jumped down, checked out the food and water situation, scratched in the litter box and promptly whacked the current Alpha Cat, AKA She Who Hates Me. Honest, that's her name. She Who Hates Me refuses to allow any human to look at her, much less pet her and she was born here. But the Queen was deposed and Pookie In Charge.

The Alpha Dog, Ursula, was good friends with Pookie from day one. She ignored Sophy the lab and thought Gunny, the Great Dane/Pit Bull mix was hers to command. If he was eating and she wanted what he was eating, he backed away from the bowl. Once Pookie had finished eating, she graciously allowed him to finish the rest while glaring at the other cats and dogs, daring them to go near the food. When Toby the Dog was dumped here, she quickly whipped him into shape, despite his obvious dislike of cats.

Pookie had 18 Claws Of Death. Trust me on that. I have scars up and down my back from when she'd climb up me when she wanted a ride around the house. I learned quickly that if Pookie wanted me to be sensible, sit down and make her a lap, by golly I'd better sit down and make a lap right then. Otherwise I'd have to endure her crawling up me to curl around my neck and purr.

She also made certain that none of us spent too much time on the computer by jumping on the keyboard and daring anyone to remove her royal cattliness from the keyboard. Another method was to sit in front of the monitor. It didn't matter if you removed her once or 1,000 times from either the keyboard or in front of the monitor, she'd just go back to where she chose to sit until you were an intelligent human and either filled the food bowl or made a lap.

Unfortunately she was an excellent teacher so now all the other cats will do the same thing and right now Cass-Purr is in my arms, hampering my ability to type, Linus is in front of the monitor (and he's a rather large gentleman cat), Daffy Taffy is draped across one side of the monitor, Cisco is draped across the other side of the monitor, Callista (who is now 25 years old and still going on well) is on top of the monitor as are Linus (Linux's twin), Akira the First and Akira the Second (also identical twins).

The first week she lived with us, I learned to check the refrigerator several times before going to bed. I also learned to check inside the dryer...the washer...the linen closet...I swear that cat could teleport to wherever she wanted to be. It didn't matter how careful I was about restricting her access to something, that cat would find a way to get what she wanted.

I made a spinach and mushroom lasagna one night. Since there was enough for another meal, I wrapped it up and put it in the refrigerator. About an hour later, I went to get something to drink and found Pookie in the middle of the pan of lasagna, eating her fill. I tried removing her from the pan, but she latched the claws of death around the pan and around the shelf. I'd get one set of claws undone and she'd latch on even harder with the others, growling the entire time while gobbling down all the food she could - and that little cat could put the food away! In the end I ended up removing the shelf, cat, lasagna and all, and putting it on the kitchen floor. She graciously invited the other cats to join her in a midnight snack. In the morning the pan was scoured clean and ready for the dishwasher. For some odd reason, I rarely need to use steel wool soap pads for cleaning pots and pans.

That pretty much set the tone of our entire life with Pookie. To paraphrase a song in the musical "Damn Yankees", Whatever Pookie Wanted, Pookie Got.

End of part I

Halloween Decorations and The Law - Addendum

Halloween Decorations and The Law - Addendum

Whilst Googling around, I found an article about some idiot - pardon me - person who hanged a vice presidential candidate in effigy. He got in trouble for that. I'm OK with him getting in trouble for that. I'm not OK with people who try to turn the innocent enjoyment of a holiday into something which it is not.

All this political correctness crap gives me hemorrhoids. I haven't put the hanging man back out because of fear that the law is going to come to my door to arrest me for racial insensitivity or anything else equally idiotic. YES, IDIOTIC.

What is next? Is it going to become illegal to put out a Halloween display of UFO's? Tombstones (made from extruded polystyrene)? Fake bones? Fake cheesecloth ghosts?

Going on from there, will it be illegal to put out a manger scene at Christmas? Ooooops, it already is. A number of local governments have gotten into deep legal dog droppings (sarcasm fully intended if it fits) because they had manger scenes or otherwise Christian looking scenes on public property. Good grief.

When is it going to be illegal to say "Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Eid" or something else connected to a religious holiday? A close friend is a teacher and she doesn't DARE put anything that even hints of religion on her classroom's bulletin board.

It might offend.

Come on, folks. Get real.

Screw it. Happy Halloween and a Joyous Samhain to all of you who care to celebrate. While it is still legal, I'm going to carve my pumpkins, drape my ghosts and put out my tombstones.

Halloween Decorations and The Law

Ah sweet Halloween. You may have formed the opinion that I like Halloween. Wrong, I love Halloween. Pull up a pumpkin and hold onto your candy corn. Here's another true story about what happens when insanity - I mean passion - meets artistic tendencies - meets the local law enforcement folks.

I did mention before that son number 4 made a rather realistic hanging man one year. Well, I had to have another hanging man, so made one, coerced the husband and son number 4 into making a gibbet (what you hang people on, sort of like the guillotine cuts their heads off) so the hanging man could look more at home.

Moving right along here, the gibbet was made, the hanging man made (wearing the husband person's old boots, blue jeans and shirt stolen from son number 4, and a really unfortunately rather real looking body and head. The body was made with PVC pipe for the armature, a foam wig head for the head and the body more than realistic feeling made from foam. Hot diggity, it was great. I didn't have a clue how to do a proper hangman's noose, but son number 4 did, so eventually we had the hanging man hanging in the side yard - near the dead end, which I have always found so appropriate.

About the second night he was on display, gently rocking back and forth in the slight breeze, I had to get up about 1 AM for a glass of water. A car was out in the circle. The car had a spotlight attached to one part of its anatomy. The spotlight was shining on my hanging man.

SWEEEEEEEEEEEET, thunkest moi. I ran to the bedroom to wake the husband. "Hey, someones outside looking at the hanging man!" After a few minutes cajoling him to rise and be about the looking at my handiwork, he was up, wearing some clothing on his nether regions and with me at the kitchen window.

Hmmm...an interesting development. The car with the two men and spotlight also had a radio. Oopsie. It was some of our local law enforcement. Oh dear. The car was joined by another.

I was almost wetting my pants and holding my mouth so the officers didn't hear me laughing. Carl said "You're going to get us arrested."

The officers (in a group) approached The Hanging Man. One reached out and pushed the Hanging Man. From having made that sucker I knew that it had the weight and feel of a body, especially in the dark. Hmm....perhaps I overdid it a wee bit.

Another officer touched the Hanging Man with a finger, it rocked back and forth, it's ghostly, luminescent face facing towards them, then away and back again. Carl started muttering about it being all my fault. I started thinking about how I would handle being someones bitch in the big house and just how much time could they give me for making a realistic Halloween decoration, for heaven's sake?

One officer turned on his flashlight and shined it onto the Hanging Man's face. He gave a bark of laughter. Like kids will do when they've discovered that the ghost in the bedroom is only a curtain, the four of them pushed the hanging man around a bit before checking out the other decorations.

Carl pulled me into the dark right before the spotlight was turned on the kitchen window. Merlin, our black tuxedo (black with white bib) male was standing in the kitchen window, watching them. From experience I know how eerie a cat's eyes can be in the glow of a flashlight at night.

"Good one, Merlin." I made a mental note to give him an extra can of tuna as reward for being such a good prop cat.

Eventually they drove off, but I was later told that all the rookies were sent out that Halloween, with the radio report of "suspicious, possibly dead person hanging at blank blank road."

At least I didn't get arrested.

But the following year it was close.

I found a fantastic plaster skull which looked just like a real skull except that the jaw was not separate from the skull part. "Cool beans, " I thought as I plunked down the cash for the skull. I knew just how I wanted to use it.

A haunt has to have a witch. I think it is a law or something. Sooooooooooo I made a witch, life size of course, with nice foamy squishy body, black rags, pointy hat, warty nose and all. In front of the witch was a large cauldron. In the cauldron was an assortment of plastic, life size bones. If I could have afforded it that year, I would have put a bubble machine inside the cauldron but had to settle for a bunch of glow sticks with some fake spider webbing on top of that to diffuse the light. The skull was put on the ground near the cauldron with a bunch more bones. Hehehe. I loved it.

Unfortunately some idiots thought it was fun to dig up some real coffins in a local cemetery, taking some of the bones with them. It was all on the news and people were really quite incensed. Heck, I love Halloween and even I knew that was Not Right At All.

I went to work since I had to pay for my addiction somehow. When I got home that evening, my next door neighbor exploded out of her back door. (Not literally. I do draw the line at exploding my neighbors.) "Hey, wait a minute!" She yelled.

"Oh God, don't tell me she's going to complain about the haunt, cars, etc." I pasted a smile on my face and waited.

"The cops came by today and they were going to arrest you."

I was astonished. "DO WHAT?"

"Arrest you. They were going to arrest you for grave robbing." She grinned and since I hadn't been arrested (yet), I started to relax. My heart was still zipping along about 180 beats a minute, though. "For real. They drove by and saw the skull next to the cauldron and thought the bones were real, too. I saw them get out of the car and thought I'd better get out there."

Yeah, sure I thought, you just wanted to hear what was going on. Gossip is alive and well in Georgia.

"They were talking about how you must be the grave robber since there was the skull and everything."

"Oh sh**." My verbal skills had deserted me.

"Yeah. So after a while I picked up the skull and said 'See, it isn't real, it says Made In Taiwan."

I thought I'd still faint. "Did they say anything else?"

Finally she answered, "No, but they did check all the bones and stuff."

I made a sound of relief. She went on "Um...you don't really know anything about the grave robbing, do you?"

I just looked at her for a minute. How does one answer that? "God NO!" Good grief, I barely can get my garden double dug and planted before having to flake out for a week. No way could I have dug up several graves and taken their contents over one night. Not to mention I wouldn't. As I said before, it's just WRONG.

Carl just looked at me when I finally got into the house. He repeated what he had said the Halloween before and pretty much on a daily basis since then, "You're going to get us arrested."

But I haven't - yet.

The Bobcat, The Husband Person and The Wardrobe

I've mentioned before that my dear husband person, Carl, can sleep through pretty much anything. I also should mention that any readers of the male gender will want to stop reading now. Trust me. Nana knows best.

All the fellows gone? Good. Poor loves, what I'm about to share tends to cause them pain just to read.

Once upon a time I came home to find yet another kitten had been dumped in the yard. He was a handsome gray tabby with a large, roundish face. When I took him to the vets, we were told he was part bobcat and would probably get larger.

Hoo boy I hope to shout he got larger. When he finally stopped growing he topped out at around 35 to 40 pounds and about twice the size of the other cats. Hobby was a friendly soul, though, and showered everyone with affection. He also appointed himself to be guardian angel for our grandson and would sit on the dresser near the baby, just daring anyone to come close to Jon.

At that time we had a large wardrobe next to the bed and Hobby (Hobbes Katzenheimer was his full name) and Merlin (long hair tuxedo male) used to sleep on top, jumping down to the bed, then the floor. We never thought anything of it.

Oh dear. One of the men knows where this is going. Read fast, love, I'll be brief.

So there we were, sleeping the sleep of the sleepy. The bed was just right, the covers just enough and not too much or too little. It was quiet and perfect sleeping weather. You know how that is.

The cats needed to use the box, get a drink or a nibble of kibble or just to prowl. I was marginally aware as Merlin jumped to the bed from the top of the wardrobe. He was only 8 pounds and managed to land on mattress and not human. Merlin was a very considerate cat.

Then it was Hobbes turn to jump down. I opened my eyes in time to see him scrunch down on the front end, the butt end wiggling. I curled up in a ball, pulling the blanket over my head.

He jumped. He scored. Carl screamed, holding his private parts and writhing in agony on the bed. Hobbes and Merlin scurried out of the bedroom. Morgana, Lunatic and Boo peeked into the room to see what was happening and was there anything in it for them. The boys came into the room, quickly exiting when they realized what had happened to their father. They also held their private parts in sympathy, groaning almost as loudly as their Dad.

Carl rarely snarls, but he did this time. I offered cold compresses, he refused them (in quite a churlish manner, truth be told). I offered warm compressed, he refused more loudly. (Really now, it was just a little cat for heaven's sake!) He told me to leave him alone. (Honestly, men!) All his writhing on the bed messed it up terribly. I could barely sleep for his groans. Really, they can be such ninnies at times.

That's when we moved the wardrobe into the living room and started shutting the bedroom door at night.

Some time later I drew a cartoon of The Incident. It had a large wardrobe with large cat and a man sleeping in bed in the first frame. The second frame just showed the man, eyeballs (and other balls, too) bulging out as the huge cat jumped on him, waking him from peaceful repose. The third frame had the smaller cats holding up score cards.

Carl hated that cartoon. I cannot imagine why.

Now all the male dears who have read this far should go to Google and look up something like "Man home alone with taser." It is quite amusing.

Beagle Bailey's First Halloween

Beagle Bailey's First Halloween
(Heaven help me, it's all true)

After Bailey had eaten our lovely new chair, he was given severely curtailed house privileges and allowed inside only if humans were around who would be awake and therefore able to curtail his slight proclivity toward furniture eating. That didn't bother him a bit, since outside there were rabbits and squirrels for chasing and woods to run through.

He did like sitting outside with me while I was working on my papier-mâché aliens, ghosts, UFO's, demons, monsters and whatevers. Bailey was good company. He tried a bit of the papier-mâché paste but decided it wasn't to his liking, so that was good, but Bailey did think that it was fun to take the large bag of torn paper to the front yard to empty and play in. I disagreed and after picking up the paper bits (which multiplied exponentially once out of the bag) a couple dozen times (in one day), I put them in a small, clean garbage can with a tightly fitting lid.

He didn't sulk. Really, other than his little problem with furniture, he was a great dog. I miss him so much, but this isn't about loosing him, it's about what he did while with us.

The Day finally arrived and I could safely put Halloween decorations outside without the neighbors whispering about how nuts I am. See, if you put Halloween decorations outside in your yard in May, you're totally nutso. If you wait until the first day of October, you just like Halloween. Of course if you invite them inside and they see life size (death size?) toe pincher coffins (yep, I make them too), ghouls, ghosties and other frankly weird things, well, you're back in the category of "complete nutcase," but I digress.

That year's UFO was a smaller one, about three feet across. Rather than hanging it from the tree, I had made little landing gear legs for it to stand on. I was still working on the mini tableau to go with the UFO - two aliens carrying a human on board the UFO - it was just the UFO sitting under the tree.

The next morning I got up, ready and rearing to go on making the aliens and terrified human as well as hanging more ghosts and getting the rest of the several dozen tombstones into position. As I stood on the porch drinking coffee and looking over the displays, I saw Bailey under the tree chewing on something I couldn't quite identify. Then I realized with horror that he was eating the UFO.

Since this was prior to the Blessed and All Knowing Internet, I called our vet. He answered the phone "Bailey just ate my UFO!" I screamed into the phone. Doc would understand, he knew the dog and he knew me.

The voice on the other end of the phone said "What?"

I figured I hadn't enunciated it properly. I'm hearing impaired so sometimes words don't come out quite as I want. "Bailey, you remember my beagle, Bailey? He ate my UFO! Should I bring him in? Will it hurt him?"

The voice repeated what I had said back at me - a ploy I would have used with a mental patient. Starting to think rather than react, it occurred to me that the voice, though male, wasn't Doc's. "Ah, is this "Handy Dandy Sick Pets We Cure Them All" vet practice. (Name changed for Doc's protection.)

The man agreed it was. I was relieved. "Is Dr. Blank there?"

The man told me that no, Dr Deleted was out of town and he was Dr. Someone else, taking the practice for a week.

Sweet relief. I still had a vet. "Well my beagle ate my UFO sometime during the night and I'm afraid he will get sick."

He repeated it back to me again. Hmmm, did he think he had a nut case on the phone? Oh, right, he may not know about the Halloween decorations, so I explained (slowly and carefully) about how I do a large haunt, blah blah and the dog ate the blanking (deleted for the vet's sake) UFO and what was I supposed to do?

He had me go over the paste ingredients (all non toxic, thankfully) and whether or not the dog had eaten any of the metal. I had gone over the detritus in the yard and reconstructed the metal armature so I could assure the vet that the dog had not eaten any metal, just the rest of the UFO.

I was assured that the dog would be OK and probably would get rid of whatever he couldn't eat.

Vastly relieved, I thanked the vet (who was probably delighted I wouldn't be bringing the dog into the office) and let Bailey into the living room where I collapsed into my chair with another cup of fuel. (Coffee)

About then he threw up about a gallon of UFO right on the new(ish) carpet.