Dogster

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what could possibly be more amusing than a german shepherd with a spastic colon?

a german shepherd with a spastic colon in a vw bus!

my person wrote this entry a long time ago and so i'll just let her tell the story this time.

saturday morning i got up and threw my stuff in the volvo to head up to tellico ranger station and meet dave to pick up trash along the banks of tellico river. the clean-up started at 9am, but dave wouldn't be there until 1-ish. i had a little time to kill and decided to make one last-ditch effort to revive the vw. she's been out of order for a couple of months (dead battery), but she has no heater so i wouldn't have been driving her anyway. the plan was to get a new battery (the other one had a dead cell, loose posts, all kinds of no good stuff) and poof have a fixed bus. i had planned to drive the bus up to the ranger station and then spend the evening camping avec dave, zack and rosie. so, i was really bummed that there would be no bussage when i replaced the battery but she still wouldn't even turn over. now i'm thinking starter, voltage regulator, alternator, wiring... frwd to the last ditch effort: went to the parts store and got two new battery cable ends ($7), it was the only really simple, but entirely possible solution i could think of. AND IT WORKED!! i replaced those puppies and she started right up!! i let out a whoop and a hollar, kissed the bus, transferred my stuff from volvo to bus and headed toward tellico. i got lost, but we won't talk about that... got there late ;) and the ranger station was closing up, but they let us fill out forms, gave us bags and told us that no one had cleaned up the bald river falls trail... we had a destination. first, just let me say that that waterfall is amazing! i think that we picked up every scrap of litter there (except that one gatorade bottle, which we could have reached if i had only borrowed andy's rappelling gear) and probably even +75% of all cigarette butts. let me also note that people throw out some pretty repugnant stuff. we found tons of soft drink cans (some of the cans were very old, back when they used heavier tin, maybe the 60's/70's)and bottles and beer bottles, sports drink bottles, water bottles, food wrappers, tangled fishing line, bait boxes (one with worms still alive inside, dave set them free), a t-shirt, a kids sock, one used feminine hygiene product... we climbed off trail under laurels, over roots and rocks, slipped down hills and gulleys, got muddy, scratched and happily tired. feels like work well done. you know? zack learned about why littering is "baaad, mmmmmkay" i learned to never forget the bananas when we go hiking and we got to sleep at the foot of the falls in the bus. we could hear the rushing through the windows and while the pop-top was up (zack asked to sleep on the top bunk which is almost the size of a full size bed - it's the whole width of the bus). well, we could hear the falls when zack wasn't screaming. he asked to sleep on the top bunk and then he changed his mind. he was exhausted, fighting sleep, in a strange place and being a four-year-old. the batteries fell out of his lamp and he screamed "i wanna see in the dark, somebody put the batteries back in my wantren!" we had fixed the light once before and he had been told to go to sleep. more screaming. more screaming. after awhile, it was "i wanna sleep in the dark..." and they got fewer and farther between. dave was a good sport about it and just lay there with me while i fought to not lose my mind and patience. not give in and let zack think that throwing tantrums is the way to get what he wants. not throw a tantrum of my own :) so, zack finally asleep...this is a family show, here, contents edited...later in the night it got cold so i brought zack down to the bottom bunk and lowered the top of the van. we were surely losing heat through the canvas sides of the pop-top and even though we couldn't hear the falls as well with it down, i think it was worth it. it was kind of cozy snuggled up with dave, zack and rosie all in the equivalent of a twin size bed... at some point dave got wrapped up in the sleeping bag and i didn't have enough covers, rosie began whining and stepping on our faces and zack woke up, grumpy and ready to leave. i was cold, tired and not in a good mood. it was like 7am!! grrrrr. finally, we decided to execute phase two of weekend plan: drive to asheville & finish our ceramic flower pot. bus=not starting. brand new battery=dead. we tried to jump it off with dave's honda civic...nope. not gonna happen. then, i realized the error of my ways!! i forgot the cardinal rules of auto repair: kick it, cuss it and cut yourself (any self respecting vehicle will cooperate for no less than a small blood sacrifice). not only was the battery and cable end fix-up job too easy, but it had WORKED! i should have known that i was DOOMED then! doomed, doomed, DOOMED!! but i tempted fate and it got me here: the bus on a rollback, all the way home. cost: $100. :( blah.

while we were gone into "town" -tellico plains- to use the phone, have breakfast & find a tow, rosie must have gotten a little nervous. she has a problem with that. she's very sensitive. she knows my moods. and though i did walk her around until she did both #1 and #2 before we left, i was upset about the bus and the entire situation and she knew it. then, i put her in the bus, shut the door and left her there for an hour/hour and a half. we came back ... rosie had, um, well, had overactive colon spasms or something. all over the inside of my van. this is what she does when she gets nervous. she poops. she poops a lot. she had poop on her head. it was not pretty. dave was right, it is kind of funny in hindsight. at the moment, it was anything but funny. we got home, gave the dog a bath, the kid a bath, me a bath, and dave a nap. i spent the rest of the day putting zack in time out. he was having one of those "testing his boundaries" days :) put him to bed at 6pm! read some budo and hagakure to get centered again. woke dave up 'round 7 'cause he had to go home...persuaded him to stay until morning...slept really well...saw him off this morning, had coffee that didn't come from a gas station and had a bowl of food that didn't come from hardee's... ;) well, have a nice day today, people, keep telling yourself: "it could be worse" and then read this entry again if you ever doubt that. :)