Home on the Range

Oh give me a home, where the long-horned cattle roam, and the Rangers and the Cowboys play...

I'm not exactly sure what happened, but one day I'm living in Denver, and next the house is packed, the car is packed and I am packed into the car and driving. Now usually I love being in the car, but with all that stuff perched at odd angles, I was really just fearing a sudden turn that might bring the cargo in it's entirety crashing onto my head. It didn't help that it was 105 degrees out and not much cooler in the car, but we managed. Apparently we went across Kansas and down through Oklahoma because 14 hours later (with a few potty stops) Katy opened the door and we got out in.... DALLAS!

Huh. Dallas?

-H

to be continued....

Sassy Squirrels and Taunting Turtles

It's almost as if they know I'm coming. As if they hear the car pull up and park... hear us unloading with walking shoes and leashes and start conspiring the most effective way to torment me on my daily walk around Wash Park. I know the trees well... the large cottonwoods with low lying branches... that's where the squirrels wait. The chatter at me... I can't stand it. My chest tightens... some days I think my brain will explode: SQUIRRELS... MUST GET... MUST CATCH. They bait me, just out of reach... tails flicking... chatter, chatter, chatter. Finally I hear a stern "leave it" and I must relent and move on. Because there is another one waiting just around the bend.

I think the squirrels have begun recruiting cross-species because last week out of the blue, I found a rock in the grass. Except it was moving. Scared the poop of me. I had no idea what it was, but I wanted it. Bad. Later, I heard it called a "turtle". Squirrels I know, but these "turtles"... holy cow. At first I thought, "finally, a slow thing I can actually catch", but he had this hard shell-thing, and didn't seem afraid of me at all. He made it back into the water, but I swear, next time, I'm going on the offensive. Seriously.

-H

Excerpt from Heidi's Christmas Letter

... As for me, I’ve been quite busy too. I’m working on two earth-moving projects in the backyard (Katy tripped and fell into one mowing the lawn---I won’t tell you what she said). I’m also keeping up my “sock-transit” efforts by covertly swiping Katy’s socks from inside the house and moving them to the back-yard. She usually ends up finding them and taking them back... party-pooper. Recently, after a particularly wet snowstorm and an unusually strenuous day of “earth-moving”, Katy even gave me a little pedicure… a warm water soak and cleaning between my toes (good for me, bad for her). Course, not as bad as my misadventures with a skunk this summer (yes, exactly what you’re thinking times two). All in all, I think I’m a pretty good pet… Katy keeps feeding me, so I guess she thinks so too.

-H