Rain, Rain, Go Away

With the recent deluge of rain, the garden at our new house has started to bloom. While I’m curious to finally see what the yard will look like, I’d be willing to give that all up if the rain just disappeared. There’s just something about the grayness of the sky that makes me want to stay snuggled in bed with a good book and a cup of hot chocolate.

The dogs seem to feel the same way. At first they joyfully ran toward the door when I shouted “Let’s go outside!” but then stopped in confusion when they noticed how wet they were getting. Luckily, the momentum of their initial run was enough so that by the time they realized it was raining, they were already out the door, across the deck, and on the grass, and from there it was but a brief step to a good pee spot, and then back in the house.

Once inside, I chased them around and around the house with a brightly colored towel in an attempt to keep them from getting everything wet. Mina ran to sit by the heat vents and Flacko shivered as I wiped him off. Paco, meanwhile, thought the towel meant it was playtime, and kept grabbing the edge of the towel and trying to run away with it while I dried the other dogs.

But as the rain continued, the dogs began to learn that going outside was wet, muddy, and altogether disgusting. When I managed to chase them outside, they would creep toward the edge of the deck, if at all, and then race back into the house when I wasn’t looking. If I remembered to close the door behind me on the way out, the dogs huddled against the wall of the house, occasionally scrabbling furiously at the door to remind me that they wanted to go in. “Hey, if you want to stay outside, that’s up to you, crazy lady,” was their attitude.

The dogs felt that the rain meant they needed to go into hibernation, and all they did was sleep when I wasn’t yelling at them to go outside. Even getting the mail, normally an activity accompanied by furious barking and whining, garnered only a perfunctory bark from Paco, who didn’t even bother getting out of his blankie to see what was going on.

In these rainy days, all I see of the dogs are their butts, hanging out of blankets they’ve wound tightly around their heads. Once in a while, if I’m really lucky, I might see a tail twitch as a dog burrows deeper into a bed.

Yesterday during their last trip outside, Chris called the dogs to go outside. Flacko decided the rain was more than he wanted to deal with and ran upstairs and into bed. Chris rounded up Mina and Paco and carried them outside, where he unceremoniously dumped them in the yard to pee.

Flacko, who never let us pick him up, stayed in bed. I tried to pick up his bed and carry him outside, but he was too clever for me and jumped out of bed, growling angrily at me.

Back inside, Chris tried to help me chase Flacko outside, but he dodged us skillfully and huddled in front of the heat vent, growling whenever we looked at him. Eventually we got him into his crate, and I carried it outside and dumped him on the ground.

Flacko looked a bit startled, but obediently peed on the ground. He turned around and raced back into the house without even bothering to see if I was following. Hibernation was calling, and there was no time to waste.

Posted by: ssjane | April 2, 2004 | 2:22 pm
Posted in: Dogs