Greetings and salutations everyone; yes, once again it is I, Mani the fairly small purebred border collie, filling in for the guy I live with, and here to bring you the latest news from our garden. You may remember me from such posts as “Naughty Noodle”, among at least a few others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose. Rather raffish, don’t you think?
“Just look at those feet!” said the guy I live with, who’d shampooed the carpet yesterday morning, and so I looked at my feet, and figured this was no big deal. It wasn’t, really.
The guy I live with also says that I look like an Egyptian; you know, the kind who had Pharaohs and pyramids and things like that. I’m not Egyptian, of course.
Anyway, the reason that I haven’t been posting much lately is because, and maybe you got an inkling by looking at my feet, it’s been raining here. Day after day.
There hasn’t been much gardening, though I have been able to chase rabbits when it wasn’t raining, and that’s a lot of fun. One got in through the part of the fence that the guy I live with thought didn’t need to be rewired, and I chased it all over the garden today. I figure the rabbit didn’t mind being chased because it came back later, and so I chased it again.
The other thing I’ve been doing, something I mentioned before, is catching flies. This is quite a sport. The guy I live with said the first purebred border collie who lived here was really into fly-catching, and wouldn’t go to sleep at night if there was a big buzzy fly in the room. I tried to tell the guy I live with that fly was truly excellent, but he said “No thank you.” He’s really finicky.
He also said that this wasn’t very funny. I like playing with the hose, like you can see in the movie, and it’s fun to tug on. I had it wrapped around this little tree more times than this, but he unwrapped the hose, which I thought spoiled all the fun. I wrapped it again, just the one time, as you see here. The guy I live with said this was a purple-leafed Prunus andersonii, and not to mess with it, but that didn’t mean anything to me. 
Well, it’s raining again. I just stand by the door pathetically and wait until it stops. That fancy gate was custom-made by the lady of the house, especially for purebred border collies. I can almost jump over it now. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll be able to.
I haven’t learned to use the bell yet. 
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
Oh, good gosh, more rain porn. Mani, you can ask Your Guy what that means. I’m as disconsolate viewing the film as you are standing watch at the screen door. All that water. At least your range is equipped to handle it. Certainly the wet makes Prunus andersonii show well against gravel. Your Guy should be in heaven with the many opportunities you present for shampooing the carpet. Alternatively, he could install a foot bath – maybe something in bamboo and iron – and towel by the door for your use upon entry. Then you would be both raffish and sophisticated, Mani, a great combination. And you do look a little like David Niven in his younger days. He had raffish and sophisticated *down*.
Yes, the guy I live with thought people in California might like to see what rain looks like. The other morning, we woke up and it was raining. That doesn’t happen very often here, and he said that when he was a kid in Los Angeles that would happen. In the winter time. And yesterday I got so wet I had to be dried off with three towels. The guy I live with said that I should have been dried off before jumping onto his bed and lying there very quietly so that he didn’t notice I was there until the sheets were completely soaked, but I know enough about being a purebred border collie to know that that’s what we do. Like on the off chance that I get sprayed by a skunk, the first place I go is to the bed, before saying about about a skunk. Oh, and incidentally, I wasn’t allowed to keep the stick. It was green-dyed bamboo.
Dear Mani:
When you didn’t post for so long, I assumed that you were off using your purebred border collie instincts to help supervise doggy day camp. Now I see that your time was being spent, once again, battling repression. If TGYLW doesn’t want you wrapping hoses around trees, he should build little fences around them.
I think you look like a Regency rake, not an Egyptian pharoah.
Thanks; the guy I live with has a rake with rubber tines, made in England, that I really like. I help him rake, by directing the way the rake should go. Oh, he says that’s not what you meant. It’s been raining and raining. The guy I live with was going to make a walk-around-the-garden movie, but realized the camera out get wet, so he didn’t.
By the Eye of Horus, you are one industrious fairly small pure bred border collie. All that hose-wrapping and rabbit-chasing is very entrepreneurial of you, even though (so far) neither pursuit can be monetized (yet). But even Adam Smith said that the main purpose of economic activity is to allow people (and DoGs) to lead lives that fulfill their intellectual and emotional needs; which means that you, Mani, are stinking rich.
Thanks; I do feel rather rich. Definitely industrious. It’s might nice of the guy I live with not to plant the pile of dirt (what he calls a “raised bed”) right in the middle of the back yard so that I can dig in it after I get soaking wet, so that I can track stuff into the house.
Your weather report indicates you will have quite a few more opportunities to get wet and muddy in the coming days. Maybe even a little snow! Many years ago, too many to count, I was giving my first dog a bath in the backyard. When she was thoroughly soaped and quite soaked, she broke away from me and burst through the back door which I had unfortunately failed to latch. She launched herself at top speed into my brother’s lap as he read a good book in the living room. What do you think of that, Mani?
That does sound like exactly the sort of thing to do. Big surprise. I hear that there was this one time, when the first two purebred border collies lived here, that they were out at night, and the guy I live with smelled skunk, and called the dogs, who came right in like we of course always do, and they ran downstairs and got into the bed. It wasn’t until that happened that the guy I live with and the lady of the house realized that both purebred border collies has been drenched with skunk. He went to work reeking of skunk. And that wasn’t the last time that happened, either. Yes, they’re talking snow here. The guy I live with says “Whatever”.
Oh god. Rain. 2 more storms this spring, that’s all I ask. I will be happy to tolerate the felines coming in with muddy feet–though they aren’t fond of rain at all, unlike the canine group.
Thought you might like that. Here, however, according to the guy I live with, it often comes with a very unwelcome component, which you can see by perusing the posts from this time, last year, starting at about the 20th. We may have gotten more than an inch of rain in the last week, though did see the sun for about fifteen minutes today. I’ve been really bored, even though the guy I live with does play with me, some, inside, and we even have tug-of-war, which I always win.