Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here today to talk about this and that. You may remember me from such posts as “Into The Wilderness”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristically pensive pose. 
I forget what I was thinking about. It might not have been all that important. I do know that the guy I live with saw me lying on the bed upstairs
and decided to sneak up (though I noticed him sneaking) and take a picture of me being all pensive.
It was probably snowing.
I should probably take a minute to talk about the bed, though I may have talked about it before (it is kind of a main thing in my life), I mean the new mattress and foundation, which as you can see is not sitting on a bed frame like it would be in most houses. This is so I can get up on the bed. The guy I live with said when I get older it’ll be easier for me to get up there, and that’s what’s important to him.
I’ve totally adjusted to sleeping on the bed at night and it’s really about the best thing ever. I have my own pillow, and can snuggle up next to the guy I live with, have my toys right there, and look out of the window to see stuff, if I need to do that.
And of course my upstairs fort is right there, too, in case things get ultra scary, like if there was thunder at night. Thunder at night used to be extremely rare here, but now it happens almost every night in the summer. So my fort comes in handy. I have some toys in there, too.
Oh, before I talk about what’s not happening, because almost nothing is, I should show you the picture I promised to show. Remember that funny thing in the tree? The one a while back? Here’s a close up.
Still pretty odd, I guess. I’m not sure I’d want something like that in a tree here.
As I said, almost nothing is happening here. I know I say that a lot, but really, this time, it is almost nothing. Well, okay, when it comes to gardening, there’s nothing. A whole bunch of stuff is happening that I’m not part of, except that I get to watch the guy I live with be on the phone for a very long time. Watching someone be on the phone is not exactly thrilling. They’re on the phone, and you aren’t. That’s pretty much it.
You know how you watch a caterpillar–the ones that aren’t scary–and how the back sort of moves right up to the front before the front moves again? That’s how things are here. The guy I live with has to start getting radiation next week, but also find time to get his mom’s taxes done. Her personal taxes and the estate taxes. And at the same time go back to the dentist because he has a cavity under a gold crown. The dentist said he could keep the gold and melt it down or something.
So this is like happening all at once. Well, not precisely all at once, but like a caterpillar, only the front isn’t moving as fast as the back is.
Just yesterday the guy I live with went downtown to visit something called the Internal Revenue Service. He had an appointment but they were “backed up”, I guess like the caterpillar again, and even though he had to go through this metal detection thing where they made him take off his belt and he began to wonder why he’d worn pants that were really a bit too big and carry all this stuff and sort of will his pants to stay up, he got frustrated and came home. It wasn’t all that important, he said; he just wanted to find out some things.
On the way home he stopped and got two French pastries, which he shouldn’t have, but he did. They disappeared rapidly.
Today he went downstairs and looked through some of the toys and stuff, things his wife had acquired, to bring to his friend, so she could give them to her grandsons. Including some fake caterpillars.
There was this little box, too.
This is a katydid, if you didn’t know. A rubber stamp.The German, Heupferd, means “hay horse”. The guy I live with and his wife used to go on walks at night, in the summer, and look for katydids when they made their katydid noises, but they were often very difficult to see. So when he thinks of katydids he sometimes shed a tear or two.
Well, so, anyway, that’s what he’s been doing.
I’ve mostly been enjoying the weather, which doesn’t change much here, and listening to the complaining, which also doesn’t change. Some of this snow is the same snow from last year.
You can see that the guy I live with was peeking into the Snowdrop Frame by the way the plastic is all rumpled. There are snowdrops in flower there; lots of them.
Some things growing in the large bulb frame too. This picture isn’t very good, but you can see some leaves.
It gets so hot in this frame that the plastic has to be lifted off almost every day, even when it’s cold. You can see some of the crocus leaves in the pot in the upper right hand corner got burned by the hot sun.
It is nice to see blue sky.
You can see that where we walk, along the coyote path behind the house, is still pretty snowy. I think most of those footprints you see are from us. This isn’t the only way we go, but I like going this way a lot. 
There are voles under the snow. I like to hunt for voles at almost any time of the year, but maybe it’s the most fun when there’s snow on the ground. The guy I live with sometimes gets a little annoyed that we have to stop walking while I hunt for voles, but that’s because he’s never tried it. 
I never find any, but I still like looking. I sometimes get snow on my nose. 
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
I think one of the cutest things you do is hunt voles in the snow!
Go easy on the guy you live with. It’s easy to shed tears over things as simple as a katydid. Today’s the 14th anniversary of my husband’s sudden death (don’t underestimate pneumonia, even in this day and age, and not just if you’re elderly), and a lot of things make me shed tears. One thing is there are no pets left who knew him. So, the new ones don’t know who I’m talking about. Sounds silly, but…
” the new ones don’t know who I’m talking about. Sounds silly, but…”
No, not at all.
नहीं बिलकुल नहीं
Well, you never know. We purebred border collies are often pretty perceptive. Maybe other breeds are as well.
The guy I live with said he’s sorry. He knows how much that hurts. But, in a way, I do know who he talks to, around the house here, because I’m surrounded by things, but also because of the two rooms downstairs, where I hardly ever go.
Meow meow mee LOVeSS to go fore wlakss with you virtuallee Mani!!! Wee have had more snow an more snow an back upss to 4 feet an more on THE way. LadyMew tooked sum more photoess; snow purrty much lookss THE same all THE time doesn’t it??
An shee helped mee with mee mewest (newest) thru patio door Selfie fore Sunday.
Catty-pillurss are fun to play with! They wriggell an jiggell a lot….mind you mee not seen any fore monthss now.
Yore bed soundss just like mine Mani! Mee has mee own blanket an mee can lay on it an look out window. Then mee pet bed iss on bed an mee pillow an sum toyss. Wee sure are alike aren’t wee??
Mee an LadyMew hope yore ‘guy’ iss doin all rite. LadyMew sayss a purrayer for him nitely.
Mee sends lotss of ***purrsss*** an ***nose rubsss*** BellaDharma
Thanks, and the guy I live with says thanks, too. He is doing okay. I guess we are alike in some ways. It’s pretty important to be surrounded by toys, in case things get scary, which they sometimes do. The guy I live with said snow would be a lot more interesting if every time it fell it came down in a different color.
Mew mew mew can you imagin ‘rainbow snow’ Mani?? That wuud bee pawsum!!! Or two tone snow even??? Yore PawPaw iss furry clevurr…..
White DOES get a bit ‘old’ after weeks an weeks of it! Trust mee! Wee had another storm yesterday. Mee snoozed thru’ most of THE day. LadyMew was at Hopisall…..ummm no Hossypital…ummm what iss THE werd??? Hos-pit-all…..that iss it!
Today iss sorta sunny butt oh so chilley.
Pleese nuzzle yore PawPaw from mee OKay??? He iss inn mee thottss an LadyMew’ss purrayerss…..
Thanks, I’ll tell him. It was almost 60 here yesterday, and very nice this morning, but now it’s not, and supposed to get very cold and snowy again this week. The guy I live with is not thrilled by this.
Meow meow wee are supposed to get more snow an LadyMew gave THE weatherman on Tee V a ‘filthee’ look! Shee iss NOT amused eether Mani!! An shee lovess Winter….mee not sure of that now. Pleese tell THE guy you live with wee hope it doess not get too cold an that wee send purrayerss to him fore a guud week.
***purrsss*** BellaDharma
Thanks. Our week has not begun very wonderfully, with more cold and snow. The guy I live with said that Tucson is sounding nicer and nicer. The cold here never seems to end. We have one or two nice days, and then it gets cold again. Except for the “incredibly snowy and awful” winter of 06-07, this has been the longest stretch of days the guy I live with has been unable to work in the garden since he can remember. Usually winters here are pretty nice, with some icky cold now and then.
I don’t believe I have ever lived with a dog that failed to bark constantly while I was on the phone.
ceci
I never bark. Or almost never. I mean if someone is walking down my street, then yes, I do. But mostly I just sing, when he’s on the phone. Sometimes he had to apologize for my comments while he’s talking. It is funny how some people don’t like to be on the phone a lot. The guy I live with spent thirty years of his life on the phone. Fixing phones, installing phones, being on the phone.
The clarity of light where you live, my gosh, Mani. Do you think it’s reflection from the snow? You are well-placed on the bed to catch the special “portrait light.” Best eating is eating what you shouldn’t; hope the guy you live with remembered to *taste*. You are absolutely at your cutest while searching for moles — um, excuse me, voles. And fortunate indeed is a dog who has a coyote path.
Thanks; I do like hunting for voles. We just call it “light” here. You would not believe how quickly pastries can disappear here. The guy I live with made short work of them, though I would have made shorter. He did get pretty irked with me just today when I licked something on the ground. But how else are you going to know what it is?
That thing in the tree is still weird. It is no less weird now that I can see the detail.
Those caterpillars are weird too. They are a bit too convincing. You have a bit of weirdness there. It is a good thing that you are there to protect the guy you live with from it all.
It looked like it was pretty weird. The caterpillars are gone now. The guy I live with’s friend is going to scare her grandsons with them. Though they might not be too scared. Also gave her some fake snakes, and things like that.
I think that those fake owls that sit on ledges of buildings in town are funny, but also startling. I think it is funny that other birds are so stupid that they stay away from them; but then I think that I would stay away from them too, just because they really are rather stern looking.
There is at least one on a house here. But we already have owls.
Real owls are not as weird, and they taste like chicken.
I don’t think one should admit to something like that.
Well, I never met an owl who did admit to such.
Indeed.
I do not recommend tasting one. They dislike it so, and are likely to get nasty about it. They have sharp claw things.
Yes, they do.