Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here today to bring you a rather different kind of post; one all about me. You may remember me from such me-related posts as “Double Feature”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
The guy I live with was asking me if I wanted to go on my midnight walk, even though it was snowing outside. I was pretty cozy there on the couch, as you can see.
But we went anyway, like we always do.
This is me, if you didn’t know. I’m checking out some things by the side of the canal road.
There are always interesting things to discover when we go on our late night walk. It was snowing last night, but not very cold at all. Just below freezing.
For some reason, the guy I live with took a bunch of pictures of trees, while it was snowing.
Well, okay, some trees in the snow.
Now back to me.
Here I am trying to decide which way to go.
There are two ways to go (I mean aside from turning around). Straight ahead takes us along the canal road; it’s pretty dark there, except for one annoying spotlight. I can tell that coyotes walk along here.
The funny thing about going that way is that, earlier this summer, there was no path at all, though there used to be. But now there’s a path again. The guy I live with said it could be coyotes, or maybe people walk there with their dogs. It’s kind of a mystery. I’m not sure I like mysteries.
I decided to go this way. It’s still a road, but it just leads to the street. I’m about half a mile east of my house.
Here I am near the cable company building. This was the night before last.
I was going one way, but then all of a sudden there was what I thought was a coyote on the path, running off to the left, which is west, and I really super extra wanted to chase it. The guy I live with said no, but I pulled him along anyway.
I didn’t get to see the coyote again. The guy I live with said it was probably a rabbit. 
Just to the left of where I’m standing is an old sluice, for a farm house that used to stand where the parking lot is now. When the guy I live with and his wife moved into our house, thirty-five years ago, there was just the foundation of the old farm house.
We hardly ever see anyone on our late-night walks, but night before last, right at the end of the road there, and off to the right (north), just as we reached the road from the street we go on to get there, I saw something move, and then the guy I live with did too.
It was a dark figure moving toward us. I was very brave, as usual, but the guy I live with got a case of the creeps.
When we came back to that place, the dark figure was gone. The guy I live with said that was a lot better. He isn’t much into dark figures approaching him; he said it was too much like the dark figure in The Earthsea Trilogy. I, of course, being totally tough and deadly, wasn’t bothered at all.
Here I am on the canal road last night. A little bit more snow on the ground.
The guy I live with doesn’t like snow, as I’m sure you’re aware of by now. but we’re also in an extreme drought, which is predicted to get even worse next year, so I guess we’ll take what we can get, though he says the snow needs to melt to be useful. Not just sit around evaporating.
So that’s it; what it’s like on our midnight walks.
I hope you enjoyed this little photo essay. I’ll leave you with a picture of me on my evening walk, just today.
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
Maybe the mysterious figure was Sasquatch.
That sounds too scary. It was probably someone from the apartments, who was out smoking.
Did it seem to be on fire?
No; it was just scary.
The first sluice photo with you, Mani, is absolutely classic. {{and, she said modestly, I know my classic photographs}} Also like the canal road photo with the lighted tree in the background, although nothing can compete with a particular pure-bred border collie in the foreground. The snowy tree photos for me capture the spirit of the holiday, and I muchly appreciate the show. No indoor tree for us this year, although we will hang ornaments in lighted tree branches we have around indoors. Your couch photo looks to be styled by Hallmark, and I wonder you could leave all the cozy to venture outdoors into snowy below-freezing temperatures. As you observed, some things are just kind of a mystery.
Thanks. The guy I live with said that when the farmhouse foundation was there, there were also woods, with paths, and he and his wife was take Flurry and Pooka, the first two purebred border collies who lived here, for walks there.
He finally figured out that there is a “night” setting on the phone camera, and it seems to take pretty good pictures.
It was probably about 25 degrees out, which is not very cold by our standards. We’re supposed to get more snow, so there will be more grumbling, though shoveling the snow is good exercise for the guy I live with. (He wrenched his back shoveling the neighbor’s driveway a little while ago, but it seems to be better.)
We’re not going to have a tree this year; the guy I live with said he thought about it for a second, but that it was crossing an emotional line he didn’t want to cross. And anyway you can see how seasonal and cozy I look in my first picture.
(Shh, Mani, don’t tell the guy you live with, but you being all fierce and tough and dangerous can be told that *some* of those photographs look like murder scenes waiting to be investigated a la 1940s noir.
Thanks. Fierce and tough and dangerous, that’s me all over.
Mee-yow wow what a lovelee foto essay Mani an ‘Guy’….you did a grate job! An THE Treess inn Snow fotoss are furry eetheral….(LadyMew’ss werd). An LadyMew sayss shee iss with you ‘Guy’; sum dark shadow comin out of nowhere wuud have her freeked out too!!!
Wee hope yore snow meltss to help THE ground…..our snow iss all most all melted here…
Iss hard to beeleeve it iss apposta bee Deecemburr rite??
Yore 1st foto iss deevine! Yore SUCH a hansum poochie dog Mani!
***purrss*** BellaDharma an {{huggiess}} LadyMew
Thanks. This is the coldest time of the year, here, in December.
It snowed again last night so there won’t be any melting for a while now.
It iss furry cold here an a bit of snow butt nothin like wee used to get Mani….January an Fabbyary are coldest monthss here!!! BBRRR!!!
Minus two Celsius here right now. So not terribly cold. Yet.
Iss -3 Cellseeus here with windychill of -10…it iss litely snowin….wee want MORE!!!
We want less snow. More heat. Lol.
Mew mew mew send us yore snow Mani an wee send you sum heet Okay? 😉
That sounds just fine to the guy I live with. I like the snow.
Mew mew mew wee have to compurrmise then Mani!!! 😉
I guess so.
Wee wuud send you warm an su if wee cuud Mani…it has been cloudy fore many dayss now. 2 inchess of snow…not much at all…butt oh so chilley!!!
Snow is predicted here for tonight. Again.
CATFISH!! Wee want yore snow Mani!!!! 😉
It will only be a little snow.
Well yore Guy will like just a little snow rite Mani??
I think probably not.
The way you snuggle with toys is really adorable! Thanks for spreading the cuteness around. I think you are both brave to go out so late in the cold. Our little dog doesn’t like the dark and will only walk in it if she is spotlighted by a headlamp. I’m not sure this is evolutionarily sound behavior for something that is so clearly a prey animal.
ceci
Thanks. It’s pretty easy for me to be adorable, immodest though it may be for me to say it.
It hasn’t been to terribly cold at night. The guy I live with bought me some snow boots, which I don’t really care for, but they do work.
He has a headlamp, too, which makes things a little easier at night.
OMG. That’s super creepy. The lady I live with shares an Audible subscription with her mother and it’s all creepy ghosty mystery stuff. I think a good round of barking solves creepy. Bark! That’ll fix it! I’m a big fan of barking. It makes trash trucks leave, so I’m sold on efficaciousy.
It was pretty creepy.
I got in trouble, a little anyway, for doing a lot of barking this morning. And yesterday morning, too. But there are squirrels. They make that chucking noise at me, so I make the barking noise back at them.
I do get upset when the trash gets stolen, like it did today, but the guy I live with said that he actually wants the trash to be stolen. It happens every week.
Mani, so funny your Guy mentioned the Earthsea Trilogy. I just read it a few weeks ago, after meaning to for decades. It’s supposed to be a “young adult” fantasy, but I, who am not young and barely an adult, enjoyed it immensely. Anyway I understand completely the reference to the figure approaching in the dark….creepy indeed.
It was pretty creepy indeed. The guy I live with re-read the trilogy I think last year. He doesn’t read much stuff like that, in fact, he hardly reads anything except for books on music, but it sounded good at the time. The books were his wife’s. He says they should have been longer.