Green chiles, anyone?

From Big Spring, we Bookmobiled our way to New Mexico, making an early and hasty exit from the Man Camp to the friendly, welcoming Pecos River RV Park in Carlsbad. So hasty, in fact, that I forgot to latch our cargo bin where all event supplies are stored. I didn’t realize this until I hooked up to the power at Pecos and saw the side door of the cargo hold flapping in the breeze.

SHEEYUT!

My life flashed before my eyes. We had jounced and bounced the whole three hours from Big Spring. But nary an item had we lost. If it had been one of my kids who’d done that, I would have killed them.

Speaking of kids, I want to introduce you to my EXTENDED support staff:

Eric (husband): king of advertising and promotion
Marie (eldest stepdaughter): events, logistics, media, and two stints on-the-road
Heidi (digital artist): covers, posters, bookmarks, ads, magnets, decals for Bookmobile, and billboard (yes, billboard)
Stephanie (longtime dear friend): online/social marketing and research
Liz (youngest stepdaughter): first stint on-the-road
Clark Kent (son): stint on-the-road
Susie (mom): stint on-the-road
Susanne (daughter): stint on-the-road, LAST — mostly to give her two months to practice her driving, oh-she-of-UPS-truck-smashing fame
Allie (Clark Kent’s long-suffering girlfriend): right hand to Marie

They are AWESOME! I am well taken care of.

I am, in addition to doing events, working on What kind of loser indie publishes, and how can I be one too?, proofing audio book files, conducting personal promotions, and handling the details of the two upcoming book launches (Leaving Annalise and Loser).

Speaking of audio files for audio books, Puppalicious is now on sale as an audiobook! My Dream of Freedom (by Helen Colin) is done! Saving Grace is done! How to Screw Up Your Marriage is done! In production: Clark Kent Chronicles, Hot Flashes and Half Ironmans, and Leaving Annalise! Many thanks to the awesome Sandy Weaver-Carman, the talented Hanna Dettman, the speedy and fun Debbie Andreen, and the silver-tongued Ashley Ulery, voice-over artists extraordinaire.

Radio interview for you to “enjoy” on Santa Fe radio: Click Here.

Major successes this week: we booked our New Jersey and San Francisco event stores. We’re almost done with the incredibly difficult and time-consuming task of booking locations.

So back to Carlsbad: we took Petey out for an afternoon run on the Pecos. Petey, who is a very black dog, scampered for 100 yards, then flopped himself into the shade on his side each time we reached a patch of it. No amount of coaxing worked to lure him into running again. We took him for an (unwelcome) river swim, then back to air conditioning. Thanks, Petey, for saving Liz and me from the heat, too!

After a great event in Carlsbad where we saw friends from my college and island days, and at which my incomparable husband arranged for tulip delivery, we drove on to Roswell for the night. Then on to Albuquerque the next day.

Well, it had to happen sometime, and in Albuquerque I finally bombed an event. To my credit, it was the wrong store for me. I didn’t have nearly enough nose rings to interact with the clientele. I knew as soon as we walked in that it was a bust, and the store management was politely intrigued about why I’d been sent to their store instead of the two perfect ones across town packed with my more conventional audience. C’est la vie. Hopefully they’ll transfer the books to the other stores.

We enjoyed our time with the store staff and with our dear friend, actor Patrick Juarez. He’s currently working as the stand-in for Lou Diamond Phillips on Longmire, a modern western which you really MUST see if you haven’t already (A&E and Netflix). We even dined at Twisters, the site of filming for some scenes from Breaking Bad, another series Patrick has worked on. Petey staged a protest over returning to the RV from Patrick’s lovely home. Petey, darlin’, I felt exactly the same way.

We redeemed ourselves in Santa Fe with a busy event, including the unexpected and delightful visit of my colleague Wendy, right before the onslaught of the book people. What fun!

We had a few hours off in Santa Fe, so we took patient Petey to a leashless dog park. From all appearances, it was the happiest hour of his whole life. We dined at La Chuza and bought Fandango tickets to Man of Steel, only to realize I’d typed my email in wrong. With no confirmation number, we had to buy the tickets AGAIN at the theater. Most.expensive.movie.ever.

And it got worse. During the previews, I had a horrible premonition that something was wrong. I didn’t know what. I sent Eric a panicked text, but he didn’t answer as he and Marie were at Man of Steel in Houston, a double-date with Liz and I in Santa Fe. Minutes later as I stared at my phone waiting for bad news, my ex called from the emergency room with Susanne who had a flare-up of leaky gut-driven allergies. Her skin got red and painful and she nearly passed out. She DID NOT go into anaphylactic shock, but she is back on the hard-core restricted diet and steroids. I left the movie when I got this message, and I spent the rest of the movie-time alone in the RV. Yes, crying. It was very hard not to drive home that night, but, really, there’s nothing I can do that my ex, Eric, and Marie aren’t already doing. And ultimately, it’s up to Susanne to adhere to her dietary restrictions.

We made it to our campground at 11 to find that someone had accidentally (we hope) removed our late check-in instructions and packet. We decided that we’d take whatever spot was open and apologize the next day. And so we did.

And now, one long day of driving and listening to audiobook files later, we are ensconced in the Bookmobile in Kansas, me with double sleep meds down the hatch. I haven’t slept longer than five hours any night since we left home, 2000 miles, seven events, and one week ago.

Nighty night!

Pamelot

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I think that’s what they call an “oh shit” moment.

Really, I’m not nuts. It was all the Boston Terrier’s fault.

So, recently I did a phone interview with the Lubbock newspaper (which resulted in a great article). Since I work from a home office, I was home in my jammies for the call, with our three noisy dogs. I always set my alarm when I’m home during the day, with the motion detector off.

I am obsessive about setting the alarm, in fact. We live in a nice neighborhood, but there are occasional day time home invasions. My dogs aren’t going to let the boogie man get me. Still, I want my alarm. It would be nice to have the boogie man run the other way instead of making my dogs put themselves at risk.

Some of our doors are wired for “instant alarm,” though, as is our motion detector. That means that if you open the door or set off the motion detector, the alarm sounds, without giving you time to punch in the code to disarm it. You have about fifteen seconds after the alarm goes off to punch in the code and press CANCEL. If you forget to press cancel, you get a visit from the popo. If it happens more than once, the city charges you $75 per false alarm visit. As the queen of thrift, my whole family endures me yelling, “Did you press cancel?” each time one of them accidentally sets off the instant alarm. I’d never forgotten to press Cancel, myself, until this year. In the space of two weeks, I did it twice. SMH, FIP.

And then came the day of my interview with the Lubbock paper. In the midst of trying to sound intelligent and “together” for the journalist, the instant alarm went off. Panic surged through me. My heart pounded in my ears and my brain froze. Not while I was on this call! Was a door open? With half my mind in Lubbock and half on my blaring alarm, I rushed first to the control panel and typed in our code to make the hideous noise stop.

Silence, blessed silence.

Now the dogs were keyed up, barking at shadows. I sprinted through the house checking doors. None were open. A small part of my brain registered the issue: I’d accidentally left the motion detector on, and between me and 200 pounds of canine and one ten-pound cat, someone had triggered it. Crapola.

I shook my head to sling out the distraction and continued my interview. And it went really well. So well that we talked for 45 minutes instead of 15. Just long enough for a police cruiser to pull to a stop in front of my house. At first, I assumed they were there for a neighbor, or pulled over to make calls or do paperwork. Until the officer starting walking toward our front door. The journalist was in the middle of a story, and I couldn’t interrupt him. The doorbell rang. Loudly.

“Just a moment,” I said, my voice sounded strangled even to my own ears.

I hit mute and opened the door. Recall that I’m in my jammies. It’s noon. My hair is a fright. I can’t remember if I’ve even brushed my teeth. I look schizophrenic. I didn’t have the presence of mind to restrain the dogs, and they surge outward toward the police officer. The last time I incurred a false alarm, the female officer was less than friendly, and I cringe and try to call the dogs off.

“I’m on a newspaper interview and I forgot to disarm the motion detector and the dogs set it off, and I was so panicked about the interview that I forgot to hit cancel and I’m so sorry and as you can see the dogs won’t let anything happen to me and I have to get back on this call or the journalist is going to think I’m rude when really I’ve just lost my mind, and I have him on hold,” I blurt out in one breath.

The young cop is Asian, medium height, and a small-to-medium build. He was smiling. He was backing away. He is an angel. Or I scared the bejeebers out of him. “No problem. I understand. You have a nice day ma’am.” I prayed that he wasn’t rushing off to call for a psychiatric pick-up, and that he really believes my explanation.

I waved goodbye in my sanest manner and dragged a squirming, yapping Boston Terrier back inside, pushing the 120-pound bass-voiced yellow lab in front of us. I took a deep breath, smiled like it could be seen in Lubbock, and clicked back to my call.

It’s all in a day’s work around here. And the bill from the city for the incident came in the mail today.

Have a great week,

Pamelot

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It’s a very Petey Christmas.

Petey has his very own Christmas tree this year, y’all. Seriously. Just ask him.

Originally, we bought it for the whole family. Silly, I know, because what’s Petey’s is Petey’s, and what’s ours is Petey’s. A beautiful 10-foot tree that will barely fit in our house is a no-brainer: Petey’s.

Once we got it home, we decorated it for him with his chew toys, those things more commonly known as ornaments. He loved them. He especially loved the tiny nest of Christmas Cardinals, Eric’s favorite ornament and his favorite birds.

We filled it with water, so that when his wittle mouth gets dry from pulverizing and eviscerating ornaments he can take a cool, refreshing drink.

We even laid a luscious velvet tree skirt under it. Petey likes nothing better than a spontaneous nap when he’s all tuckered out from ornament munching. Its position is appropriate, since, duh, it’s his tree and he needs to stay close to guard it.

Life is good when you’re Petey.

Pamelot

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Must Love Dogs

Just like Petey used to be, pre-Cowboy.

I wish I could say my son loved and related to animals, but I can’t. I read about other kids with neuro-atypicality similar to his who bond with pets, especially ADHD kids, and I am jealous. Clark never has.

When he was seven, we bought a puppy. Theoretically, this was going to be his dog. What a fine, handsome yellow lab puppy he was, too. Cowboy would have loved nothing more than to be Clark’s dog, to fetch him sticks, to play chase, to splash in the mud together. Except Clark had no interest in the real live animal. All his energy and excitement about getting the puppy lasted for about three minutes. It wasn’t that Cowboy disappointed him, hurt him, or scared him. He just didn’t measure up to being the most exciting thing in Clark’s very narrow frame of reference. Cowboy couldn’t outshine a book or a computer game, for instance. So the dog moved on to Clark’s five-year old, neuro-typical sister Susanne, who adored him. They remain best friends ‘til this day.

When Clark was ten, we got a cat. We thought that possibly a lower maintenance animal that could curl up with him when he was involved in a sedentary pursuit would give him a creature he could relate to. No such luck. Juliet also became Susanne’s.

Over the years, we added fish, a guinea pig, a live pig, five more dogs, and another cat. Like with any child, we had to beg him to take care of them. Unlike with our other four kids, though, no animal got through to him. No animal ever rose to “the most important thing in my four seconds-left-to-live” worldview. The animals shouldn’t feel too bad about that, though, because most people didn’t rise to that level either. We knew he loved us, I knew I was the central figure in his life, but that didn’t mean he needed to talk to us, unless required. Clark was not an interacter. He wasn’t asocial. He just didn’t know how to engage, or really care to, other than, well, theoretically. He floated around the fringe.

Eventually, in his mid-teens, Clark started maturing enough that the worst of his social inabilities passed. He was still the odd kid that might say the extremely unfunny and awkward comment, loudly, but he found a niche with people that “got” him, at the same time as his assertiveness grew.

That’s when we got Petey. Petey is a Boston Terrier. When he first came home with us, he was barely over six pounds. Petey was terrified of Clark, and Clark was only mildly interested in Petey, certainly not interested enough to try to figure out how to engage with the small creature. By then, Clark was nearly 16.

To read the rest of Must Love Dogs, please CLICK HERE to go to {a mom’s view of ADHD}, and y’all have a great day out there.

Pamelot

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Your daily dose of Petey…

Petey the one-eyed Boston terrier went under the knife for the snip-snip. You know, neutering. Why, you may rightly ask, would we do this to our sweetie Petey?

Well, when we picked him up from boarding at the super awesome Polka Dot Dogs two weeks before, they said, “Your little darlin’ is trying to become a father and has his one eye on that Chihuahua over there. And the cockapoo. Oh, and also the Maltese.”

Pooooooor Petey. In his defense, he told me all three were super hot little bitches. And he loves Polka Dot Dogs. Instead of kennels, they let all the dogs of similar size and temperament play in open rooms together. He’d like us to take him along wherever we go, but if he can’t go with us, he prefers PDD.

PDD, however, has a policy: At the age of seven months, little boy doggies no longer get to stay in open-room boarding if they can’t keep it to themselves. While I think anyone would be lucky to get the bonus of little Peteys along with the price of their boarding, I guess I can accept this.

***

Well, today the rest of this story (republished as an adapted excerpt from Puppalicious and Beyond with the permission of SkipJack Publishing) appears on the site of my good friend Sandy Webb. Sandy is an animal lover extraordinaire. She is practically the horse whisperer, and she is the “Mom” to a terrier named Tater Tot that rivals Petey for cuteness. To read the rest of Petey’s story, CLICK HERE.

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He who rules the roost.

Small dogs rule the world.

What does a little dog have to do?

A few days ago, I sat at my laptop printing my boarding pass for a quick work trip to Chicago. The day before, Eric and I had taken Petey the one-eyed wonder terrier on a five-mile gallop in the rain. Today, by comparison, was a big snore for Petey. Petey decided to take matters into his own hands. He went to my unzipped but packed suitcase and retrieved one of my neon orange Newton running shoes. He brought it to my office and dropped it at my feet.

I didn’t notice.

Petey ran back to my suitcase and retrieved the second running shoe. He set it beside the other one.

I didn’t notice.

Petey danced in circles in front of me, tongue lolling. He punched me in the knees with his little Petey paws, Anne Sullivan to my Helen Keller. What was a dog to do?

“Down, boy.” I scratched him behind the ears.

Finally, finally, I pushed back from my desk. It was time to zip my suitcase and throw it in the Malibu, to leave for the airport. I stood up and almost tripped over one small black and white dog and two stinky shoes.

And that was it. It was as if Petey had run cold water over my hand, except that he had no opposable thumbs and couldn’t reach the faucet. I GOT IT.

Not only did I get it, but I realized my Boston terrorizer is pretty darn smart. I looked at the time. How could I say no after this assume cuteness?

“We can squeeze in five minutes,” I said.

Eric clipped on Petey’s leash while I put on the mutually beloved running shoes, and off we went. I had to rush a bit to make my flight, but it was worth it.

Pamelot

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Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater

Petey the one-eyed Boston Terrier will eat anything. And I really mean it.

Sweet fifteen and never been kissed.

My youngest turned fifteen recently. She’s never had a real boyfriend, so lately she’s practiced her moves on the dog, Petey the one-eyed terrier. Wait, that sounds bad. He really does only have one eye, but he is a D-O-G.

So she was snuggling Petey, and she puckered up to give him a big smooch. Petey is a very sweet animal. He is also an enthusiastic kisser. He was so enthusiastic that he grinned as he zoomed in for his kiss. This caused his mouth to open. Well, I’d love to say a little doggy slobber and tongue bothers my teenage daughter, but I’d be lying if I did. She stayed her course.

Until she saw the two-inch cockroach on Petey’s slightly protruding tongue.

(Sadly, this is a 100% true tale.)

So that’s Susanne’s first kiss story, or at least the one I plan to tell at her wedding to Tim Tebow.

What’s YOUR’S?

Pamelot

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Alert: Do not read this post if you need a PG-13 rating

Well, that title got some of your attention. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. But, seriously, my grandmother and mother-in-law should stop reading now.

Eric and I have a sacred morning ritual. Alternating by day, one of us gets up to let the dogs out — Cowboy, the mutant yellow Lab the size of a pony, Layla, the Boxer, and Petey, the one-eyed Boston Terrier. The dogs sleep in the living room, with Petey in his crate and the big dogs loose and on pillows so that they can perform their guard dog function if necessary (and so that Cowboy doesn’t take out Petey’s other eye). The dogs are soooo excited to see us and to go outside. When they come back in, 10-month old Petey sprints to our room and flies through the air to land on whichever one of us remained in bed.

Whoosh! Out goes all the air in the lungs under the weight of his punching paws.

The dog reliever returns to the room and crawls back in. Depending on our schedules, we have from five up to maybe forty-five minutes to snuggle, catnap, and chat. This is THE BEST part of Petey’s day. He burrows between us, snorting like the piggy he thinks he is. He trades off daily against whose waist he leans his head, muzzle in the air, neck contorted like a giraffe. Sometimes he doesn’t smell so great, but on this day he had a bath the night before, and he is warm and soft with a slightly antiseptic aroma. Not too bad.

Also on this day, we get to sleep in. Petey rolls to the side, the baby spoon between our tablespoon and teaspoon-sized bodies. He wriggles around until everything in his world is just right. We all fall asleep, two spoons snoring in perfect tandem, one spoon wearing earplugs.

The alarm wakes us at 6:45. The baby spoon is behind me, pressing his feet in a stretch up against my backsides. Now, this occasionally happens in the mornings, but it is usually something else, and it’s related to the tablespoon. Basically, the tablespoon decides it’s a fork. Or wants to be a fork. Or wants to fork, if you know what I mean, and ladies I think you do.

On those days, Eric and I have a little schtick a la the movie No Way Out, from way back in 1987. In one of the opening scenes, Sean Young’s character says to Kevin Costner’s character, ”Is that a gorilla in your pocket, soldier, or are you just glad to see me?” Yes, a play on the Mae West pistol line.

So, anyway, it usually goes like this:

Me: Is that a gorilla in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?

Eric: I’m just glad to see you.

Today, though, today the fork is the feet attached to the baby spoon. And the schtick changes.

Me: Is that a gorilla in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?

Eric: It’s a Peter in my pocket. And I hope it’s not glad to see you.

But wait, it gets worse. Because Peter shares a name with someone, someone very special at our house. Petey-poo’s namesake? My father.

I think I just threw up a little in my mouth.

***

Please, do not make me explain the double entendre, Mom.

And on that note, happy hump day, y’all.

Pamelot

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What’s an eye, between best friends?

David and Goliath, Cowboy and Petey. 125-pound lab v. 20-pound Boston Terrier, on either end of a stretchy rope. Vlog.

Tiny Muslim.

Religious experimentation continues at our house. Or is it something more? Oh, that Petey!

Must love dogs.

I read about the bonding between special needs kids and animals all the time, and, I must admit, I’m envious. Clark missed this gene. Or did he?

Tiny Catholic.

I’ve never been the mother of a Catholic before, and I really want to get it right. Self doubts haunt me. Like, what are the implications of Petey’s recent veterinary procedure, in light of his religion? Oh, the possible horrors are endless.

At least we’ll always be able to find it.

Post procedure 3-way w/the 2 objects of his “affection”: kangaroo and German shepherd.

Last week Petey the one-eyed Boston Terrier went under the knife for the snip-snip. The nip-and-tuck. The neutering.

Why, you may rightly ask, would we do this to our sweetie Petey? Well, we got this feedback when we boarded him at the super awesome Polka Dot Dogs here in Houston two weeks ago: “Your little darlin’ is trying to become a father and has his [one] eye on that chihuahua over there. And the cockapoo. Oh, and also the maltese.”

PDD, however, has a policy. At the age of seven months, little boy doggies no longer get to stay in open room boarding if they can’t keep it to themselves. While I think anyone would be lucky to get the bonus of little Peteys along with the price of their boarding, I guess I can accept this.

So, Petey visited his very intimate buddies at the vet. After three months of eye treatments, they know and love him. After neutering my poor baby, they know him even better. Before the procedure, they asked me if I’d like them to put a microchip in Petey, in case he ever gets lost.

I called Eric. “Do we want Petey to have one of those Pet Finder microchip thingies?”

Eric said, “Sounds like a good idea to me.”

“Okey dokey. They said they can put one in when they remove his you know whatsies,” I explained.

Eric paused. “Wait a second. They remove his you know whatsies and put the chip in the space left behind?”

“I didn’t ask, but that sounds likely, since this only came up because of his procedure.”

“So he’ll have a tracker in his ball sack??”

“I wouldn’t have put it quite like that, but, yeah, I guess that’s about right.”

Another pause.

“Well, I guess we’ll always be able to find it, then,” Eric said.

Ew. If we ever wanted to actually know where it was. Other than between his legs, I mean. I’m thinking this microchip may tell us a little more than we really wanted. Plus, whatever happened to the right to privacy? What do we do when Petey starts dating? Or God forbid, if he marries? Wouldn’t it be enough of a challenge that he couldn’t father little Peteys without his anxious parents tracking his every move with his beloved? This is a little more intrusive than, say, a GPS tracker in a car, which I’m not above installing in my kids’ vehicles if they deserve it. But a ball sack tracker? Could I do that to him?

As I pondered the horrors, Eric broke into my reverie. “I’m kidding, Pamela. It’s a good idea. It’s fine. I’ll bet they don’t even put it there. They probably just use the occasion of anethesia to tuck it in somewhere else.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

I exhaled. What a relief, because I was pretty sure that wherever they were going to put the microchip, it was a done deal by now.

Later that same day, I picked up our Petester. Oh, what a pitiful sight he was, head hanging, eyes downcast. He seemed awfully low, even for a dog who had lost his manhood. I paid and whisked him to the car, whispering supportive and encouraging words in his ear about his bright future and the long line of female dogs who didn’t give a rat’s ear about puppies, citing to our own Layla and Cowboy as an example of devoted and puppieless partners.

Nothing worked. I just couldn’t cheer him up. We were almost home when a cold dread seeped over me. I pulled to the side of the road and put the car in park. I knew even before I carefully searched his 16-pound body for a microchip incision what I would find — nothing.

The only point of entry? Yes, you guessed it: the poochy pouch. Little tears of guilt welled up in the corners of my eyes. I stroked him and begged for his understanding and forgiveness. This appeared to mollify him a bit, and I headed for home.

As I was making dinner that night, my daughter Susanne came in. “I guess that surgery didn’t work. Petey’s humping his stuffed German Shepherd.”

A few minutes later my son Clark swung by. “What a stud, Mom. Petey’s giving it to that kangaroo. Didn’t he just get his balls chopped off today?”

When he walked through the door, Eric exclaimed, “Wow, Petey, you aren’t letting a little pain stop you, are you?”

I could only imagine. As I pondered his actions, even I had to admit it. Our Petey is a total slut. Maybe the vet put the tracker exactly where we need it to be.

Pamelot

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Cold nose, warm feet.

Actual Quacker photo of joyous Petey on the bed during the arctic freeze.

You know that age-old saying, “rednecking can lead to redneckedness?” No? Well, deal with it and work with me, people.

Let’s try that again:

You know that age-old saying, “rednecking can lead to redneckedness?” Last weekend, it didn’t hold any water. We spent the weekend rednecking, and there wasn’t a damn bit of redneckedness.

Here’s what happened. Eric and I hoofed it to Nowheresville for another idyllic weekend camped out in the Quacker. For once, I have no poo stories for you (And the crowd screams, “Yay! Thank you!”). Nor, it turns out, do I have any naked stories. Not that I usually share any naked stories. I’m simply confirming there were none.

And the reason for no naked stories? 1) Gas and 2) Petey the one-eyed light of our lives. No, not that kind of gas. Although there was some of that, there is no causal connection between that “gas” and the “no naked” issue. Instead, I’m talking about propane gas. My husband Eric aka, in Nowheresville, Bubba-mon ran out of propane in our two propane tanks. Guess what kind of heater we have? Pr-o-p-a-n-e, yes.

Today in Houston on January 16th it was a balmy 70. But last weekend in Nowheresville it got down to 25 degrees on the fateful propane-less night. 25 is a brisk daytime/sunshine temp. It sucks for camping, however. Which is what you are doing if you are in the wildnerness with no heater, even if you are on a mattress in a trailer.

So, for starters, it was wayyyyyyyy too cold for naked. It was flannel jammies double comforter cold in the Quacker. But I mentioned reason number two for “no naked:” Petey.

Since it was just the right temperature for the Abominable Snowman but not for a 16-pound dog with a thin layer of hair, Petey did not find his own bed a satisfactory place to spend the night. Actually, the big dogs, Cowboy and Layla, didn’t either; they were living the highlife in the back of the old Suburban. Don’t scoff. There’s a big difference between the inside of a vehicle warmed by their breathing and without a breeze — and away from the yelps of coyotes and calls of the wild hogs — and 25 degrees when laying on the ground outside the Quacker. Worry not, friends, the broken seals around the Suburban windows gave them ample oxygen as well.

Where was I? Oh, “no naked” and Petey. So Petey suggested that he join us under the double comforters in our bed. Normally, Petey is a no-people-bed kind of dog, although not for lack of trying. He only spent a night on the bed with us once before, and that was the night of the day that Cowboy put Petey’s eye out. You would have let the little bugger sleep with you that night, too, I guarantee.

On this night, as we breathed whole storm systems of frost clouds over our heads, I again felt sorry for Petey.

“Just for tonight,” I said.

“Just for tonight,” Eric agreed without hesitation.

We didn’t even have to say, “Come, Petey.” He sensed the change and leaped up between us where he tunneled under the covers and to the foot of the bed. I couldn’t have asked for more. My feet were encased in blocks of solid ice, and his warm little body thawed them right out.

As Eric and I finished eskimo kissing goodnight a few moments later, though, a rocket shot out from under the covers, and, when we pressed our lips together for a people kiss, Petey’s cold, wet nose and extended tongue made contact with both of our lips. It may not have been the most romantic way to end the evening, but I’d trade my cold feet for his cold nose anytime. So, after a few dry heaves, we bid our little critter a fond goodnight and fell asleep three abreast, all snuggled up and warm as a summer day.

I <3 Petey sweetie.

Pamelot

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Not-necessarily-the-newsworthy.

My top 10 not necessarily newsworthy items of the week.

Badassedness.

Who is this badass canine and where did he get his bitchin’ shirt? Beats the hell out of me. I’m in London. And he’s not.

Water retention.

Water retention is a bitch.

For sale: one-eyed dog who pees on bed.

The threat hasn’t seemed to make much difference, even when I logged him into Craigs List and showed him the ad.

Pamela Fagan Hutchins

Holding Nothing Back

Tag Archives: petey

Green chiles, anyone?

I think that’s what they call an “oh shit” moment.

It’s a very Petey Christmas.

Must Love Dogs

Your daily dose of Petey…

He who rules the roost.

What does a little dog have to do?

Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater

Sweet fifteen and never been kissed.

Alert: Do not read this post if you need a PG-13 rating

What’s an eye, between best friends?

Tiny Muslim.

Must love dogs.

Tiny Catholic.

At least we’ll always be able to find it.

Cold nose, warm feet.

Not-necessarily-the-newsworthy.

Badassedness.

Water retention.

For sale: one-eyed dog who pees on bed.