Working at the Car Wash, Yeah

Do the words “undercarriage blast” mean anything to you? Up here it doesn’t matter if your car is red, green or blue, it’s covered in salt. Every week one must drive through a car wash to eliminate the salt before the next onslaught of snow and salt to melt the snow and eat your paint and undercarriage.

A few months ago I went through one car wash with Zoe the dog in the way back of the SUV on a tie-down and behind a cargo screen. She jumped around the screen onto the back seat and nearly hanged herself. Today we went through the car wash across the street and I talked to her the entire time and she was cool about it. I was very proud of her.

Togetherness and food are the motivations. She didn’t get any food for this but she got to come with me in the car and for a herder that beats a treat and being left alone at home. And I spent half a day yesterday going downtown to get her frozen raw lamb for dinner. I am a fan of the BARF diet (Bones And Raw Food) for dogs. She loves it, is regular like clockwork and her coat is so soft it’s like human hair. Everyone comments on the quality of her fur. If I do take up knitting, I should keep dog fur for a year or two and have someone spin it into yarn. It would make a great sweater.

My leaving the dog at home in her crate secret is very simple. Take a Kong (a spherical device, we get the black ones that are nearly indestructible as Zoe can eat raw meat totally frozen) and put in some peanut butter. Freeze it solid. We have six of them and rotate them from dishwasher to filling to freezer, and she runs into her crate and sometimes pesters us to leave on a Saturday for lunch and a movie because she knows she’s going to get the PBK (peanut butter Kong). We can’t even call it that anymore because she knows the term and is even understanding “spherical device.” Well, she’s in the home of a Physics guy. Hopefully after 10 p.m. he’s finally on his way home. It’s been a stressful day. Cheers, Dee