Victory at last...

My new aunt Marie and uncle Paul came to stay in the basement space for a while.  That means the basement has been off limits to me for seven weeks.  I'm bereft.

However, having them here hasn't been all that bad.  You see, they are Amos fans!  And pretty much anything I do is adorable to them.  Wise folk.

Miracle workers, aunt Marie and uncle Paul got Myrtle to start eating at the table with them instead of in the GREEN chair.  Now, you might be thinking that is not such a good thing, since I could climb in Myrtle's lap in the chair, though not when she is at the table.  But think about this.  They got Myrtle to start eating at the table with them.  With!  That means three sets of dishes for me to lick, rather than a mere one!

Being a rather smart fellow, I quickly figured out that uncle Paul is the fastest eater, so I camp out at his side once they sit down.  Sure enough, once he's done, uncle Paul will set his plate or bowl or both down on the floor for me.  My puppy momma finishes next, so I take care of her dishes.  Aunt Marie always finishes last (this is because she does most of the cooking) and some times forgets to give me her dishes, but once reminded, she sets them on the floor for me.  Good times, eh?

Well, my adorableness has worn down their caution a bit.  They lost a bit of diligence in ensuring the door to the basement is always closed.  Now, don't misunderstand me.  I'm not that feeble.  I have managed to find my way to the promise land many times.  But each time someone was hot on my heels.  Not this time.

Myrtle, aunt Marie, and uncle Paul were busy play a game...a long game...for hours.  Something about phases.  Anyway, my aunt and uncle each went to the basement to tend to their needs throughout the game.  Being a patient fellow, I bid my time.  When the iron was hot, I struck.

VICTORY AT LAST!

Someone left the door open.  Of course, I was down there in a flash.  Sure enough, the basement really is the promise land.  Not just paper and all sorts of interesting stuff did I find to shred.  That didn't even catch my eye.  Like an arrow sprung from a bow, I shot straight to this fantastic section of bread left in the trash.  Oh, my!  This was no mere nibble, no bite given in pity.  This was practically an entire loaf!  Okay, maybe a third.  But still.  Wow!  To be fair, I must admit that I did not have the opportunity to devour all of it.  Pride goes before a fall.


I couldn't help myself.  I brought the bread back upstairs to show aunt Marie how much I appreciated the tasty treat she left right at the top of the trash can, for surely she did this for me. Surely!  However, Myrtle took exception to my display or my eating all that bread...or both.  Spotting disapproval painted all over her face, I raced up the stairs to our bedroom.  Myrtle is MUCH slower than I, so I figured I would have some time for my feast.  I was right.


Myrtle went back downstairs with a mere stub compared to the branch I carried up with me.  Most of that bread happily ended up in my tummy.  My puppy momma wasn't all that mad at me, though.  She was laughing when she picked me up to grab the bread out of my mouth, she was laughing as she walked back down the stairs, she was laughing when she showed aunt Marie and uncle Paul the little bit left, and she was laughing when she tossed it in the trash.  Too bad she didn't just let me finish it.


Still, I savor the victory.  I, Amos Adams, shall not be denied entrance to part of my own home!  Surely my perseverence was rewarded.  I wonder what I shall be given next time??


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

What lingers still...

Myrtle and I are having a bit of a difficult time.  As you can see, I am not my usual happy, carefree, adorable self.

Out of nowhere, this wild, fierce, and rather terrifying storm came up and knocked out the power to our home.  Since my puppy momma cannot be without air-conditioning, we went to stay in the basement of Aunt Leslie's house.  While Myrtle was very thankful for a place to stay, its effect on me was rather hard for her to face.

It was hard on me, too.

You see, Aunt Leslie lives next to this place filled with lots of trees and wild animals.  Fearsome Beasts of all sorts!  That would have been terribly hard to face all by itself, but her back yard doesn't have any fences.  Yep...that meant I had to wear the horrible, wretched, terrifying leash each and very time we went out.

Facing your greatest fear all day long, day after day, is exhausting...as you can see in my picture.  Exhausting, draining, debilitating....mentally, physically, emotionally.  I was a basket case by the time we left there.  And, even in the haven of our home, it took me many days to shed the weight of my fear.

Myrtle and I don't talk much about the pit bull attack.  At least we don't with our mouths.  But our bodies sure are still vocal about it.  We each tremble like a leaf at things most folk don't bat an eyelash at...or so it seems.  Other folk seem so brave, so fearless really, about doing things like walking outside, being around strangers, and wearing leashes.  Myrtle tells me that I am fine just the way that I am, but being scared is not very fun.  It wears on a fellow.

Next week it will have been a year since we started getting scared together.  Next week it will have been a year since we were both scarred.

Myrtle tells me that sometimes she feels like she is still standing on the corner playing tug-of-war against the pit bull with my body.  Sometimes, she still feels my body slipping from her fingers, slick with our blood mingled together.  She doesn't remember anything from the last time she stumbled to her feet, clutching me against her until the two of us were lying on the ground...the attack finally over.

Only...it really isn't.  As much as we both wish it to be over, it is not.  It is not in our bodies.  It is not in our minds.  It is not in our hearts.  We startle at little things.  We fear little things.   And we think walking about the neighborhood is just plain a bad idea.

I guess, though, in a strange way it is good that it happened to both of us.  I mean, I don't EVER want anything bad to happen to my puppy momma.  EVER.  But since it happened to both of us neither one of us is completely alone.  Even if no one else does, we understand each other.  We understand the fear.  We understand the trembling.  We understand the weakness.


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

Hard at work...

This is me, hard at work! 

Myrtle decided to finally paint the back stairwell and the hallway upstairs. Oh, my, if I had a quarter for each time she deliberated about stripping off the wallpaper first, I would be able to purchase all the bacon I could ever desire! [I wouldn't desire it so much if Myrtle would not be so selfish about sharing hers.] Over and over and over again, I heard the argument about the "horrid" seams on the walls and the possible "disaster" of pulling down the ceiling once she started. Something about the mess of old lathe and plaster. Finally, she decided to just paint. As she put it: to finish the blasted job I started over a year ago. 

You see, the hallway and back stairwell now match the foyer, main stairwell, and parlor. All of the walls that needed to be painted are painted. And the white walls that did not necessarily need to be painted but were driving my puppy momma slightly crazy now sport some color. 

This is me when my puppy momma started improving her walls, just after I came to live with her. Such a tiny little fellow, eh? Adorable, though, right? Back then, Myrtle's painting was so stressful for me. I could barely stand to be away from her and the ladder was so scary and I didn't understand what she was doing. Now that Myrtle has painted the basement living space, the basement bath area, the laundry area, the living room, the parlor, the master bath (including the antique tub), and all the places I mentioned above, I know full well what painting entails: Myrtle starts making a mess; hours later, Myrtle cleans up her mess. All the while she works, Myrtle doesn't want my help. 

This is the finished project (at least the hallway...the stairwell is kind of boring). I take full credit for it. Yep...you read that right: full. You see, painting is much, much, much harder for Myrtle now than it was when she started over a year ago. It causes her a lot of pain (which is why I think the walls were perfect the way they were before she started). Pain from her arthritis and pain from the now constant tendinitis in her elbows because of the muscle weakness in her forearms. So, I keep her company, the whole time. As you can see from the photo array above, I have learned to keep out of her way (I ended up with absolutely no Mellow Ivory in my curls--a first for me). And I am so darned adorable when I sleep that I kept distracting her from the pain as I shifted positions, looking even more adorable in the new one than I did in the one previous. So adorable, in fact, I bet you are having trouble reading this because your eyes are drawn back to the top and all my snoozing glory. 

That's the kind of fellow I am. I sacrifice willingly for my puppy momma. Instead of spending the ten hours it took for her to do the painting job comfortably in the GREEN chair, I spent all that time napping on the cold, hard, unforgiving floor. I did so, because even though I think Myrtle was slightly crazy for making herself hurt just for the sake of colored walls, I love her. I love my puppy momma. And she needed my help. 

This is my life with Myrtle. Amos Adams signing off!

A little advice...

Myrtle had two plumbers over to the house on Thursday to install a new sink in our bathroom.  Now, first I shall say that I preferred the old sink!  As you can clearly see, it is low enough that even a puppy dog can use it.  However, that's the very reason Myrtle replaced the sink.

My puppy momma has something called arthritis.  I think it is a disease that makes you cranky.  But Myrtle tells me that it is a disease that causes stiffness, swelling, and pain in joints.  For my puppy momma, using such a low sink was hard on her.  She would grunt and groan while doing so.  And she would be very, very grumpy afterwards.

Well, the plumbers were nice fellows.  They played with me a bit...at least until they grew weary of retrieving the fascinating bits and pieces I plucked out of their work bags. That was okay with me, however, because one of the plumbers very kindly took the toilet paper off the holder and set it within my reach.  Myrtle only ever lets me play with the empty core.  That kind man gave me an entire roll!

I had a grand old time with the toilet paper.  Myrtle had been complaining about how there was no mid-West winter, so I provided snow all over the living room floor for her.  Because the snow outside is rather tasty, I helped myself to some of the snow I made.  Okay, a lot of it.

Myrtle didn't really know that I had eaten the toilet paper.  She just scolded me over the mess.  As the evening wore on, though, I started to feel a bit peaked.  Myrtle didn't really understand why all I wanted to do was curl up in her lap. Once we went up to bed, I did not fool around in the bathroom or play with my Babies or anything.  All I wanted was the growing agony in my belly to cease.

It did.  After many, many, many times of throwing up foul bits of toilet paper.

Myrtle was not happy with me when she first figured out what was causing my belly ache.  But soon she ceased scolding me.  For a while, she ceased everything, having fallen down in a pile of former toilet paper.  When she awoke, her stomach emptied, too.  And there was lots and lots and lots of the kind of silence that you don't want to hear.

As she worked to get us both cleaned up and then tend to bedroom floor, Myrtle's face got very wet.  I dried it off for her once we were back in bed. It was a long, miserable night for us both.

So, well, I would like to proffer that eating a roll of toilet paper just might not be the best course of action.

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

Finally...

Myrtle has been rather ill and oft discouraged, so she has resisted every attempt I have made of her to start typing for me again.  I finally convinced her that my many admirers were probably going through Amos withdrawal.  Hence, I'm back!

Did you miss me?

There are a gizillion new photos of me to post, but Myrtle says that to stick them all up here would make for too much work for her.  I begged for at least one to start things off.  She agreed.  So, I chose this one. Am I not still utterly adorable?

I am a bit reluctant to admit that Myrtle and I are going through a growing period, so to speak.  Sometimes, she finds me rather trying.  Mostly, she plain flummoxes me.  Frankly, I think I have far, far more to tolerate in her than she does in me.  But I am, after all, a very accommodating fellow.

Right now, we are in the midst of the Grand Experiment Take Two.  Therefore, I am quite pleased to announce that all baby gates in the house have been taken down.  Myrtle talked for hours...or so it seemed...about the fact that she wanted to see just how much I have grown up.  [After all, I am now 15 months old!]  She wanted to start trying to trust me in the house, to see if I could make wise decisions.  One way she did this is by not forcing me to do my major business immediately after supper.  Myrtle allows me the freedom to let her know when I have a need to do so, rather than following her need for me to take care of things.

Another way is the removal of the baby gates. With the last of the baby gates down, that means I now have total access to the two main floors of the house.  [My continued major business indiscretions on concrete preclude me from having the run of the basement, too.]  In other words, I can run up and down either staircase as much as my heart desires!

Yes, for the first few days, I did avail myself of this privilege many a time.  So much so that I suspect Myrtle was ready to fetch the baby gates again.  Now, racing up and down the servant stairs, the ones covered with thick brown grass, is a delight.  I can even skip a step here and there if I put my mind to it.  But there has been no such racing upon the main staircase.  The first time I ever stepped paw there, down I went its entire length on my belly to land in a pile at the bottom landing!  I am a tad ashamed to admit that I was frightened and rather sore afterward.  However, I am very proud to announce that I can now go up or down those ginormous wooden steps without falling or slipping or anything other than proper staircase navigation.

In fact, I used this new found ability to trick Myrtle when she was angry with me and tried to give me a timeout for something she had never forbidden.  When she closed the door to the parlor and to the dining room, she forgot that I still had access to the servant's stairs.  Once she was safely ensconced in the GREEN chair, I snuck up the servant's stairs and down the main staircase so that I could launch myself up beside her.  My puppy momma was so surprised that she relented on the time-out and allowed me to remain with her.

[Myrtle might very well have been afraid that I could have been hurt on the main staircase.  However, now I am quite confident on them myself and do not slip even a single time whilst traversing the smooth wooden steps.]

Why was I being disciplined?

Well, Myrtle had gone grocery shopping and she bought herself a treat: a fresh, sugar coated, yeast doughnut.  It was in a box at the top of one of the grocery bags.  While she was busy unloading the groceries, I helped her by unloading the doughnut.  Really, it took me mere seconds to nose open the box, remove the doughnut, carry it to the living room rug, and polish it off for her.  She didn't even notice I was gone.  She did notice, however, that the doughnut was gone.  A very, very loud and angry sort of notice.

But Myrtle never told me that doughnuts were not puppy-appropriate food. Never!  Tell me, then, how in the world was I supposed to know that the food so easily accessed was Myrtle-only food?  It was wrong--very, very wrong--for her to punish me for something I was not aware was improper behavior.

SIGH.

I will say that I have surprised my puppy momma with the fact that there have been absolutely no accidents on the brown grass upstairs.  I have been very, very good at following proper protocol in the disposition of my bodily excesses, with the tiny exception of the basement concrete floor.  [To me, it is identical to the garage floor, a space where Myrtle has not objected to my personal actions.  So, I do not see the problem with using it for purposes other than walking.]

I could have told Myrtle that I can be responsible when properly motivated.  And having the freedom of the house is motivation enough.  After all, that means that I can visit Flower Baby, who, if you remember, stays up in our bed all day long, whenever my heart desires.

But, really, Myrtle need not have worried.  The truth is that I prefer to be at her side, no matter where she is.  Even if I am napping, should she go to the bathroom or to the kitchen for a drink, I will gather myself up and follow her.  I even poke my nose up over the side of the antique tub each time Myrtle takes a shower just to be sure she is all right.   So, while I like the freedom to go where I please about my own home, where I always long to be most is with my puppy momma.

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

Lost arts...

My nemesis is getting skinnier and skinnier...but he just won't go away. In the top left photo, you can see him fleeing my wrath after having squeezed his loathsome body between the side gate and the fence.  Chicken.  In the top right, you can see him sitting at the edge of my neighbor's house, taunting me.  There he will stay until I go back to Inside.  No matter how long I glare at him from my side of the house, he will remain.  The rat.

My puppy momma has told me, again and again, that I should learn the art of compromise or sharing or both.  Myrtle says they are lost arts.  I don't know about that.  I find nothing artful about having Fearsome Beast living in MY backyard and taunting me in the process.  Myrtle says I should feel sorry for him, because while I have gotten a tad...plump...he has shrunk in size over the winter.  She has worried that he will die.  Me?  Well, honestly, I would say, "Good riddance!" were that to happen.

But despite her confusing and somewhat treasonous stance on my nemesis, Myrtle does love me.  Truly she does.

Today, she bought me my own Baby Bunny, complete with a squeaker!

Now, this bunny is down right ugly.  And already I do not have the same love and affection I have for all my Babies.  Instead, I have found it a perfect object of all my ire and wrath and frustration over Fearsome Beast.

Already, I have ripped his whiskers off and damaged his tail.  I eaten one of his eyes.  And I am thinking that his ears might make a good snack, too.

I shall not tuck him into bed with all my other babies.
I shall not snuggle with him.
I shall not carry him about to keep him company.
I shall not love him.

This bunny shall be no Baby of mine.  I shall be making short work of him.

Too bad Myrtle won't let me get my paws on the real thing.  Maybe...just maybe...after seeing me pour my righteous wrath out upon this bunny, she will relent about continuing to allow the miscreant interloper to live in our back yard.  Maybe she will cover up the hole to his home beneath the back porch and dig up every single speck of greenery, so that, if Fearsome Beast chooses to continue to live in stubborn defiance of my rightful reign, he will die a horrible death of starvation.

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

The grand experiment...

Myrtle has announced that we are beginning The Grand Experiment.  The dining room is now open for business...just still not my business!

You see, when I was but a little pup, my favorite indoor place to do outdoor activities was the dining room.  After umpteen thousand accidents, in a fit of pique, Myrtle closed the pocket French doors and set up a baby gate between the dining room and kitchen.  I was shut out.  Completely. I believe this move was rash and rather unfair.  I also believe that Myrtle should long have been practicing far more forgiveness than she has in this matter.

Well, I have kept up an unrelenting campaign ever since our canine visitor departed for Myrtle to allow me entrance to this most wondrous of rooms.

While she was here, Seri got to spend practically all her time in the dining room.  AND her free reign was allowed to continue despite the fact that she had several accidents since, as a baby puppy, she's still learning about the proper disposition of her bodily functions.  Now, does that sound fair to you? Seri had free run of the room while I was left to make do with peering over the gate or through the lowest panes of the French doors.

I am nearly 15-months old now.  I have lived with Myrtle for over a year, absorbing all those millions upon millions of house rules.  Fairly consistently, I have proven that, unless my puppy momma is being negligent on noticing my communicative efforts regarding my bodily needs, I understand all said activity needs to take place out of doors. Therefore, I believe it is high time that I be given access to the dining room.  After all, there is this fantastic table around which I can run laps, there are wooden grates in the floor that allow me to peer down into the basement, and I can get from the GREEN chair to my water bowl in a fraction of the time it takes to go across the living room to the foyer, through the parlor, and then across the kitchen to where my water bowl resides.

Today, victory was achieved!  After much lecturing about trust and responsibility and how second chances do not come around all that frequently, Myrtle opened the French doors without quickly shutting them again in my face.  Yes, I, Amos Adams, am now free to spend as much time as I wish sniffing about, exercising, and taking short-cuts.

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

How to pick a puppy momma...

Will Power.  Well, a lack thereof.  That is the key to picking a good puppy mom if you have a choice about the matter.  Will Power.  Remember that!

Myrtle has none of it!  Well, very, very, very little, which is almost always to my benefit.  Truly, about the only will power she's managed to muster on my behalf is refusing to share her bacon.  In all else, she caves.

Do you see my new baby?  That's Gorilla Baby!  Myrtle has no will power when it comes to walking by the $3 Baby bin at Petsmart when fetching more food for me.  He's GREEN!  Myrtle and I share an affinity for that great color.  Turtle Baby and Gorilla Baby will be the best of friends.  I just know it!  In any case, each time Myrtle comes home with a Petsmart bag, I know that food will not be the only thing found inside.

Myrtle has told me about how puppies come to mommas, about how there are places where puppies wait for mommas and poppas to find them, places where puppies are viewed first, are chosen, rather than just given to their mommas like I was. So, I thought I would proffer some advice about how to look for signs of a lack of will power in prospective puppy mommas and poppas in case you are a puppy looking for a home:

• visitors who stick their fingers through cages
• visitors who throw toys
• visitors who make strange noises
• visitors who sit on the ground

Now, you might think those have little to do with will power, but the key is repetition.  Take the repetition in the list itself: visitors.  People who show up repeatedly probably have little will power, especially if they come during day.  By this, I mean if they come during their work time.  Work means what a puppy momma or poppa does to earn money.  Missing work for visits to puppies means they might have have little will power when it comes to being firm with puppies because having a puppy will be really, really, really important to them. So, you want to position yourself with those mommas and poppas.

If they stick their fingers through the cages, shower them with kisses.  Shower them with kisses every possible chance that you get if the momma or the poppa reaches out to you or gets down on the floor to play with you.  Giving copious amounts of affection is always a good move for those who are a bit weak in the will power department.

If they want to play with you, tossing toys and such, play until they stop.  Repeat, repeat, repeat.  Wag your tail.  Play until they are exhausted.  Then, curl up next to the prospective puppy parent and put your head in his or her lap.

If visitors make strange noises, that usually means they are talking to you.  You should talk back...but not too loud or too much.  A good time to talk, though, is when the visitor is coming and especially when he or she is leaving.  A well-timed ruff will expose weakness in will power for those who snuck away on a lunch hour looking for a puppy to bring home.  If a visitor walking out the door turns back for a minute or two more, then you have a good bet of picking a momma or a poppa whose will power may be lacking.

So, why someone with weak will power?  Well, weak will power means that you get lots of snuggling, lots of bites of meals, lots of fetch, lots of kisses, and, most importantly, lots of babies with those most marvelous squeakers in them!

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

This means war...

Myrtle forgot our first anniversary!  How could she do that??  After all, she's hated Valentine's Day for years and now she has a reason to love it, to celebrate it.  After all, her bestest love in the world joined her life that day.  Alas, Myrtle forgot our first anniversary.

I suppose I can forgive her.  I mean, given how much she forgets things now, if I do not forgive her for forgetting, we will never be reconciled.  Mostly, what I need to be forgiving her for is laughing at me.  Boy, does my puppy momma laugh at me ever so much!

Anyway, the past couple of weeks she has not been well.  So, Myrtle has not been seeing to her particular duties in the out of doors.  For all her being hot and bothered about my being ever attentive, she is not always so.  Do you not think that puppy mommas should be consistent role models rather than merely consistent nags?

Anyway, Myrtle was out in the back yard picking up my deposits and she started laughing.  I suppose that I should just get used to her laughter...but I should admit that I also laughed.  Wickedly so!

You see, Myrtle finally noticed that I declared war against Fearsome Beast.  That wretch has been leaving his deposits all over my back yard.  Mine!  So, I have been letting him know exactly what I think of that.  I smother each piddly pile that he leaves with a great big one of my own.  That deluded interloper might think that he hold dominion over Outdoors, but he is wrong.  He is only there on my suffrage.  Fearsome Beast might think that he is able to out-run me and escape through the fence, but the real truth is that I let him escape.  Bloody rabbit spread about the yard would mightily distress Myrtle.  My beloved puppy momma certainly needs absolutely no more distress in her life.  Thus, in order for Fearsome Beast to fully understand his place in this world, I leave little reminders for him each morning and each evening.  Actually, they are reminders that the war is already over.

Now that Myrtle knows what I am doing when I sniff about the yard, searching for the right spot to make my deposits, do you think that she will be a bit more patient with me?

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

A little slow on the uptake...

Sometimes, Myrtle needs to get a clue.  Sometimes, my beloved puppy momma is a tad oblivious.  This day, I had remind her many a time that her chief and primary duty is to love on me!

Myrtle got a bee in her bonnet and spent ages and ages and ages in the basement.  She was doing more of that work whereby she removes stuff, carries stuff out to the special trash bin, moves around stuff, and generally makes things look totally and utterly different.  Honestly, I don't see why she wastes her time.

Here I am, a lonely little fellow, woefully neglected. On and on and on she worked.  She pulled books off the shelf.  She moved other books around.  Baskets of office supplies went from one set of shelves to another. The smaller shelf was cleaned and filled with empty baskets.  Frankly, just watching her was exhausting.  More so was that the entire time Myrtle refused to hold me.  I tried and tried and tried to land in her arms, but they were always full of things.  At one point, I launched myself up on her shoulders, but I miscalculated and merely landed on the floor on the other side of her.  Yes, you guessed it: Myrtle laughed. No matter how hard I tried to communicate with her that I was in dire need of snuggling, she just didn't seem to understand.

I confessed that I tried twice to garner her attention by less-than-appropriate behavior involving bodily fluids.  How in the world could I have thought that would be a good idea?  My puppy momma...well...she has a temper when it comes to blatant disobedience.  There was no real way that I could pretend my watering the tub upstairs while she was fetching something as an accident. I was not quite napping on the rug in the photo above.  I was in exile.  Myrtle did not want such a BAD DOG near her.  Over time, I managed to scoot my way unobtrusively, inch by painful inch, over the course of an hour until I was at least allowed to lie near her.

So, this evening, I resorted to simple repetition.  You see, Myrtle was sitting on the couch when I wanted her to lay in the GREEN chair.  That way I could get in some serious snuggling with her to make up for all the time that was stolen from me this day.  Because Myrtle is so slow on the uptake, I had to systematically drag the pillows off the couch and hold them in my mouth as I jumped up on the GREEN chair.  Myrtle just chuckled.  Then I moved the blanket.  Still, she had not a clue that I was wanting her to move.  Finally, I jumped up on her lap and then jumped down before jumping up on the chair.  I lay down for a second, whimpered, then jumped down to leap back up on her lap to swipe a few kisses.  My goodness, I must have rotated between the couch and chair a thousand times before Myrtle understood what I wanted.

I am plumb exhausted. However, we are lying together in the GREEN chair, my body curled around her shoulders, her head resting on my belly, my breath keeping her right ear warm.  [Myrtle is now cold much of the time, so a fellow has to help out any way he can.] If you ask me, together is how we should always be!


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

Nary a word...

There are some things about which Myrtle is fairly tolerant.  Kisses, for example.  I like to give them and she likes to receive them.  Whenever Myrtle comes home from her appointments, I like to greet her with many kisses upon her return.  When I return from doing my business out of doors, I like to give a few kisses once I am back with Myrtle.  When I crawl in Myrtle's lap, I like to shower Myrtle with kisses before dropping off to sleep for a nap or two or three.  When Myrtle awakes at night and leaves the bed, I like to greet her with kisses upon her return as I do at the front door.  When I awake at night and move to curl up on her shoulder, I like to cover her with a few kisses before dropping off to sleep once more.  Frankly, in my opinion, there is never a bad time for a few kisses...even more than a few.  Mostly, Myrtle agrees with me and allows me to express my affection for her.  Though, sometimes in the middle of the night, she cries out, "Enough!" and begs me a bit to settle back down so we can both get some rest.

As I have noted, there are also many, many, many, many, many things in my life about which Myrtle is absolutely intolerant.  For example, after weeks and weeks and weeks of proper disposition of my deposits, I took use of the basement floor when the need arose.  The basement floor is exactly like the sidewalks and streets out of doors where I have free reign to conduct my business.  So, I ask you, "Ought not the basement also to be an acceptable location?"

Myrtle says most emphatically, "No!"

However, there are some things about which Myrtle says nary a word. With them, she is complete mercy and grace.  Chief among them is my utter love for the beds in the sunshine room (the one Myrtle calls the solarium).  I just love them.  Love, love, love, love them!

Whenever Myrtle is getting ready for bed, I cannot resist the urge to sneak over to them and jump up.  The room is so peaceful.  I like to look out the windows, even at night. I like to hop from bed to bed.  I like to curl up for a nap with all the sunlight that never ends shining down upon me.  Truly, it is a marvelous place.  However, sadly, once up on the beds, I cannot get down.  You see, the floors are wood and leaping down from such a height without soft carpet to cushion my landing is too frightening for me.  I am trapped, each and every time.

No matter how many times I find myself trapped on a bed in my beloved sunshine room, Myrtle comes and rescues me.  She comes even if it is twice or more in the same evening.  The smallest whimper will reach her, and when she is able, Myrtle will come chuckle at the sight of me, gather me in her arms, bury her face in my curly hair, and whisper sweet nothings to me before giving a few kisses of her own.  No yelling at me for interrupting her.  No lecturing about getting myself in situations out of which I cannot get.  No sighing deeply over a perceived misbehavior on my part.  No reminding me that she has already rescued me that evening.  Just love.  Just love and grace and mercy.  Each and every time Myrtle rescues me.


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

A better education...

Myrtle needs a better education.

Yesterday, she cleaned out and pulled the curly hair from inside my ears. [I HATE this process].  Then, she gave me a hair cut.  After that, she got out the detangler and worked on some mats on my neck and beneath my ears.  Finally, she finished her puppy torture by giving me a bath.  Yes, the bath was followed by my near favorite activity: being swaddled and cradled in Myrtle's lap for a long as I like (usually several hours).  However, the entire afternoon was too much stress on a still-developing, innocent puppy!

I was so exhausted from the strain of so much angst over the pain of having things pulled and cleaned from my ears, the terror of having snipping scissors clipping all over my body (Myrtle has twice now actually cut my skin instead of my hair, first my chest and then my leg), and the agony of the mixture of the fear of having that stuff spritzed so close to my face and the pain of having a comb dragged through a section of tangled hair until enough clumps come out so that it can be easily combed once more.

Puppy mommas need to be properly educated regarding how dangerous it is to pile stress and strain on an innocent puppy.  Baths are good.  Detangling mats is even a good and proper process.  Hair cuts, when you have wildly curly hair, are needful.  Even...though I am loathe to admit it...cleaning out wax and curly hair from inside a fellow's ears is necessary.  However, all of those things are a bit confusing and rather stressful.  And two of them are painful.  A fellow needs time to recover.  A fellow needs time to...forgive.  Just because you understand that being hurt by your beloved puppy momma is something that has to happen does not mean that you can easily accept it.

I think Myrtle has learned her lesson.  I think.  I mean, she held me all last night and started whispering apologies when I was still napping hours later.  She was still telling me what a great little puppy dog I was when we finally headed up to bed, my having spent the entire evening conked out, first in her arms and later curled up behind her head whilst she stretched out in the GREEN chair.  I think she understands the whole afternoon was just too much.  I think she understands she should never again attempt all that grooming at the same time, subject me to all that stress and strain.  At least I hope she does.


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

Just plain weird...

Myrtle is just plain weird.

My puppy momma keeps the thermostat at 68, though sometimes she dares 70.  However, she is so cold all the time that Myrtle has taken to crouching over the vent in the kitchen floor each time we come in from out of doors. She will lie on the hearth before a fire, oft wishing aloud she could crawl right into the fireplace. And the rest of the time, she is lying in the GREEN chair, covered with four layers of clothes and two blankets and clutching a heating pad set on high.  She also tries to soak up every spare bit of puppy warmth from me when I crawl up on the chair with her.

I asked Myrtle why she doesn't turn the heat up a degree or two or five.  She told me that 72 would be too hot, that she would grow ill, shaking and confused and faint if she got too hot.

How can 70 degrees be too cold and 72 degrees be too not?  Myrtle is just plain weird.  Or bonkers.  Or both.

I think she needs an inch or two of curly white hair all over her body like I do.  Frankly, God did a pretty good job of designing puppies...at least Bichon Poo puppies...don't you think?  In all my time with Myrtle, I have never been too hot or too cold.  I've been just fine.  I sure wish Myrtle were.


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!    

Why does she laugh...

Do all puppy mommas laugh at their puppies?  Myrtle does.  All the time.

Tell me, what is so humorous about my using the stepping stones?  I mean, stones placed in the ground equal distance along a directional path are certainly meant to be stepped upon, right?  That's what I do.  I use the stepping stones to make my way to the yards on either side of the garage.  Of course, being a might small fellow, I have to sort of hop from stone to stone, but hopping is a form of stepping, right?  Where's the humor in that?

And what is so funny about using a stealth approach when aiming to remove a prohibited-to-Amos item left lying on the table next to the couch?  If Myrtle really did not want for me to have it, she would not leave it in such easy reach.  Because I love her and I know that any reminder of her diminishing cognitive function, like leaving a dinner napkin behind as she clears her dishes, distresses Myrtle, I make every attempt possible to keep from pointing out her error. What is so funny about that?

And carrying around babies in my mouth.  How in the world could that draw laughter?  A fellow should always have a baby close at hand, and surely Myrtle knows I need my hands to walk.  So it is natural that I would carry about babies in my mouth when traveling from room to room, from floor to floor, inside and out.  Again, where's the funny in that?

I could go on and on and on.  Myrtle laughs when I snore (waking me up), when my meal takes but 37-seconds to consume, when I toss the ball for myself, when I check on her while she is taking a shower, when I work on a chew toy in her lap, when I perch across her hip while she is lying on her side in bed reading a book, when I sneak down to the basement for a visit behind the dryer (it smells so very good back there), when I fall asleep in her arms after a bath on the way from the basement sink to the couch, when I tuck my all my babies, balls, and chew toys into bed for safe keeping, when I curl up on the back of the couch and rest my head upon her shoulder for a nap, when I try to sneak a tasty clod of dirt past her after tending to business in the out of doors, when I take a flying leap from the lower sidewalk to the upper sidewalk in the back yard to bypass the two steps connecting them, when I stand on my back legs to check out what might be in the bathroom sink, when I slip one of her sleeping-eye-covers-thingys out of the laundry basket, when I try to figure out a way to hold a couple of babies and a ball in my mouth at the same time, when I climb up on her shoulders for a ride, when I leap up in the air for someone to catch me (sometimes I must do so six or seven times before the visitor understands that he or she is supposed to hold me), when I chase Fearsome Beast out of the yard, when I wag my tail at Neighbor Dog and give her kisses through the fence, when I am warning people who are walking on the sidewalk that I am guarding the premises, when I fall asleep holding Flower Baby at night...the list is endless.

Why does Myrtle laugh at me?


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

I've been deceived...

My beloved Aunt Leslie came by to see me yesterday and dropped a bombshell in my lap...or my mouth, that is.  Did you know that it is possible to get a treat even if you did not do a poo-poo outside?  In fact, I learned that is possible to get treats for just being adorable!  Myrtle has been deceiving me! Deliberately!!

All my life--at least my life with Myrtle--the ONLY time I have ever been given a treat by her was after I did my major business out of doors in the evenings.  Myrtle says morning poops don't count since I have been storing up things all night and am naturally inclined to take care of such matters as soon as I step paw on grass in the morning.  Myrtle says that treats are for when I demonstrate my ability to do this action in the evening, when the long hours of sleeping in bed are not pressing upon the needs of my body.  Myrtle says that treats are for when I choose to do the right thing regarding my major business.

Myrtle is a liar!

Aunt Leslie sat down on the couch and let me shower her with kisses and snuggles.  When I sniffed out a container of treats in her purse, she promptly opened it up and gave me one.  Then two.  Three.  Actually, but the time her visit was over, the entire container was empty...all of its contents rather happily residing in my tummy.  And I didn't have to perform a single poop for her.  Nor did I have to sit first before I was given a bone.  Not once.

Alas, my heart is heavy. For now, I am wondering just what else Myrtle has lied to me about.  For example, I am betting that not every puppy is required to "lay down and stay" for the count of three after every fourth throw of the ball in order to keep playing fetch.  SIGH.

This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!

The Mexican stand-off...

That's what Myrtle calls it. I still say it is betrayal.

Yes,  I am writing again about Fearsome Beast.  He will not leave.  He refuses to find his own home.  Instead, the wretch insists on trespassing in mine.  In fact, he's nothing but a low-down, dirty squatter.

I never know where he will appear, but I know that he will.  There I am, stepping out the back door to tend to my needs, making my way down the steps, and looking all around.  A fellow ought to be able to just saunter over to a place that best fits his needs in his very own yard, right?

Wrong.

Fearsome Beast will suddenly appear.  One moment I am certain that I have chosen an empty spot save for a brown rock or a little statue, and the next I realize he is right in front of me, mere inches away.  Taunting me.

Do you think that is unfair of me to assail his actions?  I don't.  Seriously, the scumbag taunts me.  Me!  The rightful resident of the wonderful expanse of grass and plants and mulch and trees and stepping stones that makes up the outdoor oasis of our home.  I belong there; Fearsome Beast does not!  Yet I am the one who has to endure the constant strain of his presence.  And...well...the constant shame of losing the day's Mexican stand-off.

Oh, I have learned to chase that two-faced rat across and out of my yard.  But all my efforts never amount to a hill of beans.  Once safely on the other side of the fence, just a few feet away, Fearsome Beast takes up his stance and waits.  He knows.  He knows the awful truth.  It sears my very soul to admit this, but Fearsome Beast is the one who has true reign in the yard, not I.

No matter how long I try to outlast the devil, I fail.  He stares.  I paw at the ground, toss up mulch, pull  at the fence, climb up in the base of the lilac tree. and still he wins.  He wins because he knows the truth.  No matter how long I try to last in one of our contests, I will eventually have to go back inside and he will be free once more to reign over Outdoor. Every hair on his body shouts his confidence that the victory will be his, that it is only a matter of time.  Those beady black eyes bore into my being until I can bear my defeat no more.  I stand down first.  I look away first.  I back up, albeit slowly, first.  And I run away.  The loser once more.

If Myrtle really loved me, she would take her gun and add some Fearsome Beast to her cooking pot.  If Myrtle really loved me, she would patch up every hole in the fence so the miserable miscreant could not escape my wrath.  If Myrtle really loved me, she would block the entrance to his home beneath our porch and leave the fetid foe to freeze in the snow.

Instead, Myrtle chuckles and guffaws over my futile efforts to force my way through the fence so that I could wipe that smug smile off the stupid face of Fearsome Beast.  If I fail to give into her cajoling to just walk away and tend to my need, Myrtle will take matters out of my hand.  Showering me with kisses, she pulls me away from the fence and picks me up in her arms to walk over to a fresh spot of grass needing either water or fertilizer. She tells me to just ignore Fearsome Beast.  She tells that I am the one who is really the winner, because I am the one who spends his life reigning over Indoors, a land never too cold and never too hot, snuggled with Myrtle, covered with love, and fed nearly to my heart's content.  When I am particularly resistant to her efforts, when I ignore her sweet nothings, leap out of her arms, and race back over to the fence in one final futile attempt to avenge my honor and right this terrible wrong, Myrtle grows a tad frustrated with me and tells me that I need a bit of perspective.

Perspective?  What I need is a puppy momma who is a bit more supportive of her own beloved companion and less protective of that impudent lout.


This is my life with Myrtle.  Amos Adams signing off!