Missed Me

Danger over with - Earl missed us completely!  There's still a few weeks of hurricane season left so we are not out of the woods just yet.

Keeping on the subject of weather you'd be forgiven for thinking the weather around here is controlled by some kind of intergalactic thermostat.  The holiday weekend marking the end of summer comes around and the temperature instantly drops by 10 degrees - the weekend was beautiful.  No more sweating like a polar bear in the Bahamas', just beautiful mid 20's and blue sky.  My paws hurt like heck though as my human decided she was going to be fit and healthy and walked the socks off me (if I wore socks that is).  I really enjoyed it but I wish she'd remember I'm not a teenager any more, I'm geriatric, the vet said so!

I had an early start on Saturday thanks to the Kentlands fun run.  The finish line was right outside my apartment and they started setting up at 6am.  After the third rendition of 'testing, testing, one two three' over the PA system I had no choice than to get up and out of the apartment.  Watching the runners from the window was pretty cool though.  As you can see not all the dogs were as enthralled as I was with the action.  We walked the 5K route on Sunday morning, nosing at all the big houses along the way.

I went to the park twice over the weekend which was cool.  Don't tell anyone but I had a little paddle in the lake to cool my aching paws.  It was a bit odd that my human was around all weekend.  Usually she takes a big bag containing funny looking sticks and little white balls and disappears for hours when the weather is nice.

Oh yeah, excitement... I'm going on my holidays on Thursday.  It's been months since I've met up with my friends at the kennels, I'm really excited.

Eh dogs, the action is this way...

Now that's the way to travel.  I wonder if it's big enough for me?

Weather Watch

This year I've survived record snow fall, record high temperatures, tornados and an earthquake.  What does that leave then?  How about a hurricane?  Oooops don't speak too soon...

Hopefully it will veer out to sea and won't affect me but I am keeping a close eye on the forecast and don't think I'll be booking a beach side hotel for the holiday weekend!

Wash Day

Life has been pretty boring for the last couple of weeks.  No storms, tornados or record high temperatures, in fact the weather has been really nice; not too hot and nice and sunny.  I can finally go for a decent walk without nearly fainting through heat exhaustion.

I came over all domestic today and gave my toys a wash because they were a bit stinky.

Before the trip to the 'whirlie washer' at the theme park.

Enjoying the ride.

Checking for predators while the toys enjoy the view and dry off

Time to bring them in after their adverture

All sparkly clean

 

Lively Start

I had a nice early start this morning.  It took a while for me to persuade my human to get up, but some pathetic whining and a quick lick of the nose soon woke her from her snoring slumber.  She mumbled something about it being too early as it was still dark.  There was a reason for that, my super-senses had detected an approaching storm, and I really needed a pee before it arrived.  Talk about good timing... I'd just finished at the first fire hydrant when the thunder started.  Two hydrants, a lamppost, a tree and two bushes later and the rain started.  It was amazing, in a scary, hide in the closet, cover your ears, close your eyes and kiss your arse goodbye kinda way.  I thought last week's storm was a biggie, this was the mother of the biggie.  Some local folks across town had a lucky escape when a tree crashed through their apartment building.  Luckily it fell through the stairwell so there were no serious injuries.  A house was also crushed by a tree and God clearly has a sense of humour as a church roof collapsed and, just to balance things up, the roof of a pub was ripped off.  Amazingly there were no serious injuries but plenty of cleaning up to be done.

I was brave enough to take a bit of video from behind closed doors.  Turn the sound up and wait...

"Bing, bong.  Clean up crew to the patio doors please, clean up crew to the doors."

Boy am I looking forward to getting back to the benign British weather, two tornado warnings in one day is two too many in my book.  

Wildlife update

Another first for at the weekend... I saw a humming bird.  Being geriatric (see previous post) I wasn't quick enough to get a photo of it but my beady little eyes spotted the little fella.  They are so cool.  I've lived here for over a year now and didn't realise they lived this far north.  Not as cool as a hummingbird but I did get a shot of a hummingbird clearwing moth.

 

Reflections

Out and about over the weekend I came across a memorial to the victims of the Beltway sniper.  I vaguely remember it on English TV when I was puppy but he was known as the DC sniper - I never realised it happened so near where I am or that so many people lost their lives.  It's a sad reflection of the times we live in and a reminder that we never know what is around the corner; personally I'm hoping it will be a massive lottery win!

Vets

I've taken an instant dislike to my new vet.  Why? I hear you ask... because she called me geriatric!  So I've got a few grey hairs, and maybe a touch of arthritis and my hearing isn't as good as it used to be and my eyesight is going a bit but geriatric - I'm insulted.  What's wrong with mature, or distinguished, or middle aged, getting on a bit or even elderly?  I got my revenge though.  I looked at her with my big brown puppy dog eyes, head slightly tilted to the right, ears slightly pricked in curiosity.... then peed on her floor!  Geriatric indeed.  Oh and if you were wondering, my physical confirmed I'm as fit as five year old.

Itchy and scratchy sitting on the sofa is driving me nuts.  All I can hear is scratch, scratch, scratch.  If it was me scratching like that she'd have me in the bath then covered in flea powder.  If she doesn't stop soon I'm going to duct tape oven gloves to her hands when she's asleep.

DC Nights

I saw a whole new side to Washington DC at the weekend... DC at night, it's rather nice.  All the monuments are illuminated and look a bit different to in daylight.  It was a bit cooler as well which was nice.  I didn't get to see all the monuments this time but I did stop by the Korean War memorial for the first time.  I couldn't help but smile when I overheard an American woman asking 'why did we fight the Korean war?"  Even I know it was so they could make the TV series M.A.S.H!

My human has been moaning ever since we got back.  She got bitten by something and both her arms have swollen up, are bright red and are giving off more heat than the centre of the sun.  She looks like Popeye with sunburn but the way she's been going on you'd think she'd been bitten by a shark or something.  She spent all last night scratching like a cat with fleas... she's driving me nuts.  I've tried my best to administer the healing lick of Ben but gave up after becoming dehydrated due to loss of slobber.  She's currently sat on the sofa with ice cold towels wrapped around her arms... very fetching indeed.

Extreme weather

Just when I thought it was safe to come out of the closet.... another storm hits.  Given the blisteringly hot weather of late it wasn't a surprise we were going to get a storm but I wasn't expecting one quite so violent.  Thankfully it was short lived one but it didn't half cause some damage.  It must have been scary because this morning I passed two cars that were still hiding under trees, nice to see I wasn't the only one hiding from it.  Every severe thunder cloud has a silver lining though, my human got the day off as her work didn't have power.  We were lucky as we only lost power for a few minutes, there are still thousands of people without it more than 24 hours later.  Luckily the storm brought cooler temperatures, well I say cooler, I guess it's all relative as 90 degrees probably isn't that cool to a Brit.  My human displayed remarkable bravery stupidity and shot a bit of video from the safety of the apartment.  I'm not sure if the shaking is due to poor technical ability or nerves, either way I think you get the idea of how intense it was.  Note: I had to mute the sound due to the prolific cussing and swearing from my human, she really doesn't like storms.

Feeling hot, hot, hot

Oh boy what a hot weekend.  It's been boiling for days now, far too hot for a black-furred quadruped to enjoy himself but boredom got the better of me and I just had to get out and about.  I headed to the calm waters of the C&O canal down near the Potomac river.  Ok so it wasn't any cooler and despite the warnings of dangerous heat and rabid animals I did manage a nice stroll along the towpath and a little dip but don't tell anybody that as it's not allowed.  If I thought I was hot spare a thought for the mules that were pulling the boat along.  I know my nose is like a million times more sensitive than a human one but it didn't need my supersensitive sniffer to figure out working mules in 105 degree heat equals a monumental whiff.  Poor guys, surely there's laws to stop the exploitation of animals in this country isn't there?

  

Wake Up Call

OK, that's enough excitement for one dog this year.  First it's snowmeggedon; tornado warnings and violent storms that set buildings on fire; gun men walking around petrol stations; record temperatures and now an earthquake wakens me from my dreams.

It was the weirdest thing I've ever experienced.  My apartment building shook and groaned quite a bit but the sound... well I didn't expect sound.  It was like a huge train rumbling down the street.  See look Gaithersburg, that's where I live.

Record breaker

First it was record snowfall and the coldest temperatures since the ice age.... now it's hotter than the centre of the sun, well the tarmac roads feel like it by late afternoon.   Morning walks are just about tolerable but the after work walk is now down to a slow plod around the block.  I don't even mind wearing the wet neckerchief any more, in fact loads of people have stopped to admire it.  I have a carefully worked out route with as much grass to walk on as possible.  If it gets any hotter I'm going to have to get flip flops to protect my paws.  Thankfully my human is sensible enough not to shave my fur off.  I met a shaved golden retriever the other day... oh the indignity of it.  His owner said he struggled to get the dog out of the house.  I don't blame him, I wouldn't want to walk the streets naked either.  

Not surprisingly I haven't done much recently.  We can't go anywhere in the car as I would cook in about 2 minutes if left alone.  Not that my human would do that but now and again she needs to pee and you humans aren't as evolved as us canines so have to use restrooms which, oddly enough, dogs aren't allowed in, unless of course it's a 'seeing eye dog' although how they can help a human pee is beyond me.