A Hotel of My Own

I was reading a Phoenix Magazine a couple of months ago and I saw an ad for a hotel that really interested me.  It advertised a room specifically for dogs.  Actually, it was a separate cottage, just for dogs.  It was in someplace called Cottonwood, Arizona.  I've never heard Mom or Dad mention Cottonwood so I didn't know where it was.  But I knew they were looking for places to go that we had never been, so I put this hotel on the family calendar.  I entered it on a day in October and just said, "Check out Tavern Hotel in Cottonwood."

Dad saw it on the calendar and thought Mom had put it on because she wanted to go there.  So he went ahead and made a reservation and then told Mom about it.  He even found the Dog Cottage and that was the cottage we reserved.  He did tell me that I would have to loose 15 pounds because only 50 pound dogs could stay there.  That's kind of discriminatory, I think.  What are we big muscular dogs supposed to do?  Sleep in the car?

Well we got in the car one day and headed to this Cottonwood.  Before we made the turn off the 17 (in Phoenix we call the streets "The 17", which is wierd, and someday remind me to tell you why they do that.  But I'm not supposed to digress, so back to my story), we tried to stop in Camp Verde to go to the Verde Brewery for lunch.  When we couldn't find it, Mom stopped and asked someone for directions.  We tried again.  This time we found it.  One look at it and Dad nixed it.  It didn't look like his kind of restaurant, I think.  It smelled good to me, but we went on to Cottonwood.

We found the Tavern Hotel with no trouble and then we went to the Dog Cottage. This was heaven.  The bed was big enough that there was even room for Mom and Dad on it as long as they promised not to take up TOO much room.

But the outside was something else again.  I had my own backyard bathroom.  (Not that I would ever go anywhere near my own bedroom, but I thought it was a nice touch anyway.

I explored all around the place.  We had a nice front door with the address so we wouldn't get lost.  

Then there was a corridor on the side of the back.  I still don't know what it was for, but it was fun to explore.

After that we went to get the lunch we missed out on at Camp Verde.  I got my usual place under the table.  But I don't mind.  As long as I get to go to the restaurant with Mom and Dad, I'm happy.

And I must say.  I really enjoyed staying at the Dog Hotel.  I hope we do it again soon.

Hope you have a nice hotel that caters to you!

Love, G

Secrets

I was looking through Mom's emails the other day.  I found one that she forgot to open and it had a picture of me.  I decided to pull it off her emails before she saw it.  It was a picture of me and my friends Roxie and Boss.  Here it is:

Roxie is the yellow lab.  Boss is the black lab.  And I'm the cute one in the back.  

We usually play on the green spot over on Rusty Spur.  Most of the time, Jack is with us.  Jack is 8 years old and he is Roxie and Boss's brother.  He likes to throw a ball for the three of us and Boss and I usually get it.  Sometimes, though, he throws it right to Roxie so she doesn't feel left out.  She's kind of a prima donna.  She doesn't like to get in the fray when Boss and I tussle for the ball.  Oh, but I'm digressing again.

One day, Mom and Dad had to go somewhere and Mrs. Jan couldn't sit for me.  So they got another dog sitter.  Her name is Ellen.  Just like my Mom's name.  In fact there must be a lot of Ellens around here.  Do you remember my Mom's friend?  Her name was Ellen, too.  How do they tell them apart?  I don't know any other Guinnesses.  

Anyway, this Ellen, the dog sitter, was also sitting for Boss and Roxie.  She decided that after we all played, we should go and play at Roxie and Boss's house 'cuz they live right next to the green spot.  

That was fine with me.  I always wanted to see Roxie and Boss's house.  I can hear them having fun in their swimming pool sometimes when I go for a walk from my house.  Their pool is right across the street from my house, but you can't see the pool because it's behind their back wall.  But they always sound like they are having fun.

See, that's Boss's house where the arrow is.  I'm standing on my driveway taking the picture.  The green spot is on the other side of their house.

We went into the house and Boss took me back to the pool.  He jumped right in.  I'm not that big on swimming, but I did get on the stairs and get my feet wet.  Roxie just ignored us as usual.  

When we Boss and I came back in, Ellen-the-dog-sitter took a picture of all three of us.  You can even see the wet footprints on the floor from Boss still being wet from the pool.  I hope Ellen-the-dog-sitter cleaned it up before Jack and his Mom and Dad came home.  I wouldn't want them to be mad at me and Boss.

I don't know if Mom would be mad that I went into Boss and Roxie's house, but just in case, I think I'm not going to tell her about it.  On the other hand, maybe I'll just save it and show it to her when it gets hot again and I want to convince her to get me a pool like Roxie and Boss have.  

A pool would be fun.  Mom was ALMOST going to get me a little pool like they have in the dog park in St. Louis.  But Dad says it would attract mosquitoes.  I don't want to attract mosquitoes.  Lots of Arizona people have gotten sick from mosquitoes.  

But how come Boss and Roxie don't get sick from mosquitoes with their pool?

Life is a mystery.  

Hope you have a pool and don't get bitten by mosquitoes!

Love, G

Uh Oh!

Everytime I think I'm doing good, I goof up.

So one day last week, Mom and Dad went out to work out or something.  I got my usual Frozen Yogurt bone and that was really good.  Nothin' like melting frozen yogurt on my delicate tongue to tantalize the taste buds and soothe my anxieties.  

Unfortunately, I usually finish a Frozen Yogurt bone in about 18 seconds.  So if Mom and Dad go to work out, that leaves about 4580 seconds before they get home.  Sometimes I just sleep.  But sometimes I try to be helpful.

So this day, I wandered in the kitchen to see if there was anything I could do to be helpful.  I saw that Mom had moved her computer to the kitchen table.  I know she does that so she can work while she and Dad watch those sports shows.  You know, baseball, basketball, tennis, football, yada yada yada.  Not for me.  But each to his own.

So I figured she must have been working while watching that Tennis Tournament she likes, you know the one they show from New York?  The US Open or some such thing.  That means that she was probably watching more tennis than she was working.  And that means she needed some help getting her work done.  So  I hopped up on the table to see if there was something I could help with.

BOOM!  Something very hard flew off the table and crashed on the floor.  I bolted!  I had no idea what it was, but I wasn't going to get anywhere near it.  I made my way back to the bedroom and hid my head under my blanket until I heard them come home. 

Unfortunately, there was apparently some evidence of my sojourn onto the kitchen table.  

Mom collected the evidence and presented it to me.  She didn't yell, but I know she wasn't happy.  I tried to look apologetic.  But I really didn't know what I was sorry for.  The nasty noise?

I probably will stay away from the kitchen table.  I'm not one for big noises, no matter what causes them.  I do thank Mom for one thing, though.  She never told Dad.  For that I am very, very thankful.

Hope you don't get BOOMed when you try to do something helpful.

Love,

G

The Kids Are Back In School

Which means ..... there are lots and lots and lots of little tigers in the library.  Yay!

So Mom and me (I mean, Mom and I) went to Mustang Library last Thursday.  I don't know why they call it "Mustang" library.  There aren't any Mustangs at the library.  They might as well call it Guinness Library.  At least they have a Guinness there on Thursdays.  (Hee hee.  I don't think they will change the name of the library just for me.  But it would be fun.)  

Even before we sat down, they were coming over to see me.  I'm a pretty popular attraction at the library.  They even have a sign up front that says, "Come read to Guinness at 3:30 today!"  Mom maybe needs to get them a bigger picture, though.  There's a huge picture of some dog I don't even know in the middle, and my picture is down on the bottom corner.  That's just not right.  I should be the big picture.  And that's not even one of my kids.  I need a do-over!  Someone as popular as me should have his own advertisement.  I'm going to have a talk with the Library Lady when I see her today.

So anyway, I got to work right away.  Mom put down my Gabriel's Angel's blanket.  It's real soft so the kids can be comfortable.  I know I have to be quiet and not move too much when they read to me.  Sometimes I help them with a word or two that they might not know.

The kids read all sorts of books to me this time.  One of them was kind of odd.  It was about an Exclamation Mark.  The exclamation mark didn't know what it was supposed to do.  It tried to be a comma and then a question mark and then a period.  After awhile it got really upset and yelled at all the other punctuation marks.  So then it knew what it was supposed to do.  (I should get an award for listening to these dumb books.  But Mom says that the kid who read that one learned a bunch of words that he didn't know before.  She said he was getting them the first time around by the end of the book.  She says that's what progress looks like.  Hmmph!)

While we had a little quiet time, a nice old man came by.  He had a cane and Mom told him to sit down with us in one of the chairs.  (Mom usually sits in a chair.  She doesn't like sitting on the floor much.  She says she's not as flexible as me.  She's right.  There aren't many dogs that can sit like I do, let alone humans.

Uh, oh, I'm digressing again.  Back to the old man and the cane.  He said he just wanted to give me a pet.  He said it made him smile.  I said it made me smile to make him smile.  He was a really nice man.  I liked him very much.  He talked to Mom while another little one read my "World According to Guinness" book to me. You remember that book:

I not only remember it, but by now I can say it backward and forward.  I told Mom she needs to make another one.  

We had lots of tiny tots here today, too.  Mary looked to be about 3.  She sat down when Angelina read me her book.  Then she got up and followed Angelina.  Mom had to tell her mother to go get her back.  I thought it was kind of cute.

One of the older kids who hates to read came to see me again.  He still hates to read.  He had been really improving last year before school let out.  I haven't seen him since and I think he's regressed a little.  He just needs to come see me whenever I'm around.  He'll get better again.

It was really good to get back in the groove.  

Mom says to say she's reading a book just now that she doesn't like much.  She says that's because it's just a mystery and not a historic novel.  But if you like mysteries with surprise endings, you might like For the Sake of Elena, by Elizabeth George.    

Hope you had a good Labor Day Weekend.  We didn't labor at all! (Hee hee.)

Love, G   

Davy Crocket's Got Nuthin' on Me!

I looked up to see who was the greatest Hunter ever.  And it was Davy Crocket.  (I'm guessing Daniel Boone's relatives might object, but then, they don't read my blog.)  Anyway, I think I'm just as good as Davy Crocket.  He hunted bear.  Anyone can hunt bear.  Me - I hunt Javelinas.

Mom likes to say, "He's on the track of Heffalumps."  I didn't know what a Heffalump was, but Mom says it was a big, scary animal in Winnie the Pooh.  She said it was the "biggest threat the Hundred Acre Wood ever faced:  Humongous, horrendous horrifying, huggable, Heffalumps."  So, yeah, maybe that's what I am doing.  I'm tracking the Heffalumps of Mohawk Lane.

We walk through the neighborhood and I can smell where they've been.  You see, I've run into at least 10 of the beasts.  So I know what they smell like.  And I have the very best sense of smell.  In fact, I have the most excellent sense of smell of anyone in the whole world ever.  (There is some guy on TV who says things like that, so I can too.!)

Yesterday, I smelled the Heffalump.  And then we saw his footprints.  Mom took a picture so she could prove to Dad that I did really track down the Heffalump.  

See those hoof tracks?  That's the Heffalump (I mean Javelina.  Mom has me so confused.)

Sometimes, when we go out in the afternoon (that's when they roam around) I stop and stare because I think I can smell them near.  Mom gets nervous then, I can tell.  She doesn't really want to run into one of them again.  They're not supposed to be aggressive if you leave them an exit, but if they did come after us --- they have really, really, really long sharp teeth.  We saw them when Mom did the Arizona Wildlife Project for my kids in the elementary school.  Those were some awful front teeth!

But I'm pretty good at warning Mom when they're close by.  My excellent sense of smell helps in that.  Just the other day, we went to the mail box, and I said, Mom, you better look around the side of the boxes.  And sure enough.  There was my HeffalumpJavelina.  But he hid his head before Mom could snap his picture.

I'm good at finding all sorts of denizens of the desert.  (Do you like that word?  Denizen.  I saw it when I was looking for what this was:

 This little guy (well he  wasn't so little, he was as big as Mom's hand) crossed the walking path right in front of us.  I would have stepped on him, but Mom grabbed my collar and yanked me back.  We all watched as he made his way across the path and on to wherever he was going.  Mom and me (that's not right, is it?).  Mom and I looked him up and we found that he was a male Desert Tarantula and not to be worried about 'cuz he was pretty harmless.  He was apparently searching for a mate.  That's pretty much all the males do, and then they all die by October.  How sad is that?    

So there you have my latest hunting episodes.  I bet Davy Crocket would be jealous of all the animals I've tracked down in the desert.  But then, he probably doesn't really care since he's not around anymore.  

But that leaves me as the greatest hunter on Mohawk Lane.  

Mom says I should stop sending these blogs because no one is going to want to come visit us ever.  But I know my Uncle and my Cousin are coming this weekend, and I bet they would LIKE to see my animal friends.

Please don't let our Denizens keep you away.  I love visitors.  

Love, G

Mom Read a Book

Which really shouldn't surprise me (or you) since Mom reads lots of books.  But this one was significant, because she said the character in the book reminded her of me.  

Now, I gotta tell you.  I thought she was going to say it was because the character was so good looking.  Or maybe he was really smart.  Or perhaps he wanted to be President of the United States of America.

But no.  She said the character was a gal.  And this gal was Neuro-A-Typical.  I had to ask her what that meant, so we both looked it up in Google.  It basically means someone who is not normal.

So what is normal?  I asked Mom.  She laughed and said that was a really, really good question; because in today's world, normal got thrown out the window.  I said I didn't see anything being thrown out the window:  Sometimes Mom says things I just don't understand at all.  But she said, that was one of the things that made Ellie (the character in the book) seem like me.  She says I take things literally and sometimes don't know when she's talking in Figures of Speech. 

She said normal in the book meant someone who did not have Asperger's Syndrome.  Ellie did.  But Ellie dealt with the world by making a list of rules to live by.  And that's what Mom said also made her think of me; because she says I live by some of those same rules.

She said, Rule 1 was:  Being Polite is always a good idea.  Well we all know that I'm as polite as they come.  This is me politely asking Mom to take me out.  

And this is me politely letting other puppies have the water before I do:

Another Rule is: Not everyone who is nice to you is your friend.  Mom says Ellie struggled with this rule.  She trusted everyone especially when they were nice to her.  I guess I do that sometimes, too.

I tried to make friends with the owl who came by to sit up in the rafters. I figured the old owl who tries to scare the birds away was harmless, so this owl must be too.  Mom said I should be very careful because owls can be mean.  That's too bad, because I know owls are my Mom's favorite bird.  It must have been hard for her to tell me not to try and play with the owl.

Another way Ellie and I are alike, Mom said, is that sometimes Ellie just didn't feel like she fit in with the rest of the world.  Sometimes when we go to the dog park, I have a hard time playing with other dogs.  They sometimes just ignore me and play with their own friends.  

And sometimes I just don't fit in because I don't fit. (Tee hee!) 

And finally, Mom says Ellie had to learn a lot of things by just making mistakes.  I guess I resemble that a lot.  Remember this mistake?

I haven't had a golf ball for a snack in a very long time.  I guess I learned that lesson.

Mom says you might like "The Seven Rules of Elvira Carr" by Frances Maynard.  She says it was a poignant and hopeful story.  I like that word.  Maybe since I'm like Ellie Carr, I am poignant, too?

Or maybe not.

Love, G

Guinness for President

First, I have to apologize that we missed a blogpost.  Mom's been really busy lately and I was helping her.  But we're back now.  

I don't know if you have been watching the news.  Especially the political stuff. I think it's all just atrocious.  (Do you like that word?  I found it while I was reading the editorial page the other day.)  People are mean to each other.  They send Tweets and Twits and who knows what else calling names and saying things my Mom would never let me say.  

No one can get anything done when it's needed.  There are a bunch of poor people in Mexico who need our help, but we can't figure out how to help them.  I'd bet I could figure it out.  There were a bunch of poor little puppies in foster care with me and we all managed to find a good home.  

I know there are a lot of Democrats who are running for president who have lots of ideas.  But someone has to figure out how we can all play together in the sandbox without throwing sand.  That's the one I want for President.

So I thought about that for a long time.  I'm really good about getting puppies to play together.  There was that time we were in the Dog Park in Clayton.  I was all by myself in the Big Dog part.  Then another big dog came, but his owner took him to the Small Dog part.  I was disappointed.  So Mom went and asked if they wouldn't come over and join us.  They said their dog was not good with other dogs.  Mom said, "Let's just try it.  Guinness here is like the Geneva Convention.  He always manages to get dogs to play well together."

So they came over.  We got to know each other at first with Sparky's (that was his name) owners holding on to his leash.  I went very slowly.  I let him sniff me.  I sniffed in his ears.  (Lots of dogs like that.)  In about 1 minute, he and I were playing.  I took him to my swimming pool and showed him how to get in and we both were in the pool together.  

That wasn't hard.

I always play fair, too.  Sometimes when we play, I get on top and sometimes I let the other guy get on top.  That's only fair.

I never push my way in front of another dog.  I wait my turn.  There's always more water no matter who gets to drink first.

I check on my neighbors regularly.  I want to be sure that they are doing well.  Especially my older neighbors, 'cuz bad things could happen to them if I don't take care of them.

I play with all the dogs.  I don't care what color they are.  They are all pretty in their own ways.  (Maybe not as pretty as me, but then no puppy is a good looking as me.  It can't be helped.)

I share my toys with all my friends.  If we tear up my toy, I know where I can find a new one.  What good is having a toy if you can't get everyone to play with you.

I don't care if my friend has a disability.  My three legged friend has more gumption than most four or two legged animals!

I especially make sure I take care of my little friends.  I wouldn't want to see them crushed by one of us big dogs.  When they're with me, they know they're protected.

I always keep up on the latest news and happenings.  I read a lot, so I know what's going on.  That's the only way to understand what's going on; you have to get opinions from lots of people in the know.

I guess what I'm trying to tell you, is that it's time for me to throw my hat in the ring.  I'd make the best President of the United States of America, so please vote for me!

Love and togetherness!,  G