When two out of three dogs came back inside this morning, I didn’t think much about it. For a while. But after patiently waiting for Bud (who we probably should have named “Bart”) to turn up, I decided to step outside and have a look. Sure enough, there he was, patiently waiting – OUTSIDE the gate. It’s been a while (a couple of years, I think) since he made a break for it so I was kind of hoping he’d outgrown that tendency, but once I got him inside I realized what he must have been up to. Mainly, chasing a skunk.

I don’t think he took a full shot, but he got enough to make the bedroom (and my hands, since I of course pet him) stink. And probably the rest of the house, too, though by then I was desensitized to it. Should smell great walking into the house when we get back home today.

Of course the first thing I need to do is go walk the fence perimeter and see if I can figure out where he got out. It was too dark this morning to see anything. Thank goodness it’s supposed to be warm today, at least.

If only things only literally stunk, it wouldn’t be so bad. After all, I’m sure everybody’s got a favorite skunk-smell mitigation recipe, which, if it doesn’t work, at least give you something to do while you get used to the smell. Unfortunately, there’s no magic elixir that will take the stink off this country while he-who-shall-not-be-named is President. I mean, thinks weren’t smelling all that rosy BT.

But now, well, let’s just say it looks like I picked a bad year to quit drinking.

Having had enough of Drumpf stories for one week a lifetime, I’m turning my attention to this feel-good story about a mother and her puppies rescued from death row in Texas. We get a lot of refugee puppies from Texas up here (pro-life state that it is), and the batch in this story were brought up to the same rescue – Helping Hounds – where two of our varmints came from exactly five years ago today (not coincidentally, both they and Fritzi were rescued from Southern states as well. Like humans, I guess they don’t go for that birth control stuff, but once they’re born, they’re on their own).

To celebrate, I finally got eyeglasses to replace the half-dozen or so pairs that they inflicted destruction upon a pair at a time (most completed destroyed, though I’ve been able to wear a chewed-up and pieced together – with electrical tape, vinyl tubing, and coat hangers – pair for driving and watching teevee) within the first six months or so of their arrival. I finally lost the last, best pair I had left and had no option other than to bite the bullet and get another pair (free exam and glasses thanks to the godless union benefits I have). I could’ve gotten a free pair every year, but at first I figures there was no point until the puppies grew out of their chewing phase, and then it was just pure laziness and my disdain for leaving the house unless absolutely necessary. Now that I have a prescription, I also ordered a couple of cheapo pairs online – just in case the pooches redevelop a hankering for spectacles.

Mother Nature (that bitch) also decided to celebrate by dropping about two feet of snow on my house during the early-morning hours on Friday (which we weren’t actually supposed to get). That made for a very early bout of snow plowing, followed by a somewhat treacherous drive in to work. A wonderful way to end the week. After a bit of a respite, they’re telling up to expect another storm today and overnight into tomorrow, though the amount and type of precipitation are still up in the air. They say it’ll be rain, then ice, then snow, but the exact proportions are up in the air (so to speak). If it’s mostly snow, we’re looking at 14″ or so. Or, Syracuse is. We typically get more than that out in my neck of the woods. What a difference 20 miles or so makes.

Right now, there appears to be some light, wet snow falling and it’s relatively warm out. I’m trying to decide if I should go out to the grocery store (to get what I managed to forget at Costco yesterday), or just say the hell with it and stay inside all day. I guess I’d better hurry up and decide.