Day 68 and 69: Dog Days of Summer



Dreaded Japanese Beetle

and

The Hooters I prefer.



Yesterday I noticed some ugly bugs on my vegetables, most noticeably on the bean and cabbage leaves.  Japanese Beetles, I am told, have arrived in Minneapolis and have voracious appetites.  They have attacked the rose garden by Lake Harriet, so I guess my poor vegetables have illustrious company.    Meanwhile, both Gracie and I are running at diminished capacity thanks to the oppressive humidity.  We should live in some cool, dry place like San Francisco (or Oakland)...operating a dog wash?  Sounds appealing to me.  So Yesterday we biked to the grocery store.  Day before yesterday, we had dinner at the bowling alley where we saw part of the Twins game with a little bit more elbow room than we have at the stadium and, happily, air conditioning that the stadium does not offer.  Earlier that day, I watched a YouTube video about a veteran with a service dog who was denied entrance to a Hooters (exactly where in the country, I'm not sure).  Since I'm already boycotting Hooters on general principle relating to exploitation of women, I guess I cannot double boycott them; however, I would if I could.  I don't like to tell others what to do, but really?  Deny access?  Isn't access a law?  Apparently, Hooters does not think so.  The manager said the vet's dog was too small and not of the right breed to actually be a service dog...like he was qualified to judge such thing.  Plus the man had all four of his limbs and was walking.  The manager decided that this meant he didn't need a service dog.  Well, the outcome of all this should be interesting.  I also watched a YouTube about a woman with a service rat that can sense when the muscles in her neck are about to spasm and lets her know by licking her neck.  This enables her take medication that prevents the problem before it become debilitating.  Amazing!  However, she too is experiencing access issues undoubtedly related to society's prejudice against rats.  Gracie and I don't like that situation either.  Well, freedom isn't free.  We have to keep fighting for it, even when the humidity is at terribly uncomfortable levels, even when the government is proving dysfunctional, and even when the Japanese Beetles arrive to steal the fruits of our summer labor.  Maybe those beetle traps actually work.  Maybe.  It's worth a try.

Day 67: The Trim

I have started reading Until Tuesday, a wonderful book about a veteran's healing process facilitated by his service dog Tuesday.  Early in the book, Luis Carlos Montalvan describes trimming the hair on Tuesday's feet, part of the way he takes care of Tuesday's overall grooming.  Inspired, I decided to trim the hair on Gracie's feet too.  I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner.  It was so easy, and Gracie didn't  mind...not too much.  Of course now she is happy to look good as this short video reveals...

Day 66: Saved

Gracie and I have a smoke detector that we use for practice, an extra one we found in a drawer when Martha was here back in May.  I keep it by my bed and when I push the button, Gracie jumps up on me.  Sometimes, I wait until I hear her snoring in her little bed beside me and then set it off.  She wakes immediately and leaps on me.  She came with this skill, and we were told to practice this daily.  I have to confess that while we practice regularly, lately our practice has not been daily.  We do some sort of practice of her skills every day but not every one.  This is the one though that she takes most seriously, possibly, I have thought, because the sound for those who can hear it is so awful.  I can't hear it; but when I put the thing right up to my ear, it makes my ear hurt...a lot. 

My hero!

This morning, we got up as usual and took our walk.  We ate breakfast and then moved to the sunroom where I have my computer.  I have started working on organizing my classes for fall and was totally absorbed in looking for errors in some printed text on the machine when Gracie galloped into the room and jumped at me (the touch).  I was surprized because I thought she was snoozing on the couch behind me.  Her feet were wet from our morning walk, and she was very excited.  "What?" I said.  She jumped away again and then came back.   I was a bit resistent because, after all, I was searching for errors in text.  "Okay," I said.  "Show me."  She took off and I followed her into the kitchen where I smelled burnt toast.  Sheepishly, Bruce admitted that he had burned his toast and set off the smoke detector on the ceiling in the hallway outside the kitchen.  Gracie had come to warn me! 

"She just saved your life," Bruce said.

And the amazing thing about it is that our smoke detector--the one we practice with--doesn't sound like the one in the hall.  Everyone kept telling me this.  "She won't know what that sound is," they said.  But she did.  Not only that, she came and got me instead of jumping up on the bed.  Can there be a smarter dog anywhere?  I can't imagine it.  She was very proud of herself too.  So proud that when we then went out for another short walk to celebrate, she immediately located the chicken bone she has been trying to snap up for over a week.  I almost let her have it because, after all, how smart is it to remember each time just where I tossed the darn thing after talking it away from her?  But that would be bad for her, so, of course, I took it and tossed it again. 

Day 65: Knowing You the Way I Do...

One of the most comforting aspects to life with Gracie for me is the growing realization that communication of a profound nature is possible without speech.  Through eyes, hands, paws, wagging tails, and the sense that we know what's coming next we have already built trust that I now cannot imagine living without.  Because of my brand of hearing loss, following spoken conversation is a tremendous amount of very tiring work.  Having companionship that doesn't require that work is truly a gift.  Being constantly with the dog is a required to achieve that level of understanding--to create that bond.  Thank you to whomever made it possible for service animals to go everywhere: stores, restaurants, buses, airplanes, trains, baseball games, movies...everywhere.  And, of course, thank you to IHDI for pairing me with amazing Gracie.

Day 64: Fleas and Ticks

...actually, avoiding them.  Today I applied flea and tick treatment to protect Gracie for the third time.  Finding the pink skin on her upper back is a challenge, even after all the shedding she's been doing.  My first thought after getting the stuff applied was here goes the post-bath fluffiness, which, of course, was doomed to not last from the beginning.  Once again, though, Gracie's thick coat simply adapted.  No fleas and/or ticks will be booking passage on my friend Gracie for another month.

Day 63: Riding the City Bus

For the second time, Gracie and I (and Bruce) took the city bus downtown to the Twins game.  It was an afternoon game that started a little after three, so we went to the nearest bus stop a little before 2.  The forecast was for another hot, humid day.   In addition, the Minneapolis Aquatennial had downtown activities planned that could potentially increase the downtown traffic.  We usually like to take the bike route to day games; however, thunderstorms were in the forecast for later in the day.



Hot but not as hot as predicted!



The bus was late by five to ten minutes.  By the fifth or so stop, it seemed to be full.  Fortunately, I was able to sit right behind the driver with fluffy, clean Gracie on my lap.  Even though the bus "seemed" full, more and more people were able to squeeze on.  I suppose something like the settling of cereal in a cereal box was the principle at work here.  At one point, when the bus seemed ready to burst apart at the seams, a man with a huge suitcase on wheels and a vacuum cleaner asked the driver to put down the accessibility ramp. I'd never seen this done before.  The seat right behind the driver provided a great view.   The ramp slides out from the bottom step.  A flap drops down at the end.  The man stepped on, pulling his suitcase and vacuum on next to him.  Then the driver raises the platform like an elevator until it is level with the interior bus floor.  Even more amazing, however, was the man who gave up his seat for the vacuum cleaner guy and even helped get the guy's stuff out the aisle for him.    Most of the crowd got off when we did, apparently on their way to the game as well.  Gracie was most amazing of all.  She rode quietly, motionless except for an occasional turn of her head.

When we got to the stadium, we stopped at what is now Gracie's restroom--a grassy knoll surrounded by benches--and she "hurried up."  She has to jump up on a bench to reach the raised grassy area.  Thankfully, she is not at all shy about relieving herself in front of an audience. Because the game started a bit late, we were still at the game when it was time for Gracie to eat.  I had a few dog biscuits in my pocket, which seemed to tide her over.  I could easily have just brought her dinner to the game since she likes eating it out of my hand anyway (not all strange habits are bad!)  Should the situation occur again, I will do just that.  Making sure she is comfortable is sensible and not, as some may percieve it to be, "pampering" her.  And anyway, what is wrong with pampering her?  I think we all need to out the inner Puritan in us and get over the idea that helping others or thinking of the comfort of others is something to avoid because it encourages them to be weak or, worse yet, interferes with God's plan for their suffering.  Please!

After the game, Gracie navigated the crowd inside and outside the stadium like a pro.  We stopped at the grassy knoll for a quick "hurry up," which she again did with her typical grace and speed.  As an aside, back when I was teaching college composition at Normandale Community College, I was assigned an office across from the offices of several instructors from the nursing program.  Posted on the door of one was a list called something like "The 10 Rules for Living Happily."  One of the rules was this: "Never pass up the opportunity to go to the bathroom."  The other nine rules escape me.  That one stuck because it seemed odd at first but then, as I thought about it, made sense.  And so simple to follow too.  Gracie and I live by it.

The bus ride home was even more crowded than the ride down and the bus was bigger too.  Thanks to Bruce's fancy footwork, we were able to be at the just the right place to be among the first to board at our hugely populated stop.  Consequently, we again got a seat in front.  Gracie settled on my lap, and the air conditioning on the bus made having an extremely furry and warm dog on my lap pleasant.

The bigger the challenges we tackle, the more amazing Gracie shows herself to be.  Practice, practice, practice!  Maybe that was one of the ten rules too: "When you need to do something well, don't just worry about it, practice."  If it wasn't a rule for living happily, it would make a good one.

Day 62: Amazing Day!

Maybe it's just because I feel better after being sick.  Whatever the reason, though, today has been an amazing day.  First of all, we took our usual early morning walk during which Gracie spotted a squirrel, perked up, but didn't lunge at it.  Good dog!  When we got home, I put dog food in Gracie's bowl, set it down by her water dish, and went on to make myself some coffee.  I thought she would wait for me before eating, and she did shoot me a couple questioning looks.  "I'll be right there," I told her.  I poured some water over the coffee grounds in the filter; then I turned around to get a coffee cup.  Gracie was at her bowl eating!  She didn't stop either until all the food was gone.  Good dog!

Gracie in the tub at Bubbly Paws.

Our planned trip to Bubbly Paws for a dog wash just had to be a success coming on top of these seemingly major breakthroughs (time will tell whether they are permanent or merely anomalies).  I personally think a self-service dog wash is a stroke of genius.  We were met at the door by a friendly young woman in an apron who asked us if this was our first visit.  We said it was, and she pointed out the wall of aprons (for me) and said, "The tubs around back are better for smaller dogs." She told us to help ourselves to shampoo, rinse, and a toothbrush.  Toothbrushes are individually wrapped and self-pasting with a substance that looked like beef consomme.  I put on an apron, and Gracie hopped into the tub unassisted .  The sprayer was nicer than anything we have for ourselves (human selves) in our house, with several settings.  The water was warm to cool.  Gracie didn't love getting wet, but she didn't mind having shampoo massaged into the fur.  I was careful to get all the shampoo out.  This wasn't hard with the fantastic nozzle on the sprayer and with Gracie in the tub.  We tried the toothbrush.  It was no surprise that the chicken flavored paste was very interesting to Gracie.  The brush seemed a little stiff, though, so we cut that short.  I grabbed a couple towels and moved us on to the drying room.  I would like to have taken a picture there but had to use both hands to work the towel and the blower.  Gracie did not like the blower, but it did dry her quickly.  We decided to skip the final step that we saw other dogs getting: spritzed with spa perfume.  That was a bit over the top for us.  We did take a Milkbone for the ride home, though.

"Not so bad," says Gracie.  We won't be going back for six to eight weeks. Maybe she will have forgetton all about it by then.  Or maybe, if she does remember parts of it, those parts will be the chicken flavored toothpaste or the Milkbone dog treat or the great massage I gave her while she was all soaped up.  Maybe she'll be glad to be back.  Meanwhile, I'm thinking a dog wash like this might be a perfect retirement business...maybe in San Francisco!

Day 61: Cooler--Ahh!

Gracie and I woke up to cooler air.  What a relief.  Gracie was very hungry this morning.  Though her eating habits are a bit strange, she isn't a reluctant eater.  Eating up all she's given twice a day without stopping makes keeping her on a schedule so that she doesn't have accidents a lot easier.  So she ate, and then we took a long walk.  As we walked the familiar circle up into Edina and back, all the things I hadn't been doing because of the heat and because I'd been sick came bubbling up.  As soon as we got back, I made a list.  First on the list was garden maintenance.

Dog wash?  I guess so!

Vegetable gardens take daily maintenance, I think.  This is my first summer with one of the size of the one I have--not huge but big enough.  I hadn't realized how attached I would get to keeping it healthy until I was actually doing it.  I don't think taking off for two weeks to vacation somewhere--even if it were a different summer when other places were appealing and not just as hot or otherwise afflicted--would work out very well for a vegetable garden.  I'd have to find someone to fill in and would then worry if they were doing everything necessary to keep the garden from going bad.  Anyway, cutting back tomato plants and adding compost and reigning in the zucchini (not like I wasn't warned about zucchini--in fact, I suspect it was zucchini that grew up and over Sleeping Beauty's castle) and then fertilizing and then watering everything took longer than I thought it would when I made the list.  Not only that, but it left me dirty and little worn out.  Gracie, all fluffy from being brushed, napped in the shade while I worked on the garden and was--of course I'm guessing here--a bit disappointed when we headed inside for water instead of hopping right in the car and heading for the new do-it-yourself dog wash.

"First thing tomorrow," I promised.  So I redid the list: dog wash, mail package, co-op, gas.  Tomorrow I will tell you all about the dog wash called Bubbly Paws--a very interesting business concept that has sprung up below the apartments that border Wolff Park in our little first ring suburb of Minneapolis.  Gracie and I peeked in after the movie the other day but were on our way to have a salad at Panera Bread.  We thought it looked like the way to go, though, especially since IDHI advises that dogs only have a bath every 6 to 8 weeks in order to avoid dry skin.  Though she is really not terribly dirty, I'm hoping that a bath will help reduce some of the vast amounts of hair that Gracie has been shedding.  Her coat challenges even the epic Furminator! 

Day 60: Adaptable

Gracie and I had developed a routine of walking and eating and working with errands and other things mixed in.  But that routine was lost for two days while I wasn't feeling well.  The heat wave didn't help, of course.  The long and short of it is that for the past three days--it's still hot and I'm still moving slower than usual--Gracie hasn't been getting as much exercise.  She has quietly adapted to the change, however. 

Tomorrow the heat is supposed to ease up a little.  The humidty already seems a bit less extreme.  I plan to be back to my old self and am making a list of all the things I plan to get done.  Though I hope that we don't have another heat wave of this magnitude this summer and that, if we do, I don't get sick in the middle of it, I do feel more confident that Gracie will gracefully adjust to our ratched up schedule next month when the Fall Semester begins at the community college.

Day 58 and 59: Sick

I have had flu or have been suffering from heat exhaustion; the symptoms are the same.  Gracie has been very patient with my reduced capacity.  Hopefully tomorrow we will be back at full capacity.  Having the heat wave end would help. 

Day 57: Heat Wave, Day 2

The heat today is worse.  Gracie and I got up before the sun and took a long walk.  We saw lots of rabbits and the newspaper delivery people--what a hard job that is!  After Gracie ate, we sat on the damp deck and read the newspaper.  When it got too hot for us, we went back into the only air conditioned room in our old house (built in 1915 with radiators and so ducts for central air) and went back to sleep.  By the time we woke up again, the combination of heat and humidity was oppressive.  The weather forecast for Minneapolis is increasing heat and humidity through Tuesday with the overall heat wave lasting until the middle of next week. 

Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts do community college.

We were prepared to spend the majority of today as we have been spending the last couple days: reading and sleeping.  Fortunately, Bruce had another idea.  We went to the St. Louis Park Cinema and saw Larry Crowne, which is about a 50 something ex-Navy guy who gets let go from his clerking job in a big box store and decides that his best option is to attend community college.  Tom Hanks plays a Forrest Gump-like guy that everyone loves, including a twenty-something Latina with a flair for fashion who takes Larry under her wing.  Among other things, she gets him to untuck his pants and chain his billfold to his back pocket.  Larry is too nice to make a pass at this young classmate--if he had a daughter (though he doesn't), she could be the age of this girl--and instead develops a thing for his forty-something communication/speech teacher, played by Julia Roberts.  Unlike the pleasant, easy going Larry that everyone loves, the Robert's character is cynical and burned out.  Her biggest career goal is to have so few students in a section that she is able to drop the class.  Not surprisingly, the dean, or whatever he is, makes frequent visits to her class.  This dean (or VP of something) seems content with what she is doing as long as she is disaffected and boring.  As soon as she starts to get into her course and really engage with the students (just one over the limit of too few), his eyebrows go up.  Of course even though Roberts is actually in her forties, she is very attractive with her large mouth full of large teeth--the toothy grin--and her great legs that really look good in the short skirts and high heels she wears when she teaches.  (It made this community college instructor's feet hurt just to she her stride down the hall in those shoes that the movie makes a point of showing her put on as she gets out of her car in the school parking lot).  The  audience likes the character because we like Roberts.  On closer analysis, however, this character is a mess.  She is married to a terrible person who would even make a bad dog.  (Shouldn't she look bad for taking this fellow on in the first place?  What WAS she thinking?  Or maybe she wasn't thinking at all.)  This bad marriage has apparently been going on for quite a while too.  Roberts and her husband--the dad from Malcolm in the Middle, so you can image what he's like--bicker endlessly.  She seems to regard him in the same way she regards her class--with boredom and contempt.  When they have their final blow-up though (he tells her why he likes porn), Roberts immediately makes a pass at Larry...the same night even.  It seems she is not quite independent enough to spend more than ten or fifteen minutes without a "man" in her life.  After all the lame guy movies that are all the rage now (Hangover etc.), this Larry Crowne was refreshing in that the lead guy seems to have standards and to think before he acts.  Gosh darn, he's really nice too. It was a pleasant movie on a hot day.  Most interesting, however, were the stereotypes from big box store and its employees to the community college and its faculty and students that it uses--like advertisements or politicians do to streamline the message.  Like all stereotypes, the ones used here ring true enough for us to chuckle in recognition.  Or do they ring true?  Maybe we recognize them not because they are true but rather because we have been hammered over the head with them so much that we have come to accept them as true...or true enough...just as we accept the stereotypes in advertising and politics.  As Grover Norquist knows, if something is said often enough, people believe it: snap, crackle, pop--try to forget that one!  This movie made me want to watch Peter Sellers in Being There again.  I think there is a connection but I suspect this new version on an old theme has been dumbed down.  I brought Gracie's bathmat to the theater and after she gave up on being allowed to scout under the seats for spilled food, she proceeded to sleep through the film.  I'm left wondering if Gracie might have been a critic in some previous life.

Day 54: Too Humid

The torrential rains we had yesterday left us with air that is almost too thick to breathe.  Neither Gracie nor I tolerate humidity very well.  We did manage a short run early in the day but now we are just waiting for the haze to clear.  As soon as the sun comes out, we expect temperatures in the nineties and a heat index over 100!  What's a girl to do but rest up for it?

Day 53: Rain

Fortunately, Gracie and I mowed the front yard this morning before the rain started.  I clipped Gracie's leash to my belt and she walked up and down with me while I pushed our non-power mower.  I am also glad we tended to the garden yesterday afternoon, trimming and restaking plants.  The current downpour is of torrential proportions!

Now, having exercised--pushing a push mower is great exercise!--Gracie and I are content to do what we like best.  For Gracie, that is napping, and for me, that is reading.  I have so much I want to read before I have to go back to planning classes and grading student  work that getting it all read will be a challenge.  Today, I'm starting with Now You See It: how the brain science of attention will transfrom the way we live, work, and learn by Cathy N. Davidson, an English professor at Duke University.  The early pages of this interesting book hit on the subject of my own Day 52 post.  Davidson writes: "In the end, distraction is one of the best tools for innovation we have at our disposal--for changing out of one pattern of attention and beginning the process of learning new patterns.  Without distraction, without being forced into an awareness of disruption and difference....[w]e might think we're simply experiencing all the world there is.  We learn our patterns of attention so efficiently that we don't even know they are patterns."  Certainly, living with a creature with acute hearing--Gracie the hearing dog--has forced me to attend to some sources of sound that I have been missing...not all of them with regret I have to add.  At the same time, her presence is a distraction for some people.  I'm just starting the chapter of the book titled "Project Classroom Makeover," which should be very interesting.  I am also rereading The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman. In this novel classified as a young adult or children's book (very adult worthy, however, and there are two more books in the series should you become engrossed in the tale and want to read more), author Pullman has created a universe parallel to our own.  As one might expect, there are some similarities, but it is the differences that are the most interesting (distractions, Davidson would call them) because they help us reassess the shortcomings of our own seemingly less exciting world. 

For anyone wondering what living with a service animal might be like, The Golden Compass would make interesting reading because everyone in that world has a daemon (their soul in animal form) that is with them constantly and that others can clearly see.  The deamon can move away the person but both become nervous if the distance is too great or if separated too long. (Sounds like Gracie and me all ready.)  A child's daemon changes into different shapes as the child experientments with who he or she is.  At puberty, however, the daemon becomes fixed.  Servents have dogs for daemons...always.  Hmmmm.  One rather evil character in the story has a golden monkey that is definitely not of the Curious George variety.  When I first read this book, I wished for a daemon of my own.  Now, I have one...Gracie.  How can one creature be both a distraction and a comfort?  Though this sounds contradictory, that's just what Gracie is! 

Day 52: Changes

Life is a sea of change.  Some change is voluntary, and that sort of change is usually experienced as good or at least positive.  Some of the changes in our life, on the other hand, are involuntary.  Thankfully, a lot of that involuntary change--hearing loss, for example--happens so slowly that we don't notice it happening.  Lately, we seem to be bombarded by excessive amouints of change--partly due to technology and the profit that comes to that industry from rapid changes.  Do we really need Office 2010 or is this just Microsoft needing to sell us more product to fund the overcompensation of its executives?  We probably don't and wouldn't buy into it if the information technology people didn't need to foist it on us to justify their own jobs.  And so it goes.  It's no wonder then that so many of us suffer from change overload.  We want to keep our big cars, our gas lawn mowers, air-conditioning to keep our homes at 75 degrees in the summer and heart to keep our homes at 75 in the winter.  We want to stay young forever.  We don't want to change...and, quite unrealistically, we don't want others to change either.

Gracie and me enjoying the Japanese Peace Garden

As wonderful as Gracie is and as grateful as I am to have her, living with a hearing dog is a big change.  I chose that change, so for me, the change is positive.  Not easy and not without new responsiblities and challenges...but good.  I am not the only one who is changed, though, by the arrival of Gracie in my life.  My family and friends are also impacted.  Though the impact on them is to a lesser degree, for them this is involuntary change and therefore problematic in a different way.  First of all, they are confronted with Gracie.  Though she is a wonderful dog, she is still a dog.  Not everyone loves having a dog around, even a loveable dog like Gracie.  In addition, Gracie's presence reminds them that I don't hear well.  I have not heard well for a long time and have many strategies for dealing with that fact that let others off the hook for the most part. I have made it easy for them to forget that I am often like a non-native speaker in this regard.  

As the days go along and the novelty of my having a hearing dog is beginning to wear off--both for me and for those close to me--I am beginning to realize that this change that I have chosen is going to be too big a change for some people.  I will be seeing some friends less than I used to and will probably end up not staying friends at all with others.  While that is sad, it is part of the change, and I am prepared to accept that in exchange for having a constant friend and companion: Gracie.

Day 51: Strange Eating Habit

As previously mentioned, Gracie has the strange habit of avoiding her dog bowl and instead prefers to either be fed or to eat her food off the floor.  Today I captured this in a cell phone video.  The picture quality is not great.  Thumbs up to those who are able to act in and film their videos.  I'm finding this very difficult as, one might surmise, Gracie finds eating directly out of her bowl difficult.

Day 50: Rendevous

Gracie, the conference room cutie!

I would like to say "rendezvous with destiny," but that would be an exaggeration.  Yesterday I was invited to meet with a group designing an educational Web site that hopes to do what Wikipedia has done in reference and what Facebook as done in social networking.  Like all of us "older people," I love to give advice even when that advice is not asked for.  So, to actually be asked to give advice was a treat.  When they told me that they office next to the Twins stadium, I naturally thought riding my bike would be the best way to get there...not the fastest or even the easiest but surely the most pleasant.  Of course I would bring Gracie.  For a moment I considered telling these people that I travel with my service dog but thought better of it.  I would just go with Gracie.

Monday evening, Bruce and I looked over the area where the offices were.  From the street map, getting their from the baseball stadium looked easy.  But when we consulted Google Earth, we found ourselves on a street below the street.  The light rail tracks and the train tracks and all the exits to the parking lots around Target Center (where the basketball games are played) converge in the area creating a massive obstacle between Target Field and this company's offices.  MapQuest now has walking and biking directions in addition to driving directions.  Interestingly, the biking and walking directions were different.  I was to learn why.

Armed with a vague sense of where we were going, Gracie and I left shortly before noon in order to arrive at our appointment by 1:30 p.m.  As one who gets lost regularly and who, at the same time, likes to be punctual, I have learned to  give myself plenty of time.  In this way, I avoid panic when I inevitably get lost...as I did. 

Sure enough, I mixed up 5th Avenue with 5th Street and went several hot, city blocks past the stadium and away from our actual destination.  Because of this, we were very nearly right on time, give or take five minutes.  Again, lucky for us, today was a beautiful day in the 70s with ultra-low humidity.  The bike ride to and part way around Cedar Lake and then along the trail awash in wildflowers was splendid! We locked the bike and tailer to the iron fence of the neighboring bar.  I put Gracie's orange vest on her, and we went in.  Like two old pros, we took the elevator to the 5th floor.  The receptionist got a little strange when she realized I had a hearing dog--but in a nice way, talking a little more slowly and distinctly.  People who claim Minnesota nice is no more should travel with a hearing dog for a while.  Gracie was very much a pro.  Of course everyone wanted to pet her (I guess they didn't read the sign on her vest), but I said please not to as that would distract her from her work.  They accepted that.  We went into a nice conference room with a cozy carpet and a big table (and of course a lot of electronic gizmos).  Gracie laid down at my feet and was so quiet and still that I forget she was there!  I shared my thoughts.  Though they may or may not follow through on any of my suggestions, being asked what I thought was gratifying. 

After we left, Gracie and I returned to the bike and had some water.  We rode to the Twins stadium, which turned out to be much easier to reach going back (right across the street, really).  I stopped at a patch of grass, so Gracie could relieve herself.  While I waited for her, I saw that a bathroom for humans was open even though the Twins were not playing.  Yeah!

The ride home was pleasantly uneventful.  Tomorrow is supposed to be even nicer--if that is even possible. 

Day 49: White Bear





Today we faced the White Bear.  That is, Gracie and I drove to White Bear Lake where the galley of a book that caught my interest earlier this summer when I read an interview with its author was waiting for me in my campus mailbox.  I had used my campus address having decided that my best chance at getting a galley from Viking was to flaunt my school affiliation.  I was right! It worked.  Unfortunately, White Bear Lake is about a one hour drive away from the inner ring suburb of Minneapolis where I live.  White Bear Lake is where I work, though.  It's where Gracie and I will have to drive a momentous three times a week for sixteen weeks beginning August 23.  Driving there, going in to get the book from my mail cubby in the English mailroom, and driving back (another hour for a total of two hours round trip!) was clearly a dry run for fall.

After the fact, I will admit that it was me and not Gracie who had ALL the problems.  It took me fifteen minutes of wandering around the house to collect everything I thought we needed, the most important item being Gracie's orange vest.  Then, about two blocks from the house, I realized that I had not brought her water bowl.  It was going up into the nineties today and having that along seemed essential.  Back we went.  I had planned to get to campus by eleven but it was eleven thirty when we finally arrived.  Gracie loves the car and was content the whole long trip.  Were our roles reversed, I would have asked at least three times, "Are we there yet?"  I got the book and was on my way out,  when another part-time instructor from the speech department who once sat in on a teaching circle with me caught up to us.  She wanted to know all about Gracie and what she could do for me.  Then she told me that she had lost her peripheral vision in one eye and wasn't sure if she would be able to keep driving.  All this was fine.  I had my hearing aids on, and we were inside the building.  Gracie, to demonstrate how wonderful she is, lay down next to me while my colleague went on to say that she had finally been hired full time at another community college in the area, one at which she had not taught before.  This was so interesting that I stopped thinking about our next stop--a birthday lunch at Red Lobster with another colleague!  Of course, once I had Gracie in the car and was exchanging her orange vest for her seat belt harness, my phone rang with a text.  "Are you coming?"

Thanks to construction (I thought that had stopped when the state government of Minnesota shut down!) the five minute drive took fifteen minutes.  Luckily, my colleague is as easy going and forgiving as Gracie.  We went on to enjoy a two hour lunch during which Gracie behaved perfectly...well she did try to crawl over to a little spilled food, but I stopped her.

So, today Gracie and I met the White Bear, and I think we're going to be all right.  That is, if I can get myself a bit more organized!

Day 48: Strange habits

Part of getting to know another is getting to know and accept and even like that individual's strange habits.  If Gracie could write, I 'm sure she could easily point out mine.  She can't point out mine, but I can point out hers.  One strange habit that Gracie has is how she eats.  Though she gets excited when we go into the kitchen for her chow, wagging her tail and even licking her lips, when I put her food bowl down, she won't go over to eat.  I have to sit down next to her bowl and coax her over.  Then I hand feed her a couple bites like I was giving her a training treat instead of her chow.  She still won't go to her bowl.  For a while I thought it might be the bowl itself, but her water bowl is an identical bowl, and she has no trouble having a drink from that bowl.  Instead, I but a few bites on the floor in front of her.  As she is eating those, I put more bites on the floor in a trial that leads to her bowl.  Finally, I leave a heap of food right in front of the bowl.  Bruce has watched us, and thinks we are crazy.  But there are a lot of pluses to this strange ritual.  First of all, it is kind of playful.  Secondly, she eats all of her food in a short amount of time, which will be especially useful once fall semester begins.  It is definitely a strange habit that I am guilty of reinforcing, but I like it. Gracie likes it too.  In the end, I guess this is now "our strange habit."

Day 47: Back in the Kayak

Today Gracie took another step in discovering her inner water dog.  I always thought Golden Retrievers were the ultimate water dog.  I suppose this is because Bruce had a Golden when I met him--Groucho, a great name for a dog--that loved the water...and snow too.  Now that I am living with Gracie, my eyes have opened to the large number of spaniels enjoying the water in the area lakes, mostly English Springer Spaniels, though.  Since Gracie is such a pleasantly agreeable dog, I have been determined to win her over to water.  "Use a ball," Bruce suggested last time we were down at the lake.  Gracie does like shagging a ball, so this seemed like an excellent suggestion to me.

Gracie says, "All right.  I'm ready.  Let's go!"

Because this morning was warm and windless, we went kayaking.  The whole process of getting the kayak off the car and to the water, our life jackets on, and Gracie and myself into the boat without tipping over went very smoothly.  The lake was like glass.  I paddled along the shore, and Gracie seemed very relaxed, more relaxed than the first time we went out.  As I've commented before, she likes the familiar.  She doesn't like surprises.  Fortunately, I lead a very repetitive life.  It was about 8:00 a.m.  A few people were swimming across the lake.  Otherwise, we had the place to ourselves.  Suddenly, Gracie sat up and gave me her "I need something" look.  We were in the middle of the lake at that point.  I stopped paddling.  She put her paw on my life jacket.  Clearly, she needed to go in to relieve herself.  We paddled to beach and got out.
I had put a ball in my pocket before leaving the house.  When Gracie and finished in the grass up by the path, we returned to the beach.  The ball was a great idea!  She batted it around a bit; then she picked it up and carried it back to the beach.  This was so cute that after a few times, I took my cell phone out of my life jacket pocket and videoed her.  This is not easy since she is always so close to me, either because she wants to be or because, like then, I have her tethered to me.  I figured I recorded enough, thought, to be able to edit it together into a sort of cohesive whole. 

Sadly, I did not have the memory chip in my cell phone and cannot share Gracie in her orange life jacket playing with the blue tennis ball on the beach.  Next time. 

Day 46: Life on Schedule

Minnehaha Creek at 6:30 a.m.

As the days pass, I am learning what Gracie likes, tolerates, dislikes.  One of the things Gracie really likes a lot is knowing what happens next.  Gracie likes living according to a schedule.  Though I do have to have somewhat of a schedule during the school year, that schedule varies each semester depending on the classes I manage to land.  I must confess that I am schedule resistant  Gracie is encouraging me to change my ways, though.  I particularly like the morning routine we have at the moment. We get up and go right out for a "hurry up."  We then come in, and I have a cup of coffee and check my e-mail.  Next we go for a longer walk up the block to Edina's little Browndale Park on Minnehaha Creek.  When we get home from that walk, Gracie eats.  Many options follow Gracie's breakfast: watering the vegetables, running, more computer work, etc.



Gracie strikes a majestic pose on the
park bench by the Creek.

 Our summer schedule is very relaxed; unfortunately, it can't last.  School starts up again mid-August.  Students start classes August 22 this year.  Then I'll have four classes and over 100 students, papers to grade, lessons to plan, webinars to hold.   I think if we keep to our current schedule until then, Gracie will adapt.  We will have to get up even earlier than we all ready do.  I will have to have the car packed with the things I'll need on campus the night before.  There is so much to keep track of, particularly since I am unable to leave anything on campus and must bring everything home and back again each time I go.  One thing won't change with the return to school: when she eats, twice a day at 7 a.m. and again at 5:30 p.m.

Day 45: Good Advice from IHDI

Today as Gracie and I were getting ready for a short run--or as I was trying to put on my shoes and she was excitedly biting my hands in a misguided attempt to get me to hurry up--I couldn't help wishing that I'd had someplace to turn for advice when raising my two boys that was as quick to reply with sensible and effective advice as International Hearing Dog Incorporated has been.  From choosing dogs that will make good hearing dogs to helping recipients and dogs become effective teams, IHDI is the best!  So supportive.  So positive.   The other day while Gracie and I were shopping, I think someone asked, "Can I have your dog?"  No one ever asked for one of my kids.  Now that must mean something!

Day 44: Riding the Bus



Thank goodness it's July 5!

 Yesterday--July 4th--Gracie and I gave in to Bruce's burning desire to ride the bus downtown to the Twins game.  The game was scheduled to start at 1:00 p.m., so a little before noon, we drove to the corner of 44th and France to catch the bus.  Gracie was excited to put on her hearing dog vest and get in the car.  When the bus came, she marched on like this was something we did every day.  Without a pause, she jumped up on the seat next to me after I sat down and put her head in my lap.  The temperature was in the high eighties and the air-conditioned bus as comfortable.

This was Gracie's 4th Twins game, and she was very comfortable with the whole procedure: walking through the downtown to the stadium, pausing to use a small patch of grass in front of the stadium to relieve herself, walking through the turnstile, navigating the crowd, walking down the steps to the our seats, slipping by the people in our row to reach our seats, and finally settling on the rug under my seat.  The stadium was packed and noisy, but Gracie went right into "dog sleep" after a quick drink from her portable water bowl.
Unlike the last game we attended, the Twins played well and won.  Gracie lasted the whole game and, thankfully as it was hot, never needed to sit in my lap.

The bus ride home was more crowded than the bus ride there.  Luckily, we were able to slip into a seat in the front of the bus.  In the past, we have had to stand up most of the ride back on the bus, and I wasn't sure how Gracie would like this.  Not much, I suspect.  It's nice to know that we can ride the city bus without a problem.  Bruce pointed out that the bus has a special fare for the handicapped that applies at all times.  Handicapped.  I check that box at work though I have not asked the college for anything more than a volume control on my shared office phone--no longer needed with the new phone upgrade that actually emails phone messages that I can then listen to with my digital headphones (and even then can't always make out because people tend to talk too fast when leaving a voice mail message, particularly when leaving phone numbers).  Still, even with a hearing dog, I have a hard time believing that I am handicapped.  Maybe it's the symbol: a wheelchair.  Maybe we need to revisit the symbol to include an eye and an ear and a hand etc.  It could look something like the interfaith symbol.  That is something to work on anyway.  Maybe everyone is handicapped (or "differently abled" in its less clear but more politically correct incarnation).  I can see now why a special I.D. is required--like the handicapped parking sticker.

Day 43: Conquering the Alarm

Gracie the Wonder Dog!

Amazingly, the explosions of July 4th celebrations that began at the end of June and will probably continue until Target runs out of fire works do not bother Gracie.  Thanks to Jesse Ventura, the former Navy Seal,  professional wrestler, and one-term governor of Minnesota, fire works are legal here.  I personally have had enough of "bombs bursting in air," but I guess the intermittent and startling explosions (which I can hear but not locate) have me empathizing with the citizens of Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Libya.  How awful it must be to live with actual bombs bursting in air for years rather than a mere month.  I think we will sit out the big displays tonight.  Meanwhile, Gracie and I continue our recommended, twice a day sound practice.  There is no holiday for a hearing dog.

Gracie's indifference to the noise of fire works makes her response to the sounds we practice even more amazing to me.  Because she does "smoke detector" so well, I decided a couple weeks ago to start working on "alarm clock."  I went to Target (where I saw huge displays of fire works--sigh!) and bought a small alarm clock with the singular function of being an alarm clock.  Like the smoke detector, I cannot hear this alarm without my hearing aids on.  Just as no one wears glasses to bed, no one wears hearing aides at night--not that I know of anyway.  Ever since, we have been practicing alarm clock along with fire alarm.  It took a few days for Gracie to pay any attention to the clock's alarm.  I had to hold her leash and give it a pull as soon as the alarm sounded as the "You and Your Hearing Dog" pamphlet suggests.  Practice time is playtime for Gracie.  She gets very excited to show her stuff and is pleased with herself for doing what she's been trained to do.  "Act excited," Martha told me when she was here, and I do.  We both do.  It is exciting!

This morning, Gracie and I went for a run.  After my shower, I thought we would lie down again for a bit and, at the same time, practice "alarm clock."  I set the alarm to go off in twenty minutes.  Gracie got the basket that she sleeps in at night, and I lay down and promptly fell asleep.  Exactly twenty minutes later, Gracie jumped up on me and woke me up.  I was so excited!  She's got that one down.   I plan to set the alarm every night now.  I know I will sleep better knowing that she is keeping track of when we need to get up.  This is a big breakthrough for us!!  Gracie is my superhero!





Day 42: Wet and Wild!

A visit to a nearby city lake on Saturday provided an unexpected opportunity to deal more effectively with other dogs.  The advice to "walk on by" was solid.  In addition, Gracie got the chance to see how nice cooling off in the lake is on a summer day that was finally not either too hot or too cold.  Note, in the video that follows Gracie's tail action, which definitely merits a return engagement!

Day 41: Socializing

Though I think of myself as a friendly person, for obvious reasons, I do not go out of my way to start conversations with people I don't know.  (For similar reasons, I do like going to parties or any large gathering where everyone talks at once.)  Gracie is a conversational magnet, and I have been trying to work out a way to handle this.   She is cute and perky.  As we walk together, she looks from side to side.  When she hears something, she focuses on that.  When we approach another person walking a dog, for example, Gracie stares at the dog. She wags her tail.  She must look eager to greet the other dog.  Thinking ahead to being on campus with her and with other service dogs, I have been trying to dodge these confrontations.  The other day, however, a neighbor had her dog, another small, cute dog like Gracie, off its leash, and it ran up to us.  The neighbor called her dog, and we stopped walking.  I thought Gracie would sit as she usually does when we are walking and I stop.  Instead, she snarled and snapped at the other dog.  Cute Gracie!  I was surprised.



Remember Monty Python's killer bunny?



Later, when I told Bruce what had happened, he said, "She's taken on your personality" insinuating that the reason I avoid what I avoid is due to lack of friendliness and not due to not being able to hear!  I decided to contact Bob at IHDI about this.  Meanwhile, I wondered if Bruce could be right.  Was I just using not being able to hear to cover up basic unfriendliness or even hostility and Gracie had picked up on this?  I decided that the next time we came head-on with a dog, I would be friendly (or what many dog owners seem to think is friendly) and allow a brief interaction between the dogs (which seems to be what dog owners want for some reason). 

The first dog we met up with was a burley, male chocolate lab who was clearly damp from a swim in Minnehaha Creek.  I smiled at the owner who I think then said, "Can they say hello?"  "For a minute," I said, still smiling.  The lab moved in to sniff Gracie who growled and snapped at his very large nose.  "Sorry," I said, and we hustled away.

When we got home, an e-mail from IHDI was waiting for us.  "Be firm," they said to me.  "Remind Gracie that you are the boss.  Use the training collar to get her attention away from the dog and back to you."  This made sense, but what about the person at the other end of the other dog?  Should I just hurry by or maybe cross the street?  So many people around here keep their dogs on a loose lead, letting their dogs run ahead or run up on other people's lawns.  Dodging them would not be easy.

I was still wondering what to do about this when another e-mail arrived from IHDI.  "Smile and say hello," this one said, "then hurry on by.  If they ask you what's up, say Graice is a service dog and you are training her to work with you."  All true!  Just keep walking but smile and act friendly.  If this doesn't work, I may resort to wearing a sandwich board.

Day 40: Too hot!

Chilling in the air conditioning

Yesterday for Gracie's birthday, we went to an Italian film that promised romance and surprise.  Foreign films are among my favorite because they have subtitles, first cousins of closed captioning.  Both Gracie and I liked being in the theater because only a small portion of our house is air conditioned and it was in the nineties yesterday.  Apparently we are among the small minority who go to foreign films in the afternoon in the middle of the week.  There were so few people in the blessedly cool theater that Gracie, the birthday girl, got a seat of her own.  This worked well until, late in the film, she rolled over, and the seat closed on her.  For the rest of the film, she sat in my lap.

...for a dog's eye view of life

Today, it's too hot again...currently the temperature is 97 degrees and the heat index is 108.  I'm not a fan of hot weather, especially hot, humid weather.  This is clearly something else excessively furry Gracie and I share.  The pavement alone is hot enough to cook an egg.  So, for now, we are laying low in our little air conditioned corner catching up on our reading.  For those in the same frame of mind looking for a book to read, I recommend Paul Auster's dog story: Timbuktu.  It's a little sad; most dog stories are.  But it is delightfully detailed and honest.  Auster must have been channeling dog when he wrote it.  Although one might assume the dog's name to be Timbuktu, his name is Mr. Bones (a tribute to John Berryman?  Perhaps!)