Monthly Archives: October 2012

why I must now shop for plates

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My life lately has not been a comedy of disasters involving several dead or dying friends, medical supply houses that refuse to ship medical supplies, the post office refusing to deliver Zor’s mail, an insane number of assignments from my college’s sink-or-swim graphic design program, an inability to receive personal phone messages because (mostly) the GOP fills up my answering machine more than once per day, multiple dead appliances, bad house wiring that would cost roughly the Korean war debt to fix, and personal illnesses.  No, it hasn’t been hellish at all.

Oh wait, yes it has.

So it will come as no surprise that there has been a latest minor disaster.  The only surprise will be the nature of the minor disaster.

Last night I was stuffing a second day’s worth of dirty dishes in the (new and miraculously still working) dishwasher.  Both dogs were crowding around, drawn by the “dirty clink”, hoping to lick plates.  With my head full of a tidal wave of mucous that changed directions every time I bent or straightened, I was not consistent with shooing them away.  Then, well…  As they say, it happened so fast.

I think what happened was, Cobie got his collar caught in the bottom dishwasher rack.  He panicked and dragged the rack, full of all my worldly china, out of the dishwasher, where it hung up briefly between the dishwasher door and the (not working GODDAMMIT)  oven.  He plunged and leapt like a cayuse, yanked the rack free in a hailstorm of silverware and plate, saucer, and bowl shrapnel, and dragged the rack into the kitchen, scattering broken shards as he fled.  There the rack came unattached, allowing Cobie to take cover in the living room.

Kelly hid under the dishwasher door.  As soon as the noise stopped, she came out and started inspecting the wreckage for tidbits.

Both dogs were barefoot, obviously, and so was I.  I was trapped by my bare diabetic feet amid all this unbroken glass, and I was too close to the sink to bend over and scoop up Kelly.  I scanned the ground for blood, and didn’t see any.  Right about then T-Moth (husband) and Zor (youngest spawn) showed up to see what the racket was.  “Could you get her before she cuts herself?  Could someone bring me some shoes?”

Eventually we got it all cleaned up, and as far as I was able to determine, nobody was cut–thank goodness.  However I am down two plates, a saucer, and a bowl.  Perhaps I can replace them, as I bought these open stock at Odd Lots a couple of years ago, and it’s Christmas (blargh) so maybe they will be carrying red dishes again.  Although the way my luck is going…

Dishes were not in the budget at all, nor time for a shopping trip.  But I could also look at Goodwill, where they might have some plain white plates that, while they wouldn’t match, at least would not clash.

Of course I sold my old dishes at the yard sale.  I suspect this is how hoarders get started.

a cobie tale

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Cobie has more vocalizations than I could name–probably more than I can tell apart.  He moos, he warbles, he howls, he chuffs, he woofs, he emits volleys of cannonfire barks, he yaps.  A few of his vocalizations I recognize instantly, for example his, “Help, I’m stuck behind a line!” groan.

For a dog that only cares what I think when it doesn’t inconvenience him overly much, Cobie has an over-the-top respect for physical boundaries.  If I shoo him and Kelly out of the kitchen, he will almost always stay out–even though Kelly almost always won’t.  He won’t come in if the door isn’t all the way open.  He won’t push by a door left partially ajar; he’ll stand on the other side of the threshold, craning his neck to see in, and groan at me til I come open the door.

Or until Kelly does.

This is Cobie in vampire mode, waiting to be invited in.

So after last weekend’s bout of dysentery–now everyone in the house has it–I have a to-do list as long as the street I live on, which is short for a street but long for a to-do list.  Waking up with a sore throat and a stuffy head was not on my list, but I added it in because what can you do?  I let the dogs out and left the door partially ajar, I thought enough so that Cobie wouldn’t go into Vampire Mode.  I grabbed a basket of folded laundry from the living room and headed back to put the things away.  I was sitting on the bed in my underwear trying to pick out socks to put on and feeling sorry for myself because I feel like crapola (again) and even though I only own three kinds of socks, it seemed an impossibly difficult decision.  Black ankle socks, white ankle socks, or white crew socks?  It was, of course, vitally important to choose correctly.

That’s when I heard Cobie groaning.  “Help!  I’m trapped behind a line!”

As soon as I stood up I had to pee (again), so from the toilet I tried calling Cobie.  I don’t know why; that has never once worked and it didn’t work this time either.  He barely comes when called when he isn’t trapped behind a line.

Finally I got enough clothes on to risk going in front of the living room window.  I get to the door (it opens on the garage which opens on the back yard; there is no direct access) expecting to see the familiar and cataclysmically handsome face peering at me with the also familiar expression of both expectancy and disappointment in my slow-ass primate response time.

No Cobie.  Just Kelly sitting on the rug there between the door to the garage and the one to the basement.

Cobie groaned again.  Dammit.  How did he get stuck behind a line outdoors?  I prop the door open with a couple of milk crates so it doesn’t blow shut and trap critters anywhere.  I look, but the crates are still in place and the door to the outside is open.

I put on shoes.  I take my sick self out into the cold and the dark and the drizzle and look for Cobie, and  he is not in the yard.

I freak out.

I hop over Kelly, who is still sitting on the rug, race to the front door, and yank it open.  It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s raining, I’m sick, and the dog who never comes when called is loose.

Then I hear him again, somewhere behind me.

WTF?

So I back track, and finally find him in the basement.  Mr Moth had put up a deck chair, one of those chaise style nylon and aluminum things, to keep the dogs out of the room where Oliver (the cat) is currently recovering from a paw injury.  He can’t hop the gates right now, so his supplies are in the family room, and the dogs keep raiding his dish.  We use the lawn chair because a regular gate, of which I own an abundance after a yard sale score, won’t adjust out wide enough for that doorway.

The chair/chaise/cot thingie looks like this:

It turned out that somehow Cobie had squeezed through the gap between the chair and the wall–a gap left so that if Oliver chooses to come up he can–and then decided he couldn’t get back through the same space.

In fact, he refused to come back through until I slid the entire chair behind the sofa so it was not impeding his progress at all.

Mind you, this is a 110+ pound dog.  He could have hopped the chair at will.  In fact, he hopped a baby gate his third day here.  I scolded him for it, and he has never hopped one since, not even when Kelly does.  (Which she won’t, unless I am on the other side of the gate.)

So there is my morning adventures with Cobie.

He is such a nut.