Category: Adventures in Rufus and/or Otis

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Fear of a Grey Planet

One of the neat aspects of adopting a failed retired racing greyhound is that you become part of a community of grey owners. I’ve never been one for, well, belonging, so I’m surprised by how much I enjoy going to greyhound meet and greets and events like this past weekend’s Greyhound Planet Day picnic. The site was about an hour from our house, in Bridgewater, NJ.

(An hour unless you run into a monstrous accident, as we did on the way home, up Rt. 287. Let me tell you: when you’re on a 4-lane highway and the accident warning sign says that the far left and the far right lanes are closed, you know you’re in for a sight. In this case, a sedan was mushed up against a light pole in the left shoulder, to the point at which its spare tire was poking up out of its trunk. In the right shoulder, an SUV was flipped over, facing the wrong way, and partly flattened. Rufus was not happy with the delay, but he did his best.)

The picnic was a blast. Here are my disjointed impressions, but you may be better off checking out my slideshow and my wife’s slideshow.

To begin, I can’t even guess how many greys were on hand, but I’m going to guess it was far more than a hundred. An adoption area was set up for people to check out some available dogs, read their histories, and take them out for test drives. I stopped at the cage/crate of one of my faves from the website, Jumpin’ Jackson, who unfortunately has medical problems (seizures) but was adorable. And huge. I also checked out a bunch of the females, since we figure that, if we ever get a second grey to keep Rufus company, it won’t be a male (size, territorial issues).

In fact, my coworker/pal Jason and his wife adopted a pair of girls on Sunday; he showed up in my office Monday and asked, “You didn’t sleep the first night either, right?” Later it was, “How long did it take Rufus to go up and down the stairs on his own?” I warned him that the next 7-10 days may be pretty rough.

The first owners we met on Sunday — people frequently stop us to comment on how gorgeous Rufus is — filled us in on their dog, whom they adopted in June. He was on the track till he was nearly five years old, and ran in TWO-HUNDRED-AND-TWENTY-SIX races. Our boy, on the other hand, raced eight times before it was concluded that he was not cut out for that job. On the plus side, all the veteran racers we met were nicked up, scarred, or had other work-related deformities. So I take pride in my dog’s failure. One owner, whom we’d met previously at a meet-and-greet, told us that he was amazed by how perfect Rufus’ overall form is. He thought we were joking when we told him how terrible the boy’s racing record was.

Another neat aspect of greys is that they make virtually no noise. Except for the instances where people brought other breeds along — a few beagles and a labradoodle — the dogs really didn’t stir up at all. That said, there was a Group Roo. Watch this and try to imagine 40+ greys gathered together and getting incited to make this noise. Evidently, it’s a tradition at these events, but it’s pretty creepy.

As was The Group Photo, in which we were all herded together in the grass. It was like a grand march of very skinny soldiers. Once we were all gathered, our boy decided that he didn’t like facing the photographer and started turning around to check out the dogs behind him. We thought it would’ve been great for a group shot of 200 dogs’ faces, and 1 dog’s butt. We’ll see how the final version comes out.

We sort of took an adoptable dog on a test drive ourselves, but only because the organizers were very busy and one of the greys — Bizzy’s Barker — needed to go for a bathroom break. I thought it would be a good opportunity to see how Rufus would deal with my walking a second dog alongside him. He didn’t care in the slightest. Neither did BB. They walked in opposite directions a couple of times, and they were pretty oblivious to one another’s presence. That’s a good sign, I think.

We had a good time making the acquaintances of other owners; it’s nice not to have to start a conversation answering, “What sort of dog is that?” I was also glad to be able to ask questions of some of the veterans. They affirmed my suspicions that it’s best to cut their food back a little during winter, since neither they nor we like going on walks in the cold. I also gleaned that most owners do not take they greys on twice-daily mile-plus walks, like I do.

Anyway, there’s a ton more to write about, but I have to get to work. Check out the slideshows (Amy’s and mine) for some pix that’ll make you start thinking about adopting one of these hounds. (If you’re in NJ, visit Greyhound Friends of NJ for more info on that.

Amy, Rufus and Bizzys Barker, Sept. 21, 2008
Amy, Rufus and Bizzy's Barker, Sept. 21, 2008

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What It Is: 9/22/08

What I’m reading: Didn’t have much time to read this week, so I’m still on Raymond Chandler’s The Long Goodbye and Jason Lutes’ Berlin. I don’t anticipate getting much reading in next week, with all the work on our October issue and our conference ahead.

What I’m listening to: Meet Danny Wilson, by Danny Wilson, and The Odd Couple, by Gnarls Barkley

What I’m watching: the last series at Yankee Stadium.

What I’m drinking: Plymouth & tonic.

What Rufus is up to: Greyhound Planet picnic in Bridgewater, NJ, baby!

Where I’m going: New Brunswick, NJ, baby!

What I’m happy about: New York Magazine cited my post on The Glass Stampede in their Comments section last week:

What I’m sad about: They didn’t call me or my blog by name, so now I have yet another alias: Chimera Obscura. Sigh. I shouldn’t complain, considering I have at least six active e-mail addresses.

What I’m pondering: How working for the Long Island Rail Road seems to be a more dangerous occupation than Alaskan crab fishing.

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What It Is: 9/15/08

What I’m reading: The Long Goodbye, which I haven’t read since 1992. I gotta read more of Chandler’s stuff. For some reason, 9 of his novels are available for the Kindle. So . . . any suggestions? (Also, The Last Musketeer, by Jason, and still with Montaigne’s essays. . .)

What I’m listening to: Beck’s Modern Guilt. And REM’s “Ignoreland,” which shuffled up recently on my iPod and will probably be in heavy rotation through the election.

What I’m watching: Your mom. There. I’ve said it. (Amy had a pretty busy week, so we didn’t get around to finishing up the last season of The Wire. Two episodes left!)

What I’m drinking: Red Stripe! Hooray beer!

What Rufus is up to: Accidentally showing up at a greyhound meet & greet! The admin of the Greyhound Friends NJ list dropped our e-mail by accident, so we didn’t know that our local pet store was hosting an event on Saturday. Coincidentally, we took Rufus up there to buy his pet food (we could’ve done it without him, but he loves going to the store), and discovered 4 or 5 greyhounds & owners in the parking-lot. Rufus, of course, was very happy to make some new friends.

Where I’m going: To the GFNJ Annual Fall Picnic/Greyhound Planet Day on Sunday in Bridgewater, NJ! My pal/co-worker Jason & his wife are picking up their grey at the picnic, so we’ll find out if their girl gets along with Rufus before we set up a playdate.

What I’m happy about: Having a quiet weekend, between pretty busy weeks.

What I’m sad about: David Foster Wallace’s suicide, even though I hadn’t read a book of his in around 10 years. (I suppose this title is a bit ironic now.) Here’s a terrific appreciation of/meditation on DFW by David Gates. Gates & I talked about Wallace in our first conversation, c. 1996, when I called him through the Newsweek switchboard because I was bored at my office and thought maybe he’d be around and willing to shoot the breeze. He was. (UPDATE: Gates suggests I/we read Laura Miller’s DFW piece on Salon.) (UPDATE 2: Michael Bierut has a good post on DFW viewed through a design/marketing lens.)

What I’m pondering: How SiteMeter made so many poor decisions when it “upgraded” this weekend.

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Six-month chipmunkiversary

On our evening walk yesterday, it occurred to me that it had been six months since Rufus joined our home! I felt bad about missing the anniversary, but since we brought him home in the evening(ish) last March, I figured he wasn’t holding it against us.

So, after getting him home, I headed down to the supermarket to get him a present! (the pet store in town was closed). Without further ado, our anniversary celebration!

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Bear arms

We’ve had a bunch of bear sightings this summer. On my drive home from work two weeks ago, I saw a bear wandering around the soccer field of a local grade school. I called the police about it when I got home a few minutes later, since the field was right around the corner from their station.

That weekend, one of my neighbors told me that they saw a bear in the yard beside our house. When they looked an hour later, the bear was still there, just hanging out.

Last Tuesday night, during Rufus’ evening walk, one of my neighbors was raking up trash in the woods about 15 feet back from the street. He told me, “I live across the street. My wife called during my drive to work and told me that a bear had just picked up our trash can and was carrying it over to the woods for breakfast.”

Tonight, we decided to walk down to the local CVS during Rufus’ evening walk, so I could pick up a Cherry Coke. About a third of a mile from my house, I noticed a jeep parked on the side of the road. The driver reached out the window as if to tap a cigarette. We walked up to her car, and she said, “He’s over there. Do you see him?” Pointing again, not tapping a cigarette.

I thought she was talking about her toddler, with whom I’d seen her walking many times. I wondered why her toddler was meandering around in someone’s yard, while she and her husband sat in her jeep. I looked where she was pointing, and realized that there wasn’t any toddler to be found.

However, there was a very large black bear beside the house across the street, in the process of emptying a trash can.

I said, “Wow, that is one giant bear!”, took Rufus’ leash from my wife, and trotted briskly on to CVS. As we got over the next hill, Amy asked, “Is there a reason we didn’t just head back home?”

Seriously, that bear would’ve towered over me on its hind legs. “Because . . . I wanted to get a Cherry Coke?”

We kept walking. As we approached the drug store, a pair of kids (around 10-11 years old, I think) were playing with their skateboard and scooter. One said to us, “There’s a bear back up the street.”

I told him that we’d passed it already, and thanked him for the warning. Amy went into the store and got my Cherry Coke. She asked, “Should we walk back the same way, or try the back road instead?”

I pondered for a moment. We’d seen the bear beside a house that let out onto that back road, so I figured there was a 50/50 chance he’d have come out on that side by the time we got back. I decided we’d go home by our regular route. The two kids left with us. I figured the bear would go after them first, since they’re trashcan-sized.

We approached the area where we’d seen the bear, and I figured that if it was in the same location, about 35 or 40 feet back from the road, chomping on trash, the five of us would be fine. Rufus gave no sign of sniffing him out, but he didn’t react during the walk down the street, either.

A neighbor across the street from that house called to us, “Be careful! There’s a bear out!”

“We know,” one of the kids said.

“No, he’s right over there!” the neighbor said, pointing to a stand of pine trees about 10 feet from the road.

I turned and bolted up the front yard of another neighbor and rang his doorbell, Amy and the kids racing behind me. The man of the house, whom I believe is a policeman, answered the door, and I hurriedly said, “There’salargebearacrossthestreet. Isitokayifmywife,dogandthesetwokidsstayinsideforaminute? I’llgogetmycarsoIcanbringeveryoneupthestreet.”

He assented, but started looking over at the trees, trying to catch a glimpse of the big bear. He offered to drive us all, but I impulsively decided a good run was in order. I handed Amy the leash and sprinted (as best I can) back to the house. The bear had already retreated from view, probably heading to that ‘back road’ area. On the way, I warned a neighbor who was just taking his little terrier out, “Gotheotherdirection. Blackbeardownthisway.”

He let out a yelp and hurried back into his garage.

I got to the car and drove down to the house. The two kids were getting into one of their mothers’ cars, since she was out looking for them. Amy & I got Rufus in, thanked the gentleman, petted his dog (he and Rufus got to make friends while I was gone), and drove back to the house.

And that’s life in Ringwood. Come visit!

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Dog days

Next month will be pretty hectic and I have a ton of vacation time piled up. So, since we’re not going anywhere for Labor Day weekend, and my Friday office hours are only 8am-1pm, I decided to take today off from work.

It’s been a pretty lazy day, except for going out to buy a new dishwasher and reading a dense section of Montaigne. Now (3pm) I’m just about ready for a new adventure, so I’m going to pack Rufus in the car, head out to one of the Ramapo Lake trails to see how the boy likes walking in the woods!

* * *

UPDATE: And we’re back! I took Rufus on the Macevoy trail, a half-mile stretch leading from a parking area off Skyline Drive up to the Ramapo Lake. I took my family — my brother, sister-in-law, their kids, Dad and his girlfriend — up there on July 4 last year. We had to take our time; in fact, Dad barely made it, but I was proud of him for surviving the trek.

Rufus, on the other hand, tried to make a sprint out of it, as is his wont. There’s no talking him out of that sorta thing. He made some friends on the way up, as is also his wont. A couple was walking down the trail, and the guy took Rufus’ friendliness as an opportunity to explain to his girlfriend why they need to get a big dog, not a little one like she wants. Ru did his best to sway her by leaning heavily against her. Unfortunately, I think he swayed her body more than her opinion, but she continued to coo over our boy.

I brought along two bottles of water, as well as one of his bowls, since he refuses to drink from the bottle/bowl I was considerate enough to buy for him. It’s not too hot today — around 78 — but he tends to hurry, and to stop and sniff at everydarnthing around, so by the time we reached the lake, he was panting a bit. At that point, a woman walked by with a beagle-ish dog, but she said it was pretty hyper and angry since getting into a doggie-altercation last month, and she was afraid he’d get Rufus upset. My boy was too tired to even disagree.

I got him to stand still long enough for some pix, and even got him to drink some water (after dropping half a dog-treat in the bowl), but I could see that he wasn’t happy to be out in the sun at that point. The trek back was a little more hazardous than the way in, because so much of it was downhill on rocks, but Rufus was a trooper. He tends to stay in front of me when we walk, but he paused in front of less certain paths, and waited for me to go by and show him where to step.

On the way we got back to the car, we encountered a family of incredible nordicity. I thought they’d escaped from the nearby Ikea, but it turned out that they were visiting family in the area. The parents and their 3 small kids all fawned over our boy, who wasn’t so exhausted as to reject the attention.

Back in the car, he was a panting wreck. But it’s only a 7- or 8-minute drive home, and he’s now sacked out comfortably on his bed, having drunk half a bowl of water. I walked in to see the Yankees beat the Red Sox in the bottom of the ninth. For what that’s worth.

So that’s my day off: some reading, some napping, some appliance shopping, some Yankees, and Rufus on a hiking trail. (UPDATE: and a cigar out on the deck, as I watch the sun go down.)

Click through the pic for the rest of the photoset!

“Oh, look at me! I’m doing my little French-maid-ears trick!”

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Don’t hide my rawhide!

For more than five months, Rufus has been a pretty awesome dog. Sure, he has little eccentricities, but they’re nothing compared to mine, even if I don’t treat my stuffed animals as badly as he treats his.

Anyway, last night, we gave him a new rawhide. Over the next hour, he proceeded to devour it on his livingroom bed. I noticed that he’d gnawed it down to one knot, so I tried to get it away from him. He barked at me, for the first time.

Desperate times required the desperate measure of shaking a bag of doggie-treats in another room. He spit out the rawhide and ran out to get his treat. I used it to get him downstairs and outside for his evening pee break, while Amy hid the rest of the rawhide in the kitchen.

Once we got back upstairs, Rufus was like a junkie missing his fix. He started turning things over in the living room, trying to find his rawhide. Originally, Amy hid it under some blankets on the ottoman near his bed. He buried his nose under the blankets, shoving and snuffing. He stormed up and down the hall, pawed at his bed, and otherwise evinced a panic I’d never seen in him before.

I got him another treat, and he settled down, heartbroken.

An hour or so later, we got ready for bed, and he proceeded to do something he hadn’t tried (with me around) since he joined our home in March:

That’s right: he ran into the bedroom, strode right up on our bed, stretched out, and refused to leave, snarling at me when I grabbed his collar to get him off. What else could I do? I got my camera, let him pout a minute while I took some pix, and then said, “OFF!” while giving him a good yank of the collar. He curled up on his bed, point made.

Kids. I tellya.

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Victory!

I’ve never had to house-train a pet. Both of the dogs we had when I was a kid were kept outdoors, and my cats were strays, and they liked getting out of the house early and often. Rufus had a couple of accidents in his first week at home, but that’s pretty understandable.

Since we got him in March, I’ve been keeping him in his crate when I’m away at the office. I’ve felt bad about this, but was assured by a ton of people — including his vet — that it’s okay. Still, I figured that he’d be happier if he could meander around the house while I’m at work, instead of being curled up inside the crate, sleeping for hours on end, and then bursting with energy when I get home.

It’s true: I imagine that my dog actually does things when we’re not here. I mean, besides standing up on the loveseat to look out the living room window. I can just see him proudly trotting up and down the hall, selecting one toy, then another, before promenading over to our bedroom, where he promptly curls up and sleeps for hours on end.

As I mentioned in What It Is this week, I’ve been leaving him out of his crate for longer and longer stretches. I don’t let him go downstairs while we’re out, and he seems to have figured out from the first multi-hour session on his own that drinking a lot of water isn’t a smart move. I’ve tried to Rufus-proof the area, making sure there’s nothing edible around, and that our laptops are not in harm’s way.

Today, I took The Big Step and left him on his own for an entire workday.

I’m pleased to report that I came home to find no accidents, no shredded furniture, no commandeered laundry (the first time I left him alone for a few hours, in his second week with us, he tipped over our hamper and dragged our clothes over to his crate), no chewed electrical cords, no signs of pot-smoking, and one tail-wagging pooch!

I get to feel a tiny bit less angst when I go to work in the morning!

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What It Is: 8/11/08

What I’m reading: Finished The Good Rat, by Jimmy Breslin, continuing Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko, by Blake Bell, and getting back to reading Montaigne’s essays.

What I’m listening to: my iPod, endlessly shuffling among 13,000 or so songs.

What I’m watching: Fourth season of The Wire, and The Dark Knight, over at the Imax at the Palisades Center.

What I’m drinking: a rosé that my wife picked up on Saturday, and Stella Artois. Not at the same time.

What Rufus is up to: Around 6 hours on his own upstairs when I’m out! I’m still hesitant to leave him out of his crate for my full 9-hour workday, and I keep him upstairs so he doesn’t meander around down in the library, where he’s less familiar. But he seems to have figured out that he shouldn’t drink a lot of water when he’s alone in the house.

Where I’m going: Nowhere special

What I’m happy about: I’m not sure, but I’m generally elated at present. I feel a little bad that I’ve neglected friends I need to write to, but maybe I’ll have time and motivation to fix that this week.

What I’m sad about: The deaths of Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes.

What I’m pondering: The irony that the Yankees’ healthiest and most productive pitchers this season are 38 and 36 years old.

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Flying fish will never be able to walk

Friday’s company picnic turned out to be pretty boring. The turnout was much lower than last year’s at the same location (enjoy the 2007 slideshow!). I split around 1:30 p.m. and took a nice drive through Harriman State Park for the slightly roundabout trip home.

I’m not sure why I felt so disengaged from it; I had a couple of decent conversations with coworkers, but there were few significant others on hand for the event, which meant we were spending the day with the same people we see every day in the office. The young’uns (anyone younger than me) seemed to have a good time, playing beer-wiffleball or something, but I felt kinda intruder-y among them.

I bought the new Paul Weller record last week and it occurred to me that no one in my office would have any idea who Weller was, nor would they ever have heard the Jam or the Style Council. I don’t mean that in a snobbish way; it just struck me that my time isn’t theirs.

So I hung with some of my older coworkers, but their conversation led to a spirited game of beer-pong. I knew that the only way I’d have fun at this picnic was if I started drinking, and afternoon drinking makes me pretty sluggish. As opposed to nighttime drinking, which makes me witty, vivacious and impossibly charming. And invulnerable (to criticism).

Or maybe I was hungover from the previous day’s reading of Camp Concentration. The best books can do that. Regardless, I felt utterly out of place, and so I shot hoops for a little while with the worst basketball of all time, then started my drive home. Sorry I don’t have any fun stories or good pix to post.

* * *

On the plus side, it was a weekend of new milestones for Rufus! On Friday night, I gave him full run of the upper floor of the house (sans kitchen) for 2+ hours while I picked up Amy at her train and got dinner. I have no idea how to positively house-train a dog, and I was a little nervous that he might not be familiar enough with the lower floor, so I put a gate at the top of the stairs and lit out for Radburn.

He was typically (which is to say, unbelievably) excited when we got home, and I immediately conducted a room-by-room inspection. He’d gone up on both the sofa and my chaise (I put towels down on both to, and discovered paw-shaped impressions on them), but had no accidents! I took him outside and he relieved himself for about five minutes straight. So I’m going to take that as evidence that he’s house-trained! (Not that I’ll leave him outside of his crate for a full work-day, but at least I know I can go away for a couple of hours without a problem.)

A night later, a heavy thunderstorm rolled through the area. It woke us up around 4am on Sunday morning, and I assumed that our boy had already decamped to a corner of the guest bedroom to hide. But after another flash of lightning, I noticed that he was still curled up on his bed in our room, snoozing away. Given his past reactions to thunder, I was amazed. Especially because I was ready to hide in a corner of the guest bedroom at that point.

* * *

But it was a pretty quiet weekend. I read a ton, and now I’m trying to figure out how to get back to my Monday Morning Montaigne project without carrying around an 1,100+ page hardcover of the essays, since the edition I’m reading isn’t available on the Kindle.