Global Wandering

LaPriel and Breanna just left on a mother daughter trip to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. Why there? Think of it as like the Harley Davidson rally in Sturgis, South Dakota, only this rally is for Little House on the Prairie groupies. They have an extravagant pageant and hotels are booked for miles around with Laura Ingall Wilder pilgrims.

That leaves me and the boys to fend for ourselves. Fortunately, we have three flats of raspberries to sustain us, thanks to Camden and Bret helping LaPriel pick them up from a local farm this morning. I’ve been subsisting primarily on berries, nuts and vegetables for the last few days ever since reading Peter Singer and Jim Mason’s The Way We Eat, Why Our Food Choices Matter. This book on the ethics of eating pigs, cows and chickens that have been raised on factory farms came highly recommended by Aussie Yam. I’ll let you decide for yourself whether you agree with the authors’ arguments, but they convinced me this country’s food production methods are seriously flawed.

In other news, the kids have been begging for a new dog to replace Kody the Dog who passed away several years ago after fulfilling his life long dream to catch a UPS delivery truck. Breanna gave the neighbors her pet hamster Nibbles to make room for a new pet. Nibbles is well named, given his proclivity for chomping on the hands that feed it. Our neighbor was kind enough to show off his gouged finger courtesy of their new charge. Despite the wounds, they seem to like their new rodent.

I am the one that reopened the debate on a new dog, having previously refused to discuss it. The pet Breanna had hoped to replace Nibbles with was a leopard gecko. We spent some time on the internet researching how to care for these creatures and after reading how complicated it was, I thought maybe a dog would be easier. Only we can’t seem to find one that is small, intelligent, doesn’t chase UPS trucks, doesn’t yap, is cuddly and will only live eleven and a half years so that it will go to doggy heaven the same year Breanna enters college. We did find one dog that met most of our criteria; a Chacy Ranior. The only problem is the breeder has a four year waitlist for puppies and they give precedent to homes with special needs children. Plus there is the issue of the multi-page qualification questionnaire with such probing questions as:

1. Do you have any experience in canine ear care?
2. What is the total income of the person who will be responsible for any bills that will occur due to having a dog in the home?
3. In the event that any relationship you are in is dissolved, or in the event that there is a death in the family, is there a plan for what will happen with the dog?

I decided to hold off looking for a new dog and research canine ear care instead. I bought Cesar's Way: The Natural, Everyday Guide to Understanding and Correcting Common Dog Problems. If we get a dog, we are going to do it right this time. No more taking in used, poorly trained mutts. I want a puppy I can train from scratch, a blank slate⎯one that when it is grown I can leave it in the bed of a pickup truck at the Wal-Mart parking lot and it won’t bark at shoppers or jump out. We have a large number of such well mannered canines here in Idaho. Of course, this is all theoretical, because we are one of the few Idaho families without a pickup truck, and if we buy a small enough dog, it wouldn’t be able to see over the side of the truck bed anyway. Sort of defeats the purpose of putting a dog in the back of a truck if it can’t see out.

Speaking of pickup trucks, I was half awake the other night as I watched David Letterman. A commercial came on and in my drowsy state I noted the pickup truck in the ad looked like my brother-in-law's. The truck was pulling a boat and I thought it looked familiar too. Finally I sat up because there on the screen was my brother and sister-in-law telling me how much they love the truck they bought at said dealership. Only later did I realize my brother-in-law had done the voiceover for the entire commercial.

How do you know you’re a true Idahoan? You recognize your brother-in-law’s pickup truck faster than you recognize his voice.