November rain

"I saw you..(and him, and him)

walking in the rain.....

You were holding hands and....

I'll never be the same.."

*This is a excerpt from the song, "the rain" , by Oran Juice Jones in 1986

Whenever I have to walk in the rain I sometimes hum this song to myself. I kind of have to laugh to myself because it's sort of a romantic song (with a catchy rhythm).

When I walked the dogs on thursday, the day was anything but "romantic".

It was freezing horizontal gusting rain.

It sucked being out.

When it rains on a hot August day, I love being out in it. I love the smell of the rain hitting the steaming pavement. When it's hot and sweaty out the rain feels so refreshing.

However, this past thursday , it was one of those days you could easily find yourself standing in a puddle, freezing, soaked, and crying.

It was awful.

"Mattie", the naughty Jack Russell terrier, just glowered at me with her ears down, her eyes wide open and shaking like a leaf.

She did not want to go out.

Matter-of-fact, she left a huge turd on the carpet to let me know that she didn't need to go out because she already went. I had to seriously bribe her with treats to get her off the couch and go out the door.

She kept turning around looking at me as if to say, "are you kidding me?"

I can't say I blame her.

The rain was running down my storm pants like a rivulet into my wellies (boots). My feet were completely soaked inside my boots.

"Kd", the poodle who wears a diaper, was not keen on going out either. Once her feet touched the cold water she gave me "the look." I told her ,"once you poop we can go back in". I swear dogs understand what you say because she promptly pooped when we reached her favorite pooping spot and ran back to the house. I dried her off and put a fresh diaper on her. I had never changed a human baby diaper in my entire life but here I am changing a dog's diaper. It's a bit surreal.

"Kd''s companion "Riley, the hyperactive springer spaniel, was another story.

This was one dog I HAD to get outside, walk around for a good 30 minutes, and to make sure she "emptied out".

She has had liquid diarrhea for two weeks now.

"Riley's" owners were away on business so I had to make sure she got out at least twice while I was on duty or else there could have been disastrous results.

If you know what I mean.

Regardless, it was still pretty bad.

After Riley purged a liquid mess, she dragged her bum across the mud as if that was suppose to clean it and then decided to roll in it. I felt like I was running in slow motion trying to remove her away from the toxic pile.

When we got back to the house, I had to wrestle with her with a towel to dry her off since she decided that she would rather dry off by ramming her snout between my legs using my pant legs as a towel. Not only did I have to wrestle with this dog to get her managably clean but immediately after that I had to race through the house to close all the bedroom doors so the dogs couldn't go in.

Wet smelly dogs love to roll around on clean bedcovers.

I don't think the owners would appreciate having their bed soiled with mud, dog hairs and shit.

My cousin's three dogs know the routine when it rains or at least, they have trained me to know what to do. Both "Jackie" and "Cuddles" run out in her fenced-in yard to do a quick potty break. Neither one of them like going out in the rain for walks.

"Ruby" doesn't mind at all. Matter-of-fact, she figured out that she'll get 'one-on-one' attention if she goes for the walk if the other two dogs wimp out. She does A-Ok in the rain. She also enjoys getting toweled off without all the drama.

Even so, again, I have to make sure the bedroom doors are closed just in case Ruby decides that I didn't dry her off enough.

At the end of the day, when I came home, cold, wet and smelly.

I thought to myself, "Ok, tough it up. The winter hasn't even started yet"