3/08/08

Saturday, 8:00 AM. –7degrees, wind E, calm. Barometer predicts precipitation. Skies blue, some haze on the eastern horizon.
I was almost dressed too warm this morning, and after walking a bit didn’t need my scarf.
Lucky and I were accompanied this morning by two canine “homies,” Morgan and Roxy, neighborhood dogs rather constantly about. Morgan is an immensely furry, friendly male dog, impervious to all weather and always looking in my pocket for a treat. Roxy is a young female black lab who’s primary interest in life is retrieving…sticks, balls, branches, logs…anything she can manage to drag to someone who will give the object a toss. Roxy has been known to come to a door or window with a stick in her mouth, asking to play. If someone should teach her to ring the doorbell (please don’t!) I am sure she would do that too. The only problem with Roxy is that she is relentless, and will put the stick at one’s feet, between one’s feet, anything to get it picked up and thrown. I have seen her entice carpenters and other tradesmen to abandon their work, reverting to boy-plays-with-dog behavior, thereby vastly increasing the cost of local construction. She is captivated by children, and there are several families around that probably would have to own a dog, except that they have Roxy.
The tale is told that last summer she followed a man with a tennis ball through town, to the ferry dock and onto the ferry to Madeline Island, and got a free ride, both directions, since she had to be returned to Bayfield. I imagine that had someone been able to throw the ball from La Pointe to Bayfield she would have swam back, but the trouble with that scenario is that she would of course have retrieved it back to La Pointe.
The pussy willow, which I have given the scientific name Salix obscura, is now fully in bloom on the dinning room table.