Bath Time for Barkers

For Feline and Furball Friday:

Showing off pre-bath, Cayenne gets tangled in a blanket.

As promised, I gave each of the dogs a bath today. Take a look!

Wet dog on the bed!

About 4 PM on Wednesday, I lured Cayenne into the bathroom, shut the door, and listed her into the tub. John had already laid down a plastic mat to protect her from sliding around. Cayenne wasn't thrilled, and shrank back a little, but really she was very good and didn't struggle at all. While I was at it, I threw her bandannas in the washer and got those clean, too.

After her bath she ran around like a crazy dog, leaping on and off the bed, running into the front room and back, and shaking herself dry. I found a clean pink towel in the laundry basket and tried to dry her off.

The titanic struggle between Cayenne and a pink towel.

Can I dry you off with this, please?

Oh, well. I did dry her off a bit, and she had fun, and the towel didn't mind.

Pepper after her bath.

I waited a little while and then repeated the process (lather, rince, repeat!) with Pepper. Here she is after her bath. She behaved at least as well in the tub as Cayenne did, sniffed at the shampoo bottles, and let me towel dry her afterward.

Wet dog on the floor!

The dog park today was relatively stress free. There were no doggie altercations involving the Blocher dogs, although Pepper was way too interested in barking at a very gentle and low-key St. Bernard. I told the woman with the three dogs about Cayenne bleeding after her dog's attack the other night, and she showed genuine concern. She guessed immediately which dog did the damage, and said, rather lamely I thought, that the dog was behaving well today. Maybe, but that's not the point. She wanted to make nice with Cayenne and comfort her (not that Cayenne would understand), but stopped herself before she got close. "I can't show affection to other dogs," she explained, because her three get jealous.

For weeks I've been wearing either a Barkers for Barack or Bloggers for Obama button on my daily trips to Miko's Corner dog park. I seldom hear a comment on these, even when Cayenne wears a Barkers button on her bandanna. But today I wore my Obama T-shirt for the first time, and that provoked a stronger reaction. Nobody said anything to me about it, but they did talk to each other:

Woman #1: I should have the word McCain tattooed to my forehead.
Woman #2: I was going to wear my Obama shirt today.
Woman #1: I should have worn my Palin shirt. Can you imagine?

Young Man on Bench (to wife or girlfriend): Don't worry. We have two McCain stickers on one car!

Such is life in Tucson, 13 days out from the election.

Tonight I posted a brief entry on my Obama blog, which cross-posted as a one-line tease on Facebook. I decided to mess around with Facebook for a few minutes and in so doing discovered their Dogbook section. Cayenne and Pepper are now on Dogbook, with profile pictures and photo galleries and membership in a group for their favorite dog park. Feel free to friend them, or have your pets do so. (Yes, there's a Catbook app, too.)

In other news, Huffington Post has published a roundup of Off the Bus "Grassroots Correspondent" entries, featuring my button maker photo at the top of the page. As it happens, more than a few of them are from AZ and NM, and most of them are much more interesting than mine. Check them out!

Karen