Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Day #591 Cats Are Easier


I’ve been dog-sitting my granddogs for the past few days.

Whenever my daughter & Edwin have to be out of town, I go over there around 7 in the morning and again around 7 in the evening to let the dogs out, feed them, play with them a bit. I enjoy doing it.

I’ve found something interesting. My granddogs seem to be regular muses for me. Whenever I go there, I always stay for an hour or two, and I generally taking along some writing or reading to do between playtimes.

Saturday morning, I took my computer, because I’d made a lot of corrections/changes to my printed copy of my most recent book endeavor, and I had to get those transferred into cyberese.

I wrote and wrote and wrote.

Ditto Saturday evening and Sunday morning.

When I went back Sunday evening, I wrote and wrote and wrote. It occurred to me to Google a couple of what I thought were facts, but wasn’t 100% sure. Sure enough, I’d made a mistake (several of them), which meant I had to go back through the whole manuscript and correct numerous scenes. I'd had my fourteenth century ghost wearing a kilt, for instance, but I found out kilts weren't used until the 1500s. So I put him in a belted plaid, which is much more fun to describe anyway. I had to change his name for his knife from "dirk" to "dagger." Things like that.

I had great fun. The rain was pouring outside, I’d already taken the dogs out to pee, and all was well.

At midnight-thirty I looked at the clock. Ohmigosh. So rather than drive the three and half miles home, only to have to turn around in a few hours and come right back, I curled up on their couch and slept all night, surrounded by Max lying on the floor beside me and Belle lying on her soft cushion at the end of the couch. I didn't worry about my cats. They had plenty of food and water, and the litter boxes had been scooped.

Max licked me awake at 8:29 - I NEVER sleep that late when I’m at home ! ! !

So we went through the feeding, peeing, playing routine, and then I wrote until about 2:00, when we all went outside again. 

Then I drove home, to find Miss Polly and Daisy perfectly content. They did wonder where I’d been overnight, but they each took a sniff at my pant legs and decided that all was okay. They’ve met Belle, after all, when she used to come for visits, before big ole Max came along. 

My daughter and Edwin are home now, safe and sound. And their dogs are, I'm sure, delighted.

As my title for this blogpost says, though, Cats Are Easier.


BEEattitude for Day #591:
       Blessed are those who cover their windows so birds and bees won’t try to fly through them, for those people will have happy birds. And happy bees, too!

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my books:  http://www.franstewart.com Please buy them from an independent bookstore or directly from my website.

2 comments:

AggiePete said...

I guess your feline children did miss you overnight but the 'grand dogs' loved your 'sleep over' for sure! There was a great special on PBS yesterday about a young lady (name which escapes me at the moment) who traveled to Bangladesh & while there went with some young men to get some honey from a 'humongous' hive! A man simply climbed a tree covered in only a scarf-type head cover to break off a portion of the hive! The bees were supposedly at least one inch long each. Unreal ! But the girl was remarking how 'soft' the honey tasted ... amazing trip. Other than the honey find, it was pretty 'hot & tiring' and someplace I don't believe I'll visit any day soon!

Fran Stewart said...

Wow, Petie. Wish I'd seen that segment about the honey-retrieval. I know that beekeepers for years used practically no protective clothing.

Of course - my grandfather was like that, but then one day he was stung by a swarm of yellow-jackets, and it came close to killing him.

The suits are a good idea IF there's a problem. Trouble is, one never knows when a problem might develop...