How many lives does one dog have?

Yesterday we narrowly escaped a crisis. Husband and I, with 3 of our dogs, were on our way to the dog park. We stopped at a red light, and turned left. The passenger side door of our minivan slid OPEN, and Nanners FELL OUT OF THE VAN.

Somehow, thank G-d, thank Dog, thank every power that is, he only got a small scrape on the side of one ankle. The guy behind us saw it happen, and as I jumped out, Nay just had this "WTF?" kind of expression on his face. Got him back in, got to the park (just a bit down the road and safest place to stop and really inspect him) and he was fine. The guy who saw it followed us to make sure he was okay, and said he was a "beautiful dog." (Which he is.)

I just *knew* when I realized what was going on he'd be run over the rear wheels of the van, or have a broken leg, head trauma, something. Somehow none of that happened. He went to the park and was running and happy and just "okay whatever." Except he decided to pee ON a bench, which he's never done before. What was also weird was that the dogs were totally silent the whole way to the park after that, which normally it's a screaming chorus of excitement.

When we got back in the van, after establishing he was at least mostly okay, hubby and I both just sat there, breathless, freaked out, and I was near tears. Just thinking about it freaks me out still. I'm just SO thankful nothing worse happened. Weird thing is the van doors are hard to open even when shut right, and I really thought they were shut properly.

I guess this is kind of a PSA for making sure your doors are shut and locked properly at all times.
Nay wasn't thrilled with us putting gauze and neosporin on his scrape, but he's fine and that's all I need to know.

Vacation??!?

An interesting thing came to my attention today. I have 108 hours of vacation accrued at work. The new rule is that we can only roll over 5 days for our next fiscal year, which ends March 31.

Why am I posting this on my dog/critter/animal blog?

Because it means glorious things for the dogs I am lucky enough to be owned by...quite a few half days, and am taking the entire week of Spring Break off next month. (I work in a bookstore for a state college.) This means a mommy who gets to sleep in, can take them for longer walks, more trips to the p-a-r-k, and possibly even getting the fencing put up in the backyard that they so despartely need.

This means more belly rubs, more treats, more fun times, as opposed to the status quo, which, M-F, and often weekends, is "Oh good grief, I just stepped in the door after dealing with idiocy all day, please give me a minute."

I am sure they will be unanimously thrilled.

How do they know?

This is a question I've wondered for a long time. How do my dogs know when we're fixing to take them to the dog park? My husband and I don't say the words, or spell them. Perhaps one of us will ask the other "do you want to go to that place to do that thing?" Sometimes we write it down. Sometime we'll step outside so the dogs can't hear us.

It makes no difference. They know.

Doesn't matter if I have my shoes on already or put them one before leaving, look for keys, any of that. There's no set pattern to our departure, but they start bouncing. And boinging. And standing at the door, and then Emma (the princess) starts barking/howling.

Next thing you know, we load up three, put Kamala in her crate (she's not a dog park dog) and away we go, for an hour or so of unfettered sniffing, peeing, pooping and splashing. (Oh how they love the pond!) They meet their friends, make new friends, Emma gives dirty looks to all the intact males, Clark plays referee every chance he gets, and Nanners just wanders around until he find a buddy to wander with. They go home exhausted, which only supports my theory...

a tired dog is a good dog. :)