Saturday Morning

Just so you know, I will be spending today and tomorrow preparing my lectures and materials for my Literature and Writing class that begins Monday. I will need to read through the literary and theoretical texts I will be teaching and decide on the sequence of lessons and activities for the firsts weeks of class. But at the end of the day, I will have a nice walk with Goose Dog. He is visiting me for the weekend.

This is because my sweet son Shanan showed up for a visit yesterday morning with his dog Goose---and he left him with me for the weekend. [Shanan is very generous, you know. To share his dog with me, even though he would miss him, is what is so remarkable.]

Last evening Goose and I went for a lovely [and spirited] walk over to the trail near top of Derby Street. [It is so so wonderful to take a walk with a dog in the evening light.] I had brought treats for beckoning him and so I let Goose off leash as much as I could--which made for lots of running and leaping on his part. There was also Goose's disappearing in people's yards and behind buildings at the Clark Kerr Campus and then, when I called him, his reappearing [sometimes after some time] and sprinting to get his treat. And too, as is the norm for this particular dog, there were the many devourings of various fruits [mostly plums] and other things I cannot mention here. [I must admit, I was not able to entice him away from such deeds with the meager treats I had brought.]

We walked home by way of Tanglewood Road, Garber and then down Russell Street. For this part of our journey, I kept Goose on leash. Almost home, when we turned south on to Piedmont, Goose finally seemed as though he had had his fill of romping about out-of-doors: he was panting, slobbering and walking slowly, a bit behind me, in fact. [Good. Goose is tired out. And me, too.] On the porch at home, I [wire] brushed him to get rid of all the stickers that had attached themselves to his thick [and beautiful] fur. And then I gave him a rub-down rub with a towel to get the trail dust off of him as well. Once inside, it was dinner time for the both of us.

I hope for much the same today when we go out for our walk in the evening.