Spring Survival

Last week I took the down blanket off the bed and tucked it into the closet for storage.  Andy and I went for a bike ride wearing shorts.  But wait...it is May in Michigan!

Six-thirty on Saturday morning Andy says, "Mike is wacky."  Not a surprise since the only exercise he got the day before was our after-dinner shopping-date at Home Depot and Barnes and Nobles.  Too early for Mike to be instigating a skirmish with a vociferous Gypsy, I grab their leashes.  I'll be back!  Tough luck that they haven't even had breakfast yet. 

As the rising sun squints my eyes I take a quick look over my shoulder and spy an ominous wall of nimbostratus.  This rain-bearing-cloud, railroaded by a ferocious west-wind, threatens to thrust night back into the morning.

I pick up the pace.  Maybe we can make our two-mile loop.  FLD Mike and Gypsy simultaneously glance up at me as if to say, "Let's get going then!"

As we turn north at Little Mack I get a better view of the impending weather.  Well, maybe not.  I turn east at the next corner to shorten our route.  The wind punches me full-force.  I wish I had retrieved my winter coat from the front closet--it's COLD!  We hustle on.  Suddenly the sun blinks out as if Zeus himself had pulled its plug.  I look up.  The dark wall is looming just over the rooftops; a few sharp drops of rain prick my face; the lofty, spring-leaved trees that line the streets of this old neighborhood groan ominously:  "Go back, go back!"

Ok! I gulp, time to turn around.  HEEL I command as we do an about-face.  I know that running with an under-one-year-old puppy is never recommended (growth plates aren't fully formed until then), but I make a decision to get home ASAP and launch into a jog.  Well, I suppose my "jog" is more of a "slog"--FLD Mike and Gypsy break into a fierce trot.

We burst into the back hallway, soaked through.  Ah, breakfast laced with the lovely aroma of wet puppies!

Afterwards, FLD Mike transforms into: ta da....REGISTER DOG!  (While we were out, Andy kicked the heat on to chase the frost-warning chill out of the house.)