Saturday

Went for a seven-mile walk with some new friends out at the dog park, and boy, did I enjoy myself! Something that we talked about is that walking is more social than running. Now that doesn't mean that those young folks that were able to run and talk at the same time weren't being social; it's that I can't carry on a conversation and run at the same time. Two things end up happening. I either can't breathe or I fall down because I'm not paying attention. Walking isn't like that. You can have a good pace going and still carry on a conversation. So I'm glad they didn't ask me to go for a run, because I would have missed out on the conversation.

I got a Sam story to share with you. For those of you who don't know Sam, he's our boy dog. He's part golden retriever, part lab, part sweetheart. Now when we got Sam, he was already grown, and he weighed in at 125 pounds. He had the breath of a fish and a habit of eating so much grass he could have passed for a cow. Well, we got the weight down under 100 pounds, and he kept the breath and the cow habit. He was kept outside all the time in Colorado, and we just don't leave our animals outside all the time. They are a part of the family, so they get to come in and hang out. Sam has always had a hard time with stairs and tile floors. We don't know why; we just know he does. Our kitchen is tiled here in Rogers, but it was linoleum in Wilmore, and he would help me cook and hang out a lot in the kitchen. He doesn't go into the kitchen here. He freaks out, and his feet move really fast like the roadrunner’s on TV. However, I can tell he misses being in the kitchen, because he will lean in as far as he can and keep at least one paw on the carpet. He has moved a little closer by using the rug under the dinner table. He sees that I have a rug by the sink but can't for the life of himself figure out how to get to it without traveling over the tile without a towel or something to give him some stability. So he sits outside the confines of the kitchen and cries to be a part of the kitchen group. Poor Sam! He misses cooking bacon with Alex too. He would lie down between Alex's feet, and as Alex was frying the bacon, Sam would lick the air and catch the bacon fat particles in the air. What a dog!