Jenn sent me this photo of Nushi - she had slipped on the snow, and this is the view she had!

For some reason today, I was thinking about my first dog. Puggsey was a cute little mutt - I'd guess some kind of longhaired Dachshund cross. She had short stubby legs that were crooked, but was bigger than a standard Doxie would be. She lived to the ripe old age of 15...pretty darned good for a dog that didn't have a heck of a lot of medical care - I don't recall that she ever went for more than the required rabies vaccines after she was spayed as a puppy.

Puggsey came to me when a kid named Tommy in my second grade class announced that his dog had had puppies and they were "trying to get rid of them." I told him I'd take one, and after school we met at a prearranged spot and he brought me an adorable black and tan puppy. If I said that my parents were not pleased, that would be an understatement! I remember I cried for days, and I guess I finally convinced them I would take care of her.

I was so damned happy to have a dog - I had wanted one ever since I could remember, and Pugs was a great dog for a kid. She would follow us around the neighborhood off leash and never roam too far away. She put up with my not very expert grooming, and my attempts at training her. She was good natured and would go along with just about anything we did to her - dressing her in clothes, painting her nails, or teaching her to jump over the low gravestones at the cemetery across the street where we all hung out!

I guess I was dog crazy from a young age . Puggsey was a wonderful childhood companion and the best introduction to the fabulous world of dogs that a kid could have asked for.

I was awarded the Blog Friend Forever (BFF) award by Michelle! (see link for her blog at right).



Now I am supposed to award it to up to 5 of my blogging friends
. No cash award or anything like that - it reminds me a bit of that lovely mirror ball trophy that the winner gets on Dancing With the Stars!

I love this song, it cracks me up every time!

Last night we got hammered with freezing rain. It sputtered on and off all day, not really doing much of anything, but around midnight it started raining in earnest and froze on contact. This morning everything was covered with a thick coating of ice. The backyard was a skating rink, and the driveway was like a suicide hill! I took a couple of pictures, but it is overcast and harder to see the ice than if it was sunny.





The leaves on the trees were covered with ice, and they looked pretty cool. Now the ice is breaking and falling, and going out in the yard is a sure way to get pelted with ice chunks. It's going to get very cold tonight, and I hope most of this is melted and gone before it refreezes. Give me snow any day over ice!