Cheryl and River: BFFs

The drive from Ogden to Boise was B. O. R. I. N. G. and long. How many farms can one drive past?  There were no interesting rest areas, either. The best one was just a shelter with some grass.  And to add insult to injury, the grass was marked as off limits for dog. The “Pet Area” was some dirt with occasional dried up shrubs in it. I didn’t have the heart to walk River in that, so I broke the rules and took him to the human picnic area.

I did some stretches on the grass while he sniffed a little bit and rolled around a little bit. No one seemed to care or notice.

The most interesting thing I saw on the drive was in this shelter. There was bird poop on the wall. I was wondering how it got there. There was no place for a bird to be perched above these droppings, so I figured they must have been released in flight. Even so, I couldn’t figure out how so many different birds managed to get this trajectory just right.

The highlight of the day was certainly meeting up with my friend, Cheryl. We met one summer when she and my best friend, Kurt were an item. I was 12 and she was 14. We recently re-connected on Facebook and still got along great. 

She and River became fast friends. He really took a liking to her and vice-versa. Within an hour of meeting her, he was lying on her foot, which is something he does when he likes someone and doesn’t want them to leave.

When she went into the Chipotle to buy our dinner, River and I waited outside, and he sat in rapt attention, looking at the door until she came back. He really loved the backyard, as that’s something we don’t have at home. And Cheryl even had some dog toys. They actually belonged to her pooch, Jack, who was off on a camping trip with her husband while we were there, but River loved playing with them.

Although River is house broken, he did have an accident in her home. I felt terrible, and actually, I think River felt pretty bad about it, too. It doesn’t make any sense to me. He doesn’t pee indoors at home; ever. The only time he’s done that is while visiting somewhere new. He’s actually done it in two friends’ homes and in one Nia studio. I wish I knew what triggered it. The weird thing is that he had just peed when we were leaving Chipotle. And we drove straight home and were upstairs chatting when he just decided to let loose without warning. But I had my pee-kit in the car. I used some rags to soak it up, and then sprayed Red Juice in the spot to clean it. I wiped it up with another rag as best I could and then sprinkled liberally with baking soda. After giving that a chance to soak it up, I vacuumed it with a handheld wet/dry vac. By the time I was done, no human could have detected it was there (although I wouldn’t be surprised if Jack picked up on it right away).

We stayed up way too late, but had lots of fun catching up and chatting, so it was all worth it.

As she left for work the next morning, River and I were in the garage and he walked out the driveway and wouldn’t budge until her car was out of sight.

She took this picture of us sitting on the stairs at her house.