This blog title is NOT a reproduction of one of Chet and Bernie’s stories…yet.
Around 8:30 AM, Zoe started barking like mad and once I got a whiff of what she had seen, I too got my hackles up and joined in with an intermittent baying hound sound. Dad was just waking up and thought Zoe was greeting all the rush hour traffic heading off the mountain, when Mom called to him to come quickly.
He joined us on the front (or back porch…depending on your perspective) and down the road was a rather large black bear staring back at us. S/he had a somewhat confused expression on its face at the sight of these two four-legged creatures making crazy loud noises (and 2 other rather slack-jawed bipeds standing alongside them).
After a few minutes, it turned around and headed off down the road and out of sight…but not out of smell-range. Therefore, Zoe and I sat attentive for the next 10 min or so following its movement away from our house.
It was frustrating that we were limited by our 30’ leashes that were tied to the porch posts as we would have loved to check this creature out more closely. Our parents, however, said to each other that they were so happy that we were restrained – making some comments about how this thing would probably have dealt with us in a manner that we would not suspect.
Suffice it to say that this was an exciting morning and more soon,
The Tempest
Afterword: Just before lunch, we took a little reconnaissance mission up Mom’s Mountain to find out if any trees had fallen across the trail (there were 3) and on the way up we came across what appeared to be the bears’ morning bathroom break – which was very exciting for us except the dang short leash Dad had us on (I’ll spare you a visual).
On the plus side, we did get some great views and numerous wonderous sniffs both on the way up and on the way back.
On the downside (from Zoe’s perspective), lunch was delayed.
First off, the story of our first night on our road trip does indeed involve a cat. A rather persistent and temperamental cat.
Secondly, the title I am using for this blog (aside from “Night 1”) is borrowed from a short story from one of our favorite authors: Chet the Jet.
Chet and his partner Bernie, are private detectives in the greater Phoenix, AZ area. Chet joined the Little Detective Agency after narrowly missing out on being an official police dog on account of a cat distracting him from one of the tasks during his final exam. Chet has authored a number of books based on some of the highest profile cases they have worked. I would recommend these books to anyone who enjoys hearing things from the perspective of a dog.
In our case, neither Zoe and I lost out on a chance for another higher degree (we already being official Bark Rangers back in MA). However, the cat in this story did cause a loss of sleep for our parents during our night in Bakersfield.
It started out around 9 PM when Zoe asked to go out for a quick pee before we went to bed – I had already hunkered down in a nice comfy spot on one of the beds. Mom offered to take her out while Dad surfed the TV channels in our room looking for something stupid to watch as they prepared for bed (btw – he succeeded by finding a comedy called “The Heat” which featured a number of Mass-accents jokes…which they have to get re-used to).
Shortly after finding the show, Mom burst in and asked if he’d heard all the ruckus outside. He did not. I, of course, did hear my sister losing her mind a few doors down but could tell by her yattering that it was nothing I had to get involved with on this occasion. Mom had taken her to this nice little grassy area that the hotel had set aside as a dog run (aka doggie toilet). Turns out, there was a stray cat in this area who immediately arched it’s back and gave Zoe a big hiss. This “welcome” was not at all appreciated by my sister…thus all the barking. Did I mention ever that she is a great hunter?
So we all attempted to settle in to watch the movie with the idea that Dad would take her out again for one last pee after the movie was over. Which turned out to be successful. So the leash came back out and Zoe and Dad went back to the dog run. Unfortunately, Zoe was not satisfied with this location to do her business so they started to take a longer walk around the hotel grounds. This seemed like a fine idea except…the cat had the same idea. Zoe spotted it under a car and went ballistic once again – Mom heard this (I yawned) and rushed out to help but Dad and Zoe made a quick return to the room and we closed up shop for the evening and fell asleep.
Well, as you may already have guessed, Zoe woke everyone up in the wee hours of the morning desperately needing to pee (and possibly poop). So, our Mother, the saint, suited up and took her out for another walk. Zoe was able to complete her bathroom routine and just as they were headed back to the room went stone cold still and stared at the parking lot. Mom was trying to figure out what was going on when a trucker drove by and the headlights hit the tapetum lucidum of a little critter under a car. Yep. Those glowing eyes were those of the cat and Zoe let loose with her best verbal assault on the cat yet.
Mom, fearing the whole hotel would awake and the management would be forced to send us packing, corralled Zoe back into our room and bribed her with treats (some for me too for being an absolute angel all evening). Things quieted down and Mom made a quick bathroom break of her own. However, during this short time our least favorite feline started caterwauling right outside our window. The little imp had followed them home and said enough to get Zoe (and now myself) all ramped up again.
Eventually everything relaxed and we got some sleep…but it wasn’t the most restful night we have ever had for sure!
The Tempest
(apologies for a lack of photographs in this post – since most of the events were after dark and whoever was with Zoe was more focused on keeping her in check; the iPhones were not snapping any pictures). Thus here is a gratuitous photo of the beautiful moi:
Montana Moments 