A slightly embellished play-by-play of this afternoon’s walk:
1540 – Maggie gets antsy. Ernie, hearing this, dashes from the bedroom to the front door, where Maggie joins him. A couple minutes pass while I find my shoes, a poop bag, and my sunglasses.
1543 – M & E dash out the front door and down the steps. The next few minutes are spent sniffing the base of the small tree in the front yard. Meanwhile, I’m trying to remind them that the purpose is to walk, not sniff in the yard.
1546 – We finally start heading up the street. Two minutes later, Maggie starts circling around in a neighbor’s yard before settling on a spot to poop. The resulting poop is about 20% of her body weight. How an eleven pound dog can make such a gigantic pile…
1549 – Ernie, in his usual fashion, simply stops and poops. No fussiness from him.
1555 – Around the corner, where Jake the mutt greets them. Much tail-wagging ensues. Jake is their pal.
1600 – Around the next corner, up a small hill, and we stop to browse the yard of a local hardcore Republican. This was one of several houses to have “Keyes for Senate” signs back in 2004. Despite my best efforts, I could not train Maggie and Ernie to poop in this yard on command, then or now.
1605 – Further up the block, and two Wheaton police officers are walking into a yard. We put on our best faces, but it isn’t necessary, as it turns out that someone’s burglar alarm had gone off. No signs of burglary, apparently. The gendarmes return to their squad cars, a youngster skateboards by, and it’s a fairly nondescript turn around the last corners.
1611 – Maggie leads Ernie by about twenty feet over the last leg, but Ernie catches up as we reach home. Their reward is a baby carrot apiece. Well done, my faithful friends.
