|
|
|
somewhat unsuccessful dogsitting experiment
Monday, March 16 2026
Our neighbor A has an acting gig that she hates in New Jersey, and one of the many reasons she hates it is that the assholes shooting the scenes won't allow dogs such as her dog Henry on set. I don't know if it's common for dogs to be allowed on set, but A is not used to not being able to take her dog with her. "Can't you say he's your emotional support animal?" I asked. She said that he definitely is that, but it's not easy getting the paperwork right for such dogs. The upshot of all this was that I was volunteered to dogsit Henry today. After A came over for coffee and to chit chat about that and other things, she headed down to New Jersey for rehearsals, leaving Henry with me and my critters. (Gretchen would be working at the bookstore.)
Meanwhile, the day was predicted to be warm and rainy, so I moved things out of the way in the southmost of our two garage spots, shoveled some remaining snow out from in front of the garage door, and parked the Subaru in the garage so I could continue working on it despite the weather. But I wasn't able to get much done today. Henry soon figured out the pet door, and once he'd escaped the house, he headed home using the road (as opposed to cutting through the forest). That freaked me out, because he's little and might easily be invisible to a passing knucklehead of the kind who likes to see how fast they can go once they get past the curve just below our driveway. Not only that, but Henry seemed a little confused about which house was his, initially going up to the door of the largest of the houses across the road from his house. I let him into his house and left him there for an hour or so while communicating with Gretchen about what to do. Ultimately she encouraged me to go back and get him to continue our "scientific experiment." I had to carry him most of the way, though, because I couldn't get him to walk to my house on the end of a leash.
For the rest of the day, I kept the pet door barricaded in various ways. Initially I tried making it work only one-way so that if I let Charlotte or Neville out they would be able to get back in. But then Henry was able to pull the flap inward with a paw and escape (a trick that Clarence the Cat also knew). So I had to run and catch him from in the middle of Dug Hill Road and secure the pet door completely. I also tried just hanging out with him in the laboratory with the door shut, and he lay with me on the beanbag for a time. But his restless energy (similar to Jack's when he is around) made it hard for me to focus on anything.
What little progress I made on the Subaru was interrupted by the discovery that the old rear passenger-side calipers were too far gone and needed to be replaced, something I was able to drive Uptown to buy once Gretchen came home.
But first A came by to pick up Henry. I was candid about what all had happened, though I didn't mentioned that he'd pooped once and peed three times on the floor. Still, I thought, perhaps he could be trained to accept being dropped off here.
For dinner, I'd made one of my vegetable soups featuring potatoes, kale, celery, carrots, mushrooms, onions, canned tomatoes, canned kidney beans, and even tofu. I left out paprika to see if that was the source of a weird flavor, and, based on Gretchen's analysis of the flavor, that might've been the culprit.
When I went to install the calipers on the Subaru this evening, I found that the hydraulic hose port was on a different part of the mechanism than it had been on the original. This might've been part of the distinction between the 2.5i and 2.0XT models (where does that appear on the vehicle?) that never usually seems to matter. To make the new calipers fit with the existing brake hose, I had to remove a bolt affixing the hose to the frame and machine out a stick of steel (recycled from previous use supporting glass on the homemade hydronic panel) to make a bracket moving that support three inches further back. (Good thing I have a drill press and a big chop saw.) After that I decided to take a bath even though I will just get dirty again tomorrow.
The state of the Chamomile Wall today, looking westward. Click to enlarge.
For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?260316 feedback
previous | next |
