Bounce Back

Last night, we arrived back from our quick trip to Florida and went to pick up Dobby from the Smiths’ house, our forever friends who watched Dobby while we were away. They have two King Charles Cavalier Spaniels, Bingley and Charlie (boy and a girl), and they are also fostering a mutt named Coco who is on the high energy side. Dobby met Coco when we had brunch with the Smiths on Christmas Day. After a few minutes, Dobby hid under a chair to ease all the attention from the dogs.

Dobby is a controversy among the three—Bingley is always trying to hump him to assert his dominance, Charlie is always trying to groom him and play with him, and Coco desperately wants to play and to do so as rough and fast possible. Yesterday, Cheryl sent a Dobby update:

Morning report from Dobby . . . He slept well (on my pillow with me) & has been groomed by Charlie and ran around the yard with Coco.

That’s Bingley behind Dobby, checking out the scene suspiciously. That stare at the camera is his evaluation on whether someone might love Dobby more than him, and if so, Dobby has to take an L.

When we were about to take off last night, Cheryl, Lauren, Evan, and I had this exchange:

G: We land around 9:30. I would like to get Dobby tonight if that is ok. We would probably reach you all around 11.

C: Sounds good

Me: Thanks for taking him

C: No problem. He’s probably exhausted from being chased around the yard & humped & licked 😂

L: Omg. I can relate

E:

Um, yeah. Took the L on that, I guess. Anyway.

When we picked up Dobby late that evening, Cheryl met me at the door in pajamas and with all the dogs. Evan was still in jeans and a T-shirt.

“We were watching a show and down for the night,” she said. “Dobby was up on my pillow ready to go to sleep.”

“He sleeps with his head on my pillow and his body wedged between our two pillows,” I said.

“Yes, that’s exactly how it was.”

We got in the car, and Dobby was so excited to find Lauren in the passenger side that she got all the kisses and he stayed with her the whole ride home. In the morning, after his morning walk and run, he got his pup cup of whipped cream (don’t ask), and then he joined her in the office for about two hours. Usually, he sleeps next to me while I work.

He eventually returned to me and totally wiped out in my lap.

So the great news is things are back to normal, and that means the highlight of today was that I found stuff. That is, I found stuff that I myself had hidden from myself apparently. For example, we have a favorite back scratcher that we keep in the front room. It went missing for more than a month, and as a result, Santa brought Lauren a new back scratcher. I sense that she blames me for the loss of the first back scratcher because she has kept her new one on her night stand next to her side of the bed, and I have not gotten to use it even once (I have my Encyclopedia Brown Junior Detective Merit Badge, folks). Well, I recently had two books on Confederate dead at Gettysburg in my work bag, and I had taken them out to lighten the bag’s load. Naturally, they disappeared, and there’s really no way I could accuse anyone else of losing them. So I went on a search for them today, and guess what . . . I found the back scratcher! I also found a missing hairbrush (I definitely am not responsible for that, but perhaps it is Graham’s missing brush he claims he never had?). And after all that, I found my missing books.

So you know, as Big Sean observed, Last night took an L, but tonight I bounce back.

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