Since Sampson gets 3 or 4 short walks during the week, (oh Lord, brain freeze, I meant per day) we try to take him someplace special on the weekends. Since Keeway had major surgery on Thursday, we’re not driving up to Maine this weekend. That’s where Sampson has spent his last 3 weekends. Boy, does he love Maine.
Keeway, our Labrador, will jump up and down on a thin layer of ice to get into the water for a swim. Sampson is a bit more sensitive to the water temperature. A couple of times he decided to chase Keeway into the water which is freezing cold this time of year. Each time he’s done that, he gets about chest deep and then bangs a 180 and heads straight back in. “Oh, Oh, Oh, cold, cold, cold – what is that Labrador thinking?”
So when we get back to the house, he heads straight for the fireplace to warm up. We have a very large couch, which was specifically designed with indoor/outdoor fabric and cushions, directly in front of the fireplace. There are very few rules in Maine, but one of them is no wet dogs on the bed or on the couch. The exception to the “no wet dogs on the couch rule” is if they are laying on a dog quilt. In case you’re wondering, yes, there are 2 types of quilts in our Maine house. One set for humans and another set for dogs. The house in Maine was specifically designed for wet, sandy dogs and kids to run around in and minimize cleaning. That’s the whole point of a summer house, there is no fine china or priceless antiques or Persian rugs.
For the first two weekends, Sampson laid on a quilt on the floor in front of the fireplace, while Keeway hopped up on the couch (on his dog quilt, of course) It’s quite obvious that Sampson has been trained to stay off the furniture. On the other hand, being up on the couch really is the warmest place in the house on a chilly day, especially if one is wet.
On his third trip to Maine, he had once again followed Keeway into the lake, which is so cold that at this point in time that it will turn your hand blue in about 5 seconds. Sampson couldn’t turn around fast enough to get out of the lake. On top of that, it was a cold rainy day. When we got back to the house, Sampson was soaked to the bone. So I put his dog quilt on the couch, tapped it and told Sampson, “It’s OK Sampson, this is Maine and you can get up on the couch.” He looked at me with sheer amazement. “Really? I’m not allowed on couches.” But he was freezing and soaking wet and his quilt was now on the couch, not the floor. So a lifetime of training went out the window in about 3 seconds. Boink, he was up on the couch with his head in my lap. He was one extremely happy dog. So now I’m sitting in between two very large, wet dogs who are gradually drying off and giving off that marvelous wet dog fur smell. Ah heaven!
I’m kidding about the lifetime of training going out the window. Sampson never got on the couch unless I put his quilt there and told him to get up on the couch and I had to be sitting on the couch to boot. His training is still very much intact.
Today we are going to the Beaver Brook nature reserve and park. It’s a nice sunny fall day and Keeway is feeling much better. So much so that he is right now whining at me that “it’s time to go.” We’ll get a bunch of pictures of Sampson at the park.
