New Heights

Went yesterday to the mountain we can see in the distance to the south east. It is my cousins' distant neighbour. They can see Mt. Baker from almost every room in their house and their back deck. I can't believe that I've lived here my whole life and this is the first time I've been there. We weren't expecting snow, but we got it. I'm tired and sunburnt (I know, I know), so I'm going to flake out and just post some photos. Enjoy.

I will post more photos tomorrow (or whenever I get around to it).

Dog Days

New neighbours moved in next door. We thought that this was a good thing because we heard from one of the previous renters (in a house that had been divided into 4 units), that the new owners were kicking everyone out because they wanted to live there.

Ahhhh, we though. Relief from all the comings and goings; relief from all the cars; relief.

Well, not so much. It is one family (as far as we can tell) that has moved in. And they have only three cars, which is the same number as we have (so we can't complain). The problem is their poor dog.

While I'm typing, it is howling. And I'm not complaining about the howling. I'd be howling too. They leave it chained to the boat trailer (small boat) all day. It sleeps in the sun, laying on the gravel. Whenever a car drives up, it jumps up, hopeful that someone has come home. We never see anyone interact with it. Sometimes, it knocks over it's water dish. Sometimes, it gets tangled up in the trailer hitch.

The first time it started howling was when it knocked over its water bucket. It would pick it up, and toss it around in the air, trying to get someone's attention. When that didn't work, it would bark. We looked just before the sun went down, and the poor thing was still out there with its tipped over water bucket.

I'm trying to write a snappy article for the magazine. It's about keeping unwanted mail out of your mailbox. To start the article, I wrote about dogs overwhelmed with their shredding duties because of all the junk mail. If only that was the dog-next-door's biggest problem.

We have reported them to the SPCA. I hope that they do something.