HAIRBALL WEEK

Amber with the hairballs, Jaz and Butch

 

Linda and Butch

The outpatient breast cancer surgery, lumpectomy and lymph nodes, was on Tuesday, August 23.  Jacob drove me into Fairfield for the day of being wheeled around and swaddled in warm blankets and coddled and catered to...at least up to coming out of the anesthetic after surgery.  After that I was ignored except by one nurse who stepped into the vacuum of her own volition.  She had recently been through the same process.

There was remarkably little discomfort.  The drainage bulb was a nuisance but not painful.  Linda drove up on Friday with her two ShiTzu hairballs, Jasmine and the new rescue, Butch.  Amber was delighted to have the company.  I was, too, particularly since Linda took care of everything around the house, shopping, driving, and so forth.  We took the dogs to the Val de Flores Park and the boat launch frequently since those parks have grass so the hairballs wouldn't get so dirty or full of burrs--always an issue.  On Sunday I convinced Linda to drive to Richmond and Point Isabel, over her objections.  She later agreed that it was well worth the drive to be with all the happy, happy dogs and the beautiful scenery, and great sandwiches at the Sit and Stay Snack Bar.

We had an excellent laid-back sort of week until Wednesday the 31st when I went back to see the surgeon, Mojaddidi.  The pathology results were not too bad, although ambiguous: there was evidently some malignancy in a couple of the lymph nodes (one or two out of 12).  The chief dread, that there would be more surgery, was not fulfilled.  I will see the oncologist next Friday.

Linda and the hairballs got packed up and left for Oxnard in the early evening.  Amber was quite saddened to see them go and moped around for a day.

High tide at the boat launch

NESTING

Four views of the living room in its current configuration

Being diagnosed with breast cancer is a wake up call.  Whatever the outcome of this particular series of medical procedures, it is clear that I am approaching the end of my life, and it's time to get serious about my bucket list, those things that I've always intended to do but have never gotten around to. As I've mentioned before, I have never been a nester, never created orderly and attractive living spaces.  So that's one thing I'm interested in accomplishing.

When I got the love seat and placed it in the middle of the room, where it had long been in my imagination, it didn't look right.  I had thought it would divide the room into separate living and dining areas, which it did, but both areas were cramped and awkward.  And so the bookcase got moved to the back wall and the love seat to the side wall and the result seems much better.  Also, after carrying them about in boxes for 30 years, I finally took the loose watercolors to Aarons and had them framed.  Linda was here last weekend and got them all hung above the wainscotting.  Furthermore, I have accepted that I will never be a house cleaner and have hired one.  She comes every other week and scrubs all the floors and the bathroom fixtures.  That makes an enormous difference, not only in the floors (which don't look that bad after all) but in the motivation it provides to keep things picked up and dusted.

I also hired a landscaper to design the backyard, which was awful.  The plants that had been there had died for lack of water, there never had been much grass, plastic bordering material was torn up and scattered about, and there was a makeshift fence of chicken wire and what seemed to be the sides of an old crib around one section. The young man, Domingo, who runs Rio Vista Landscaping had been recommended by Sam Richards, the real estate agent who rented the house. Domingo thought there was not much hope for grass as long as Amber would be out there and suggested crushed rock with a border of plants.  Here are the results:

The little plants around the edges should get a lot bigger

Amber digs little holes in the crushed rock, so I'm not sure how this will work out, but so far I've been able to repair most of the damage by smoothing the rock out with a broom.  Also I water the plants and the rock surface every evening.  Domingo says the surface will become harder, and perhaps the novelty will wear off for Amber so she will stop digging.  Meanwhile it is a very great improvement and quite a pleasant space.

I have already done the traveling and living in other countries, have been up in a balloon in Luxor, snorkeled in the Yucatan, travelled through the Andes from Chili to Argentina, gone white water rafting in Alaska...I'm glad I did that sort of thing and now I'm glad to have a chance to do a bit of nesting.

GUESTS

Amber and Jasmine together again

Linda arrived Friday with her two Shi Tzu hairballs, Jasmine and Butch, the latter a recent rescue that Amber and I hadn't met before.  Amber and Jaz began chewing on each other just like old times.  Also on Friday, in the morning, Dr. Ferrick called to give me the report on the breast biopsy that was done last Wednesday: it is cancer, so there will be that to deal with in the near future.  So far it is a toss up whether it is the malignancy or the Sutter Medical Foundation that seems more distressing.  But there will be plenty of time for discussing that.

Linda and pooches got a ride to San Ramon with her friend Chris and husband, who were going there for a family wedding.  I had thought I might have enough time in Antioch to get my car smogged, or at least washed, but between being shell shocked at the biopsy report and impatient at the congested traffic piled up in the highway construction at the Antioch exits, I drove on by and went into Richmond to take Amber to Point Isabel.  A beautiful day there, and lots of dogs and play.  We were there about an hour and a half before Linda called to say they were in San Jose and would soon be to San Ramon.  It took us quite a while to get there since I had been reading the map and decided to take the 13 to the 24, even though there was a large sign by the 80 saying to take the 580.  The 13, it turns out, is Ashby Avenue through the heart of Berkeley.  And by then it was rush hour on Friday.  But we got there at last, found Linda, mounds of luggage, and dogs on a grassy corner of a mall.  She drove back to Rio Vista.

Saturday Jacob took his car with Linda and the dogs--her choice since his car is air conditioned--and Amber and I took my car into Antioch to be smogged.  His passed.  Mine didn't, not because of emissions but because of problems with the computer codes in the engine.  Then when we left the smog place my transmission started clunking between the lower gears.  And I headed the wrong way on the highway trying to find a recreation area.  But we got turned around at last and found the park, Contra Loma.  Very nice, and Amber got to run and chase rabbits but of course wouldn't come back and led Jacob a fine chase over the hills, encountering clutches of wild turkeys besides rabbits.  He caught her at last and we headed back to Rio Vista to change for dinner at Peter's Steak House in Isleton.  We all had prime rib and it was excellent.

Sunday we lazied around, took the dogs to Val de Flores park a couple of times, got a movie to watch in the evening.  Linda got the pictures all hung above the wainscotting in the living room.  Monday morning Jacob took Linda and dogs back to San Ramon to catch her ride back to Oxnard.  It was good having them here, a very welcome diversion.

Linda tries to convince the three dogs to pose for a Kodak moment

THE LOVE SEAT

A living room at last

I'm not a nester.  I have always watched with baffled curiosity as my friends transform their living space into comfortable and attractive homes.  Fortunately I have a friend, Michael, who has stepped in whenever I've moved and done amazing things with whatever sticks of furniture I happened to have.  Alas, Michael lives in the Pacific Northwest in the islands and hasn't yet come to visit me in the Delta.  I'm on my own.

Amber chewed up the sofa we had in Oxnard--that was during her puppy days; she hasn't chewed on furniture recently.  It would have been too large for our little cottage anyway, so I thought that what we needed to create a living room would be a love seat, the two seater version of a sofa.  But my search for such an item had not met with any success.  The consignment stores that had anything at all were asking prices in the range of $300 to $400, which was not that much less than what furniture stores were asking for new love seats.  I was willing to get a new one, and visited several furniture stores, only to find that there seems to be some sort of competition to see which manufacturer can produce the ugliest sofas, great lumpy overstuffed things in dismal patterns.

Jacob suggested Craig's list, and there it was: the love seat of my imaginings in a town called Acampo.  A phone call determined that Acampo is on Highway 99 just north of Lodi.  Nellie volunteered to take me there in the van on Saturday.  We left about 10:00 a.m. so we could stop at the dog part in Lodi, which we did.  Amber had a good run and then we set off for Acampo.  The love seat is leather, in perfect condition, and just about exactly the same shade of tan as the wainscotting.

The family was selling it because the son, his wife, college age son and a toddler and an infant were moving into the small house with his parents and they needed every inch of space.  Outside in the yard was an extensive yard sale in which prospective buyers examined furniture, clothing, tools, and all the other artifacts of a household that no longer held.  The yard was also full of police cars and policemen since the son, himself an off duty policeman, had shot a pit bull belonging to one of the neighbors.  The dog had evidently come charging into the yard and was deemed a danger.  In the midst of all this the father and a fourteen year old son loaded the love seat into the van.  On our way out of the yard I got five blouses and a purse.  It is not possible to leave the house any more without encountering amazing examples of the collapsing economy.  Direct experience indicates that the situation is far worse than even the news media indicates.  Would we take to the streets if we knew how bad it is and how there is little or no chance of it getting anything but worse?  I doubt it since people are making such heroic efforts to carry on: moving in with relatives, living in cars, working two or three minimum wage jobs, selling their belongings.

We drove back to Rio Vista where Jacob met us at our house, and one of the young men from the 'hood came running over to help move the love seat into the living room, which now actually is a living room.  Two rocking chairs and a coffee table just weren't convincing as a living room.  You need to have at least one sinfully comfortable place to sit, which we now have.

Maybe I should think about curtains?

RECOVERING

Amber and I have been sick and doing very little other than taking pills and naps, so little blogging has gone on. She is better now, in fact quite full of her usual wickedness and inventiveness.  Her high spirits have at least gotten me out of the house and into the fields with her so she can pursue rabbits and thus siphon off all that energy.  I am determined to get a video of a jackrabbit breaking cover and bounding across the field with Amber bounding after in full cry.  So far no luck.  I have probably seen this occur several dozen times, often spectacularly with the rabbit leaping directly toward me or crossing close in front of me with Amber in pursuit.  Alas, on these instances the camera is in the car, or I can't fumble it out of my pocket in time.  Sooner or later I'll get that shot.  Meanwhile, here's Amber looking for rabbits:

 When we're out in this field near Poppy House Road, we often encounter other dogs off leash with their companion persons.  This rambunctious white charmer is six years old but with the impulse to play of a puppy.  She has perfected the play bow, the invitation to play that consists of placing the front legs flat on the ground while the rear end is elevated.  The two of them had a good run.

DOG ETIQUETTE

Imagine, for the sake of illustration, that we humans live on another planet under the care and patronage of an advanced race of beings. The other humans I’ve met here and I are very content with this arrangement, for the most part.  These beings who care for us and love us, who see to it that we are fed and sheltered are so good that our chief joy is in pleasing them.  Sometimes it seems to me that they like us humans better than they like others of their own kind.  Maybe they know too much about each other.

These beings who care for us are silent.  They communicate without any spoken or gestured language, evidently with a direct transfer of thought and emotion.  I can’t be sure of this, of course, since I cannot communicate with my being.  He can communicate a little with me, however.  When I please him he beams this warmth and pleasure at me.  And when I displease him that wonderful feeling is simply gone, and a sort of cold emptiness is there instead.  It’s hard to describe, but very real.

I said that we humans are content for the most part.  But we are still humans after all, and we like to have the company of our own kind some of the time.  Our caretakers are aware of this and frequently make arrangements for us to be with other humans.  There are special places they take us where we can meet other humans.  But these beings don’t like the way we humans communicate.  The noises we make, our talking, is distasteful, even disgusting to them.  When we try to talk, just a few words to exchange names, maybe tell each other where we were from on earth, the beings are embarrassed and try to separate us so we can’t talk. And I feel that coldness of disapproval from my being.

I wonder sometimes why they can’t understand how important our way of communicating is to us.  What does it hurt them, after all, if we make our noises that are the only way we have to know each other?  Couldn’t they just wear ear plugs if the noises are so disgusting to them?

This is what we do to our dogs. What we term “private parts” are public parts for dogs.They know and are known by sniffing each other’s butts and sharing spots of urine to smell.  Their friendly greetings, their smiles and handshakes and how-are-yous are embarrassing to us and we try to prevent them from happening.  But what does it hurt us after all if some detailed butt sniffing takes place?  Why not just turn away and look somewhere else? 

 Amber and boxers being polite

PHILADELPHIA

Rocky statue viewed from the top of a tour bus

Although the wedding was in Swarthmore, Jacob and Nellie and I stayed in the El Meridien Hotel in the middle of Philadelphia, right by City Hall, to avail ourselves of touristing opportunities.  On Sunday, after the brunch on Rittenhouse Square, we took the Big Bus sightseeing tour, which included (I quote from their brochure) 24 hour ticket, expert local guides, hop-on hop-off, 21 stops.  Our expert guide told us of the travels of the Rocky statue, which had been dedicated to the city by the film company that immortalized Rocky Balboa's training sprints on the formidable steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum.  It seems that the statue was first placed at the top of the steps where Rocky's expansive gesture was made in the film.  The museum's board, however, got sniffy over the question of whether the stature was in fact art.  The statue was moved to some other location, but it turned out that it was the biggest tourist attraction in this venerable city and the tourists followed it.  The art museum board then had second thoughts and brought it back, although not to the top of the steps.  The Rocky statue now holds court off to one side on ground level--thus is a truce between popular culture and high culture maintained.

The Philadelphia Art Museum, among the largest in the country with an excellent and extensive collection, was one of our hop-off the bus places.  We were there for about two hours, which is a bit over the time I can productively view art.  After that I just shamble along like a stunned ox without really registering much.  Fortunately I got to the American collection before that happened and was struck by how similar the work of Homer and Eakins are to Repin and the Russian Itinerants although they were not contemporaries.

Jacob hopped off the bus again at the Four Seasons, but Nellie and I continued on along the Delaware River front and then to the core of the historical district at Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell.  We just had time to see the Liberty Bell before catching the last bus of the day back to our starting point at Love Park, home to the Love Statue, which I hadn't known was a statue.  Jacob and Nellie took the second half of the tour on Monday before we went to the airport to head back to the Delta.

Me with the Liberty Bell, which was smaller than I had imagined and cracked on the other side.

WEDDING

William with his father and sister

Frances with her father and mother         



                                                           









Last Thursday, July 7th, Jacob and Nellie and I flew to Philadelphia to attend the wedding of my niece, Frances Tate, to William Gardner.  The wedding was held at the home of the bride and groom in Swarthmore, a suburb of Philadelphia.  Tate and Gardner parents, aunts and uncles, cousins, brothers and sisters and their children assembled at an Italian restaurant, Tre Scalia, on Friday evening for the rehearsal dinner.

The wedding ceremony was on Saturday afternoon at 4:00 in the back yard of the couple's home.  A few close friends of the bride and groom attended, but it was primarily a family affair for Tates and Gardners.
After the ceremony a reception dinner was held at a restaurant midway between Swarthmore and the city.
On Sunday morning a few members of both families had brunch with William and Frances at the Park Restaurant on Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia.

Ceremony.  We have little of it left; the rites of passage with which we mark the transitions of our lives have eroded until only a few fragments remain.  But from these fragments a couple can create an experience uniquely their own, which is what Frances and Will did.  And in the process they provided their families with the opportunity to celebrate an emotional continuity that we only rarely pause to acknowledge.  Frances wore the wedding gown her mother had worn in a much more elaborate and traditional church wedding, and the album of photos from that wedding was on a coffee table in the living room.  All the careful choices, those that conformed to tradition and those that departed from it, preserved the essence of ceremony without cliche or triviality.

BEAGLE MEET UP

Point Isabel Dog Park in Richmond with San Francisco across the bay

Serious heat has returned to the delta, so Nellie and Amber and I headed for a beagle meet up that meets on the first Saturday of the month at Point Isabela.  The breeze off the bay cool enough to make a sweatshirt feel good; the misty skyline of the Bay Bridge, San Francisco, and the Golden Gate Bridge; rolling hills dotted with shade trees; and dogs, dogs, dogs everywhere...what a great place!  We arrived late and started looking for beagles.  Reports from people we passed on the many paths indicated that there were beagles ahead, and after reaching a fenced perimeter, crossing a bridge, and starting down the narrow peninsula on the other side, we finally encountered a group of about a dozen beaglers and beagles.

Amber does not seem to recognize any kinship ties to other beagles.  From what I have observed, this seems to be generally the case: dogs are interested in other dogs irrespective of  breeds.  Affinities and aversions are as inexplicable between dogs as they are with humans.  Who can explain why suddenly that person across a crowded room seems so attractive?  Or that curly haired, lop eared dog half way up the hill? Amber did find one of the beagles congenial.  Dolly, who was about the same size, also liked a good game of chase-and-be-chased, and also liked to sound the beagle chasing bay.  Otherwise Amber picked playing friends from a variety including pomeranians, bull dogs, poodles, and retrievers (and quite surprised the beaglers by plunging into the water with the retrievers--none of the other beagles cared for swimming).

Among the amenities at Point Isabel are restrooms at either end of the long park, a gift store featuring dog items, a bath house for any dogs needing a shampoo, and a snack bar that Nellie and I discovered had excellent sandwiches.  All in all it was a splendid outing before driving back into the heat of the delta.

Three beagle girls and a curious lab

LODI'S DOG PARKS

Lodi's Vinewood Dog Park

Yesterday's heavy rains brought delta temperatures down to the cool side of comfortable, so Amber and I drove to Lodi to go to a dog park or two.  I had just finished reading Alexandra Horowitz's Inside of a Dog.  Her final chapters deal with how dogs communicate, with us and with each other.  Particularly fascinating are the movements that are their vocabulary of play.  Dogs all know this language, the greetings, introductions, invitations, agreements, refusals.  And animal behaviorists like Horowitz have studied the language in great detail using slow-motion video.

Reading about how dogs play reminded me of how much Amber enjoys a good chasing game, or a rough-and-tumble play battle, or tug of war, or keep away.  Chasing rabbits is a lot of fun, but can't entirely take the place of playing with other dogs.  And so we set out for Lodi, since Rio Vista, although its parks are quite dog friendly, and the surrounding fields rabbit heaven, has no dog park.

Lodi has two large, fenced dog parks with well-tended grass, shade trees, a few benches.  We had previously been to Beckman Park, and stopped there today but it was closed.  Yesterday's downpour had converted a former marshy area into a good sized pond.  We had not been to Vinewood Park before, and had a little difficulty finding it.  Once we did, it became an instant favorite.  Vinewood has at least two acres, probably more.  The address provided on the Internet is on West Tokay Street, but once there we found a notice on the gate forbidding entrance and directing dogs and persons to the gates on Virginia Street clear on the other side of the park.

To get to Vinewood Park from Kettleman Road, which is what Highway 12 through the delta becomes in Lodi, continue to Ham Lane (which is a major artery not at all a lane) and turn left.  Go several blocks to Tokay Street and turn left.  Instead of going all the way to the park, turn left on Virginia just before the Vine Elementary School, and it will curve around to the side of the park where entry is possible and legal.

Of course the most important feature of a good dog park is the dogs, and there were plenty of well mannered and thoroughly socialized new acquaintances for Amber, including some enthusiastic chasers.  The people were also well mannered and socialized, and cheerfully willing to allow the dogs to be dogs without heavy-handed supervision of their interactions.

To get to Beckman Park, which is also an excellent dog park and presumably will open when dry, you also go up Kettleman to Ham, but turn right.  Continue to the first stop light, about three or four blocks, to Century and turn right.  Beckman Park is on the left. 

MAIN STREET, RIO VISTA

 Looking down Main Street from Second Street

After the flood of 1862 had washed away the first attempt at establishing Rio Vista, a small group of determined survivors approached a wealthy landowner, Joseph Bruning, to solicit land on which to rebuild the town. About three miles downriver from the original settlement Bruning had purchased a sizable chunk of the Montezuma Hills, the high ground stretching from the Sacramento River to the southwest.  He was a remarkably charitable chap who not only donated land to rebuild Rio Vista, but continued to support the community.  Another wealthy landowner, whose ranch bordered Bruning’s on the south, T.J. McWorthy, also contributed land.  The surveyed border between the two properties became Rio Vista’s Main Street.

Walking down Main Street, we have, as the town’s name promises, a view of the river.  We also have the local businesses that in their idiosyncratic ways are quite sufficient for our ordinary needs: a pharmacy, a veterinarian, a travel agency, two local banks (I count the Bank of Stockton as such in addition to the Rio Vista Bank), real estate agencies, a book store, Hap’s Bait Shop, several restaurants (Italian, Chinese, Mexican, the Pizza Factory, and of course Foster’s Bighorn a local landmark) a bakery, a grocery and meat market, a pet store.  At the end of Main Street, by the river, is the City Hall.  In front of City Hall is a memorial stone honoring the wayward whale that brought Rio Vista to national prominence in 1985 for 15 minutes of fame.

 Official Rio Vista memorial for a visiting whale

Rio Vista’s Main Street evokes my memories of Springville, Iowa.  There is the same feel to a stroll here.  I was quite young during the months—I don’t know how many—that I actually lived in Springville with my mother, who had returned to my grandmother’s large Victorian house on the occasion of a separation from my father.  It was about 1937, the heart of the Great Depression, and while it was undoubtedly a difficult time for my parents, I remember it as a time of great adventure.

We had been living in Duluth, Minnesota, but were not prospering.  My father decided to return to the family farm near Winterset, Iowa to help his mother run the place, and so we did.  Briefly.  My grandmothers were both domineering women, as for that matter was my mother.  At any rate, my mother did not last long on the farm and decamped with me to her childhood home in Springville.  I suppose many children would have been upset by the emotional turmoil and moving about, but I have always had a great appetite for uproar, and particularly for travel.  My first word was recorded as being, “Bye bye.”

At three years old I had experienced the big city: apartment living, busy traffic, large brick buildings, anonymous strangers on buses and passing on the sidewalks.  And I had been on the farm and helped feed the chickens, watched the cows being milked and even got a squirt of milk directly into my mouth.  And then I was in Springville where the most exciting thing to do was walk uptown.  I don’t know why it was called “uptown” there instead of “downtown.” 

But Main Street (if that was its name) in Springville had the same feel to it that Main Street in Rio Vista has.  It is like a slow steady heart beat, the living center of a community.  There is no heavy traffic, no bustle and hurry, but it is alive.  The people greet each other as they pass, frequently stop for a word or two.  Amber is a great help in this regard as she provides us with a topic for brief conversations.  And Main Street in both towns is the gathering place during holiday festivities, the 4^th of July band concert, years and years ago in Springville, the Memorial Day Soapbox Derby Races this year in Rio Vista.  It is where the community celebrates itself as a community, a particular unique entity.  These small towns have much in common, but part of that is being entirely themselves and not a copy of somewhere else.

2011 Memorial Day Soapbox Derby, Main Street, Rio Vista

WATCHING THE 'HOOD

What Amber likes best about our house is the many windows, and that the windows are low so she can see out.  In the bedroom the sills are even  with the surface of the bed so she can curl up, or stretch out, lie down, sit, or stand, and still keep an eye on what goes on in our neighborhood. Frequently I join her. We each prefer to watch the activities of members of our own species, but both are interested in cats.  There are usually representatives of all three species moving about.  People with dogs on leashes pass by.  Children in swim suits with towels draped across their shoulders  walk to the swimming pool two blocks away.

Across the street live two black labs who come out on their deck to bark loud warnings to any dog passing by.  Alerted by them, Amber joins in to tell potential interlopers not to mess with us either.  Caddy-cornered across the street lives a very old golden lab who is free to wander loose but never goes further than the sidewalk surrounding his yard.  He suns himself at the foot of his porch steps and pays no attention to the ruckus.

Across the street in both directions live seemingly unemployed young men who are outside much of the time.
They attract more unemployed young men who come by to lean on their trucks and smoke and talk, or get a football and toss it back and forth in the street, or help each other carry things from the trucks to a garage.
Some of the young men are attended by small children who play in the yard. Amber and I watch what goes on. One of the children, a little girl about three years old, is playing with a garden hose and sprays the young men standing by the truck.  One of them chases her and takes the hose, spraying her with it as she laughs and runs.

Do Amber and I see the same thing as we look out our window at the ‘hood?  Not exactly.  Partly, of course, our interests govern what we notice.  But beyond that there are differences in our ability to see.  It is not true, although I have often heard, that dogs see only in black and white.  But it is true that their ability to distinguish colors is less than that of humans.  According to John Bradshaw, “they have only two types of color-sensitive receptor cells.”  However, “they can distinguish many different colors based on the relative strength of the signals coming from these two.”  He goes on to say that dogs cannot distinguish orange from red.  And that they see turquoise as gray, which I wish I had known before painting the bedroom walls bright turquoise.

So if it’s bright daylight when Amber and I look out the window, she probably does not see the bright primary colors of the children’s yard toys across the street as vividly as I do.  But if the daylight is fading in the evening, she has the advantage.  Her vision is much better than mine in dim lighting because while she has fewer color receptors, she has more light receptors, making her night vision more sensitive than mine.  According to Alexandra Horowitz, Amber also sees faster than I do; that is, she is better at seeing things in motion.  This no doubt comes in handy when chasing rabbits.  It also explains the almost miraculous-seeming ability many dogs have to catch a ball or a Frisbee  on the fly. 

THE NOSE KNOWS

The weather has cooled off.  What a very narrow range of temperature provides sufficient comfort for us to go about our daily activities. How peculiar it is that this little window of life sustaining coolness-to-warmth is generally available on our planet, at least when supplemented by technology.  Today was cool enough to go to the road by the ferry dock, but not to be without shade in other of our favorite places.

I am reading Alexandra Horowitz's Inside of a Dog.
She is a cognitive scientist examining how dogs experience the world.  Not only is it clear to the most casual observer that dogs have a more acute sense of smell than humans, but the degree of difference is staggering:

"Once a smell has been vacuumed in, it finds a receptive welcome from an extravagance of nasal tissue...The tissue of the inside of the nose is entirely blanketed with tiny receptor sites...Human noses have about six million of these sensory receptor sites; beagle noses over six hundred million."  I try to imagine what it would be like to be one hundred times more aware of odors.  Jonathan Swift was evidently much more sensitive to smells than most people, and this fueled his misanthropy.  How amazing it is that dogs like us in spite of how we smell.  Or maybe even because of it.

Horowitz makes the point that not only do dogs have an incredibly sensitive sense of smell, but that to them smelling is believing, the way seeing is believing for humans.  The primary way dogs accumulate experience and assign meanings is by smell.  I watch Amber as she makes all the necessary little decisions about which direction to take while we are walking along the road by the cherry orchard, and it is clearly her nose that is deciding what direction to take, while I make my choices by what I see.

 

THE BRIDGE TO ANTIOCH

The bridge is directly above the image of the camera taking a picture of the bridge.

Today I again drove the hundred years and 20 miles from Rio Vista to Antioch.  Since there was only one errand--picking up our portable air conditioner at Lowes--Amber went with me.  Lowes is customer and dog friendly and one of the few places where I am able to buy things.  The employees there are evidently trained to be helpful, to not only find what you are looking for but to explain about how things work or what the relative merits of different models might be or how to use whatever widget you need.  In the other places I had looked yesterday, Best Buy and Target, I had to search diligently to even find an employee, and then the most information I could pry out of them was, "Against the back wall," or "Aisle 14," or whatever.  I was then left to stare stupidly at a row of boxes on which were printed letters, "BTU," whatever that is.  British Thermal Units?  Whatever that is. 

At any rate, the experience at Lowes was sufficiently positive that I not only bought an air conditioner  from them, but bought an air conditioner that they didn't even have.  The other two places actually had portable air conditioners in stock, or at least boxes for me to look at.  I thought it rather strange that I would make an extra drive to Antioch simply because of a friendly conversation with two men who told me things about air conditioners even though they didn't have any.  But the expected shipment did come in this morning, so we got our air conditioner.

Getting the air conditioner has cooled off not only the house but all of Rio Vista.  We were not able to install it because it had to be transported on its side, and has to wait 24 hours to get its innards back in place or it won't work correctly.  However, simply having an air conditioner was sufficient to change the weather, although this did not happen until evening and Amber and I spent the afternoon in heat stupors that precluded any useful activities.

But it did cool off as the sun went down, and we went to our current favorite rabbit place, the end of Poppy House Road, where the rabbits were also evidently invigorated by the cool breeze.  They were leaping about in such profusion that Amber hardly knew which one to go after next, and ran until she could hardly stagger.

RIO VISTA BOAT DOCK

The twin towers of the Rio Vista Bridge spanning the Sacramento River are in the background.

Although long time residents refuse to admit that it's hot until the temperature hits triple digits, it is hot enough for me at 95 degrees and above.  And for the last two days it has been that warm inside. Amber is an even bigger sissy about the heat than I am. She finds a slightly cooler spot--next to the tub in the bathroom for instance--stretches out flat, and refuses to move.

Today, which promised to be even hotter than yesterday, I realized that some action beyond whining was called for, and made a foray into the 21st Century as represented by neighboring Antioch with its many big box stores selling portable air conditioners.  I had been warned not to wait until it got hot, but of course didn't listen.  I found a suitable model at Lowes, but was informed that none were in stock.  Supposedly some will arrive tomorrow and I will go back to get one.  At any rate, I managed to get several errands done and was back to Rio Vista by early afternoon.

The drive to and from Antioch affords some of the best views of the delta with all its sloughs and islands.  The view from the top of the great arch of the toll bridge on the outskirts of Antioch is spectacular, a sweeping 360 degree vista stretching to distant hazy horizons, translating the delta map into direct visual experience.

When Amber and I go out in the heat of the day, as we did yesterday and today, it is down to the little park by the boat dock and boat launch.  There is some shade from trees by the river (the cottonwood trees send their little puffs drifting by), and cool river water at the boat launch for Amber to swim in to retrieve sticks.

A sign on the public boat dock reminds us of the bass festival that will be held in October. I have not experienced this but understand it is quite a popular event.  Rio Vista has legitimate claim to being a
major mecca for fishermen after striped bass and sturgeon. There was evidently so much competition for the prizes awarded for the biggest fish--boats, large cash prizes, etc.--that people were keeping large fish alive in their bathtubs for weeks in order to claim that the fish had been caught on the day of the competition.  The festival organizers had to change the contest rules so that the winner would be the fisherman who brought in the bass closest to a secret length, which would be revealed only after the entries were all in.

Meanwhile the dock and boat launch are nearly deserted on hot weekday afternoons, so they are a good place to get a little walk and cool off at the same time.  For rabbit chasing we wait until the sun goes down about 8:30 to drive out to one of the open fields nearby.  Amber has a LED lighted collar so I can keep track of her in the dark visually as well as by her excited yelps as she pursues the jackrabbits.

Fish and bait leave tantalizing smells on the dock.

Cool river water is good for a splash on a hot afternoon.