Millie the Basset Hound's Sunday Salon 11.29.09

2009 at 2pm     Posted by Rebecca Joines Schinsky

Hello, world! Millie the basset hound here. My mom Rebecca has been unplugged this weekend, and she’s enjoying it so much that she decided to stay lazy today and let me write her Sunday Salon post. And Thank goodness for that. I’ve heard that she tells some embarrassing stories about me, and it’s time I set the record straight.

This is me.

I’m cute. I’m thoughtful. I can actually stand still for a picture every now and then. So what if I spill my kibble all over the floor and bark at it before I eat it?

But I’m even cute when I’m barking. See?

You’d be barking too if you saw all of the delicious food that has come and gone through my house this weekend. My parents have barely let me lay a paw on it!

But enough about me. I’m supposed to be telling you about our Thanksgiving weekend. Now, as much as I can figure, Thanksgiving is just a good excuse to have some of your peeps visit and make a ton of the aforementioned delicious food (and torture little basset hounds by forcing them to smell all of those wonderful smells and keeping the food just out of reach on the counter).

On Wednesday, my mom and Dad drove up to Washington D.C. to pick up Rebecca’s parents. I call them Grandma Kaye and Pookie.  While they were making the long drive, I went over to my neighbor’s house for playtime with my two best friends Hazel and Bean. My mom kept saying something about wanting me to be tired and mellow by the time all of our company arrived, and man did her plan ever work!  I ran around and barked and played chase and barked some more, and then I wrestled Hazel to the ground a few times. She’s part hound dog like me, but she doesn’t have my skills.

Oh, but I digress.

So, Grandma Kaye and Pookie came to visit, and that made me really happy because Pookie is just about the easiest mark I’ve ever seen. He basically fell in love with me the first time we met, and ever since then I’ve been batting my droopy eyes at him and getting nibbles of tasty food in return. My mom and dad pretend to be upset about it, but I can tell they think it’s cute too. I mean, who can resist this face?

After I greeted my grandparents (they have a hound dog named Maggie, but she didn’t come to visit), Rebecca’s sister and her fiance came to my house, and they brought my cousin Angus. He’s a giant yellow lab, and even though he’s a few years older than me, he’s still pretty good at chasing after tennis balls and playing tug-of-war with my big rawhide bone. He sleeps a lot, and he tries to steal my food, but I love him anyway, and I was so proud to show him off when we all went on a walk together Thursday morning.

But getting to Thursday morning was an adventure because I decided to wake up in the middle of the night Wednesday night and check on all of my visitors. Mom and Dad told them to keep their bedroom doors closed so I couldn’t barge in, but they didn’t close them tightly enough….so at 2am, I tried to jump in bed with Grandma Kaye and Pookie, but my mom caught me. So then I tried to sneak upstairs to visit Angus, but my mom caught me again!  Really, I just like to make her run around in her underwear in the middle of the night.

Oh, I digressed again, didn’t I?  I’m sorry. I get distracted easily, and there are squirrels running around in my yard. I have to keep them in check. Plus, my brain’s the size of a walnut. What can you do?

Anyway, everyone spent most of the day on Thursday cooking up yummy side dishes and desserts, so I spent most of the day sitting on the kitchen floor just wishing and hoping and thinking and praying for a few morsels to fall my way. Then they all went over to my dad’s brother’s house and left Angus and me here all by ourselves! We felt really left out, but it turned out that they brought home leftovers, and my dad made us each a little plate! So I had a nibble of turkey, and a nibble of mashed potatoes, and a nibble of sweet potatos, and even a nibble of pumpkin pie for dessert!  I never get to eat people food, so it was a big treat.

And I loved every minute of it…..until Angus started farting. Do you have any idea how awful it is to smell big dog farts with a nose as powerful as mine?

On Friday, I lazed around the house while my mom and Grandma Kaye went shopping (but not crazy early like some of those peeps I saw on TV), and yesterday I held down the fort (whatever that means) while my mom and dad drove my grandparents back to the airport in D.C. They said traffic was really bad, and they were gone a long time.  They looked very tired when they came home!

So this morning we’ve been pretty lazy, but that’s not really different from any Sunday around here.  Mom and Dad will wear their PJs all day, and we’ll all take a nap together on the couch this afternoon, and Mom will read books while Dad watches football.  They’ll probably eat leftovers for dinner tonight and maybe watch a movie or something. I don’t really care what they do as long as I get to be cozied up in the middle of them. Or snuggled in my armchair with my favorite afghan.

It’s almost time for lunch now, so I have to go muster up the energy to beat the fight out of my kibble.  Before I go, my mom wanted me to show you our new family picture:

Thought I should end on a good note in case that little goat I’ve been hearing about comes by to check me out. Apparently our moms are cooking up some kind of interview or something.

Thanks for letting me visit your Sunday Salon. I hope you’ve all had a wonderful weekend. Now that I’ve said my how-do’s, I’m off to resume my lazy Sunday. Watch out, kibble….here I come!