Fluffy Dogs On The Go: Memorial Day in the Rain

This morning I was up and out with the dogs for the mile loop walk in the hood...once again they were so wonderfully behaved. I'm still using the Gentle Leader on Bear, he's still in Kennel Cough recovery. I find that the three of them like to walk together in a group more then one on one side of me and two on the other. They are all such gentle / good walkers...nice slack in the leads....I just love it....makes me feel so cool and powerful and peaceful all at the same time. Dog Nerd ya know!

By 9:00 it was raining...thunder, lighting, pouring...the whole summers storm enchilada...groovy dudes...we're supposed to go to Chicago...what now? So I called Jaz......
For those of you new to Fluffy Dogs on the Go, Jaz is my daughter, she's 28 has a good job and a very nice man in her life and lives in Wrigleyville .....

Back to my story....Jaz and Ryan look at weather.com and say it's only 40% chance of scattered thunderstorms....come on in. So I shower and load three dogs, my hiking water container, three leashes, one rain coat and walking shoes....I wanted to arrive looking cool in my poet shirt, jeans and sandals....ya know man, like hippy Mom.....Well, it was still raining...fairly hard when we left, remember the word scattered, whatever, man it rained softly....fairly hard...hard and monsoon all the way.....with windows in the back opened for the dogs....and Jake's love of hangin his head out the window....then coming back in and shaking that huge head....it was quite the trip into Chicago! It never stopped raining, and raining and raining so freakin much for scattered.

Next you new readers need to know that Jake will not go up stairs....he just flatly refuses....and when you weigh 145lbs and are 31" at the shoulder and over all big and stubborn this can be a problem. Jaz's lives on the second floor..."But Mom, the stairs are really wide and carpeted, it will be fine" "Have you meet Jake?"

After circling her block at least 11 times, with three dogs that have been in the car 1-1/2 hours, and now all three are finding ways to stick their heads out the windows.....we find a parking place.....I run across and ring the bell....."Get down here and help me get this crew inside...out of the rain....PLEASE" Jaz and her friend Brooke come out....Jaz has Bear, Brooke's with Mollie and I take Jake....let them do a quick sniff and we are in the foyer of the building....its small....their wet....I'm wet....remember the head shaking in the SUV X 3 dogs....Bear goes up the staircase in leaps and bounds...Mollie follows....Jake makes it up the first 4 steps to the first landing and lays down.....great.....Jaz was ready.....she is standing at the top of the stair with dog treats...."Here Bear you want a cookie...such a good boy....here Mollie Maie have a cookie, such a good girl, Jake, Jake come and get your cookie" It worked.....he raced up the stairs to get his reward!

They were all three really good in the apartment, it is really large and I must say beautiful. We hung out for about an hour...Ryan has never met Mollie and Jake, now add Bear and he was like WOW...these are really big dogs....he was fairly surprised when Jake decided to set on his lap...Jake truly believes he's a lap dog.

When the rain settled down to a light-rain we hooked everyone up and headed out into the city for a walk. Ryan lead us to a huge parking area, only used for Cubs game parking....no game today....it has a huge gate that is never locked and completely fenced. This place has some grassy areas, a few trees and is the size of three football fields, only in Chicago!

We let the dogs run around and once again Bear didn't disappoint. He ran around, chased a ball, even played chase and race with Mollie and Jake....some really good fun and exercise! But man, three really wet dogs.....like we just had a swim wet....We hooked them back up on leash and headed back....now I know Jaz loves me, and if you love me, you love my dogs, but she looked horrified when we started down her street....."Mom, a, what are we going to do with them now?" Don't worry kiddo I have towels in the truck, lets give them a drink, load them in the truck, towel them off and head out for brunch. Luckily it was only in the low 70's that close to the lake, still raining lightly and no one, not even in Chicago is going to steal a car with this crew inside! Jaz and Ry elected to take their own car....cowards! Brunch was terrific, a small corner Swedish place with a fabulous Belgium Waffle, go figure.

After brunch the crew and I headed back to the country...and of course the rain stopped and the sun was peeking out from behind the clouds. I opened the sun roof and all the windows and created a wonderful cool-air blow dryer! With all three crashed out from their city adventure and the wind rushing and the hair flying it was a good drive home. I stopped at Angles with Tails and picked-up three knuckle bones....I'm going to put the junk blankets on the floor in the living room and let them munch away....they deserve it....such well mannered dogs!

Jake and Bear on the Ride Home....Over the shoulder shot!