Magic Puppies

I've never had it happen before.

I locked four puppies in the cage last night at the end of the night. This morning when I got up, there were only three. I swear I locked four in there and I swear there were only three when I uncovered the cage. I also swear that the doors to the cage were not only closed, but locked.

One of the puppies is a magician.

I was in a total panic. I picked up all the bedding and shook it, hoping a sleepy puppy would fall out. I started looking everywhere for the missing puppy. I went to check the bedding again and to take it out to the washing machine. I sent a frantic message to Ashley. "One of the puppies is missing--and I don't know how!"

When I got back into the family room, there were four puppies playing happily.

WTF???? Where had that puppy been? For that matter, which was the puppy that had been "missing"

(That's, left to right: Princess, Harry, William and Diana)

I haven't lost any more puppies today, though I have found myself counting an awful lot. They love playing outside and it seems that I can always find three of them...and always a different grouping of three. Then sooner or later the fourth comes sauntering in.

Diana seems to be the shy one of the group. She was the last to join her siblings. I guess the owner decided to keep her and then decided to give her up to the SPCA. But in the time she was gone, she seems to have lost the bond she had. They all sleep together in a heap, but when they wake up and I let them out, she always stays back by herself, unless I encourage her to come out. Once she gets out, they play well together, but she does seem to be the outsider of the group.

They all, however, love chewing on my shoes (they would rather chew on my socks, but those sharp little teeth dig into my toes!)

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After we got home last night, Walt discovered that we had no hot water. When he checked the water heater, he announced that it was time to buy a new one.

(I'll tell you, they don't make appliances like they used to. This one wears out after only 36 years!)

Walt went off to Home Depot and bought a new water heater, which will be installed this afternoon. We thought about one of those "instant on" heaters that don't have to store water, but it would involve doing significant reworking of our gas pipes, so we went with the old water filled kind.

The laundry room needed to be straightened up and he spent the afternoon doing that, since there is only room for one person in there at a time.

Since we have no hot water, I went out to Panda Express to get dinner for us...individual serving bowls that didn't need to be washed!