Steffi has always liked to get on my pillow at home when she naps. I usually cover them up, but sometimes forget. She is in pillow heaven here as each bed in the 2 queen bed room has 4 pillows. I gave her a pillow to start with because Randy does not use as many as I do and he gave me one of his extra pillows. Somehow, she has managed to coordinate them all around her. Although she is still scared of new things, she has really done much better than we anticipated for her first time in a hotel, going up and down stairs to get outside to the doggie area. She has become quite the agility dog on the stairs after her first tentative couple of days. She has learned commands such as “slow” and “wait for me” because she wants to go faster than I can. While anything out of the ordinary in the hall or outside (door opening, people walking in the hall, loud truck driving by) would startle her into “back up mode”, she is even improving in that. In that regard, it has helped her learn to better manage her fear, and hopefully build her confidence.
Reggie has always been outgoing and easy going and friendly. He loves investigating things he has not seen before. He wants to run down the stairs and up the stairs, which of course, Randy does not, nor can he, unless perhaps the building was on fire. He goes down the stairs with Reggie and Steffi and me, but he and Reggie return in the elevator. Randy also took a fall while he and J were at the house yesterday when he slipped on ice stepping off the deck into the back yard, and landed on his arm and hip with one leg still on the deck. Fortunately, no serious injury, but he is rather sore today. They have even had fun leaping from one bed to the other when they want to change spots, or both decide to hang out on the same bed. They have been perfect hotel guests.
I had to go get more water this afternoon, another longer dog leash, socks, candles, a new journal, and laundry soap. When I got back, Randy showed me this picture he had named “How Steffi spent her winter vacation.” He said she had indeed built herself a little nest with all the pillows.
We are planning to wash dirty clothes from this week tomorrow before we return home, as we do not know what the water/power situation is yet in Oxford. Some has been restored, perhaps even most of it, but we have no way of knowing the laundromat situation. I have not used a laundromat since the first 3 months I was here when Randy still had the washer and dryer in the house in Abilene. Going to Water Valley to the laundromat was my regular Sunday afternoon outing. It was always interesting, and talking to people while I waited, or observing interactions from the others who came in. When I would get back to the rented house, our ritual was for me, Randy, and 3 of our friends in Texas to email in a continuous conversation (since we were still using flip phones and texting was cumbersome and not done in groups), usually based on my experiences of the week or the latest trip to the laundromat. I was not yet acclimated to Mississippi, not understanding the local dialect, the culture and totally feeling like a fish out of water.
Besides dog training, it has been a week of basically doing nothing but relaxing, reading, napping, talking. Our son has eaten dinner with us every night and stayed to visit a while. That alone has been worth all the hardship to me. Randy is back with dinner, so I will sign off for now and simply say it has been a good day, and thanks to all the kind and supportive comments on yesterday’s post.
All photographs are original images with all rights reserved unless otherwise credited. Kindly request permission prior to using.
Suzassippi's Lottabusha County Chronicles 
