Are We There Yet? Who Let the Dogs Out?!

DAY SEVEN:  WHO LET THE DOGS OUT?

We decided to forego any Kansas sightseeing today.  I admit, I’m getting a little worn out.  So we just drove.  And it was really nice to have an easier, shorter day.  The kids are doing pretty well overall—the driving part hasn’t been nearly as bad as I’d feared.  J and R entertain themselves by getting lost in their pretend games or by pestering each other.  K and S continue to be the best intervention for a fussy B.  Although it’s becoming a family joke that K’s standard opening diversion is, “Look, B!  Is that a truck?”  When you live on the open road, there is always a truck.

We stopped for lunch at Dairy Queen.  Where B spent all her time trying to climb over the back of our booth.  She is not a good buddy for eating out.  But she did enjoy the ice cream.  Somehow, though, I remember DQ blasts being yummier.  It’s possible that cold stone has spoiled all my childhood memories of ice cream treats.

We thought we were in Iowa for a good portion of our drive.  But as we discovered hours later, we were actually in Missouri.  One of the side effects of navigating solely with a gps unit rather than maps.  Not that it matters, really, but the kids thought it was funny that we didn’t even know which state we were in.  Other than the state of denial.  And the state of grumpiness.  And the state of impatience.  And many other such lame puns.

We finally crossed the M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I into Iowa just before we got to the hotel.  Since the hotel manager seemed abnormally dog friendly (for a hotel manager, anyway), we left the dogs in the room and walked across the parking lot to have a real live sit down dinner.  It feels like it’s been ages since we’ve done that.  The little local diner had surprisingly good food, fortunately.  Unfortunately, for little B it was more of a sit down, stand up, turn around, climb the table, grab the drinks, steal a fistful of spaghetti from across the table type of a meal.  No wonder we mostly never go out for dinner.  She sort of makes me lose my appetite. 

When we were leaving the diner, I figured it might be a good time to turn on my cell phone for the first time that day.  Just in case somebody had tried to call me.  Oh, say, like the hotel manager.  Who left a rather alarming message for us to call her back ASAP.  And that would be when we entered the state of panic.

She had received a phone call from a poor fellow hotel guest saying that there was a big dog who wouldn’t let him out of his room.  It was Charger.  The stinker.  Who can now apparently add ‘opens doors’ to his list of talents.  We can’t quite figure out the whole not letting the guy out of his room thing.  Charger wouldn’t have barked at the guy unless he 1) had a cat hiding in his room, 2) was riding a scooter, 3) was delivering some mail, or 4) had a bird fluttering around his head.  But Charger would have been nosy, trying to sniff around the door to determine if Shaggy was in there.  He’s all about chasing small animals and staying close to Shaggy.  I hope the poor guy isn’t scarred for life.  But we weren’t about to hunt him down and go apologize.  I’m a little fuzzy on the proper social etiquette for this sort of thing, anyway.  Flowers?  Chocolate?  A simple card, perhaps?  What is the best way to say sorry my dog escaped from our hotel room and trapped you in yours?  Leave it be.  Probably the best policy.

I'm cheating and including this picture from later in our travels. Ruger is the big one. The stinker is on the right.

So, when the fabulous and dog friendly hotel manager got this call for help from her guest, she promptly went up to the 5^th floor and put Charger back in our room.  He was quite docile and sweet.  Probably because he knew he was in big trouble.  The stinker.

We were lucky that Ruger wasn’t quick enough to join Charger in his little escapade.  And it was good that we learned about Charger’s newfound talent at this particular hotel and with this particular hotel manager rather than another point in our travels.

So much for our easy, low stress day.  We put the younger kids to bed at a decent hour and watched a little Harry Potter while we polished off an entire box of cookies dunked in milk.  We did not share with Charger.  The stinker.

We learned a good lesson today.  One that will hopefully prevent any future dog escapes.  We’ll see what tomorrow brings, because we’re not there yet.