Cougar Cafe

Author's note: I am well aware of the fact that I haven't blogged in months. Getting married and a subsequent move halfway across the country, the realization that I would need to figure out an alternative plan for nursing school, and the fact that I needed to find a job all took up a bit of time. Excuses aside, I'm back; we're married; life is good. My blog style will be changing slightly - for now, I've decided to blog short snippets of real life, with the occasional profound foray into All Things Deep and Philosophical. Without further ado...

Today my dog jumped off a cliff.

To elaborate:

Today my ever-fabulous neighbor, Lanie, and I took our dogs to Runyon Canyon. Basically, it's a 134-acre off-leash park with a wide path that gradually climbs to the top of the canyon, affording views of downtown L.A., the Hollywood sign, and on clear days, the Pacific Ocean.

The pooches loved it. All was going swimmingly until Lanie's pooch, Calliope, found a stray tennis ball. My somewhat intellectually challenged dachshund, Badger, loves tennis balls. Now, we use the word "love" a lot - we "love" pizza, we'd "love" to take a nap. This does not compare to the way Badger loves balls. He loves them, pardon the expression, like a fat kid loves cake. He will do ANYTHING for a tennis ball. He proved it today when one of the dogs let the ball drop on an inclined part of the path.

The ball rolled over the edge - and Badger soared over after it. Just to give you an idea of this "edge" I reference, please see the photo* below.


See the path? Yeah. See the drop? Yeah. That's what Badger leapt from. The dog has a death wish, I swear. I turned around in time to see a flash of golden-brown fur flying down the slope...and then nothing. I was sure my dog had been eaten by a cougar. (An actual cougar, not a forty-year-old woman dating a twenty-year-old man. Although, now that I think about it, there are probably more two-legged cougars than four-legged ones at Runyon, and they really have no interest in dining on dachshund.)

We called. We cajoled. We started to draw a crowd at the top of the hill. Lanie began stripping off layers so she could dive down after Badger and Calliope, who had now decided to follow Badger down on a rescue mission. And then, in a moment that truly should have had musical accompaniment, (c'mon, Hollywood, where are you when I need you?) Badger and Calliope emerged intact from the brush, Badger with the hard-won tennis ball clamped in his jaws.

The rest of the Runyon trip was uneventful. The ride home was peaceful. Fierce was taken directly to the groomer for a wash 'n curl and is now a pretty, pretty princess. Badger has been asleep for the last six hours. Los Angeles? I think I love you. Tomorrow: My love/hate relationship with IKEA.


*Photo credit: Alain Demour.