Fourth of July Fun

For the first hour this morning, Ray was pure puppy. He walked around the house picking things up with his mouth to see if they were toy-worthy. This morning's list included:

• A 25' heavy-duty tape measure (not worthy)
• A felted bowl (worthy)
• Every last toy in his toy basket (worthy for about one minute each)
• A Chicago Softball (worthy; although I really had misgivings about letting him play with it; it's the perfect size to use as a felted-bowl-shaper)
• Plastic wrap (worthy, but I took it away from him)
• His bone (worthy, but he had to go dig it up first; he actually played with it for about five minutes)
• My yarn tote (worthy, but he wasn't going to get the chance)
• Yarn in a plastic bag (ditto)
• Hand spun yarn (ditto; he is particularly attracted to this skein of yarn probably because it still has a lot of lanolin in it)
• An external hard drive (not worthy - thank God)
• Post-it notes (worthy but only for about a second)
• Me (worthy; I walked outside and he attacked in spastic cannon ball mode, grabbed my robe and started pulling, he was not deterred by the Bah)
• Knitting needle (I didn't wait to see if this one was worthy - just grabbed it out of his mouth)
• My sandal (worthy; for some reason he brought it to me, maybe it was a hint he wanted to go for a walk)
• Gregg's sandal, the pre-chewed one (worthy enough to carry outside, not worthy enough to play with)
• The towel that we have been leaving on the kitchen floor to wipe up Ray's water-slobber (worthy but only until Gregg pried it from his jaws)
• My metal nail file

Ray borrowing my nail file

Unfortunately (or fortunately) Ray has a very short attention span so each of these "toys" only kept him amused for about a minute each (if that). I don't want to imply that Ray is destructive. Most of the time he's not (except for the telephone headset and Gregg's sandals), usually Ray just gives these things a couple of chews and moves on. 

After he ran out of things to grab, Ray tried to use his Ninja skills to once again break into the laundry room where the ever-interesting cat boxes are located. I caught him in the act and BAHed while smacking a newspaper against my hand. It caught his attention, but I'm not convinced he will stop his nefarious activities in that area.

Ray was a pest throughout breakfast. He tried to eat Gregg's leftovers, drink my coffee, and when Gregg was distracted, lapped his tea. (Ray will take his caffeine any way he can get it.)

After the stressful morning of babysitting the miscreant, we decided to go to the local Fourth of July parade. We left Ray in the backyard to ponder his bad-dogginess. (Ray's trainer said that if you don't catch 'em in the act, don't bother reprimanding them - they don't remember anything after 20 seconds) and headed out.

When we got back, Gregg took off for the pool. I took Ray for a quick walk around the block, came home, dropped my sneakers inside the sliding glass door, and left them there.
I just don't learn. 
The screen for the sliding glass door is just a flap attached by velcro to the top of the door frame and weighted at the bottom. We used to have an actual sliding screen door with a little screen cat-door in it, but Ray tried so often to get through the cat door that he finally ripped it out of the doorframe. Hence the flap-screen.
I went off to throw in a load of laundry and got back to the kitchen just in time to see Ray stick his head through the flap-screen, grab one of my socks, and back out onto the patio. I watched to see what he was going to do with it but he just dropped it, stuck his head back through the screen, pulled the second sock out of the shoe where I had stuffed it, slapped himself in the face with it a few times, then dropped it near the other. 
(Yeah, yeah, I know I'm supposed to stop him but it's just so entertaining to watch, and it's not like he knows I'm there watching him and condoning his actions - as far as he knows he's all alone and getting away with murder). 
Ray then stuck his head back through the screen, picked up a sneaker, put it on his nose and carried it out into the backyard. He played with it until I went out and took it from him, then went back to the kitchen, grabbed the other one and ran away with it.
It's something we're going to have to come to terms with, Ray has a shoe fetish. 

Ray huffing one of my sneakers

Ray then helped me make brownies for the party that we (Gregg and I) were going to that afternoon. Ray is very supportive when you cook. He especially likes to have his head jammed between your body and the kitchen counter, even if there is only an inch or two of space. 

We didn't stay long at the party because we weren't sure how Ray was going to react to the fireworks activity in the neighborhood. I was fairly confident that he would sleep through the major displays because they weren't close by, but the locals like to light off firecrackers by the bushel. 
Ray was fine until somebody lit off some BIG ONES. He jumped off the couch, yelling, and ran into the hallway. The hair on his back was up. A couple more boomers went off; Ray let off a couple more yells and some menacing growls. I led him back to the couch where I was lying. He climbed up and in about five minutes was sound asleep, snoring.

Ray's favorite, well-aged bone