Vacation Photos

Here's a picture of the full moon rising above Commercial Street on Portland, Maine's waterfront. The cellist and I were dining at The Farmer's Table with Scruffy.

And here I am with Dr. LeeAnn Cote at NH Endodontics, in the middle of a root canal. Dr. Cote is very good. Nothing hurt until the Novocaine wore off.

The dog's ambition

Scruffy, our adopted terrier, has left behind the touchingly grateful phase of his assimilation. He now feels safe to reveal the less endearing traits like raiding the bathroom trash can for incomprehensibly disgusting snack items and getting up 30 to 60 minutes ahead of the alarm clock to demand service.

This morning he took it to heights I don't want to imagine he can surpass.

He began as he has begun for the last four mornings (at least), with shrill, insistent barks at 5 a.m. The cellist dragged herself from already shallow sleep to escort him to the door so he could go relieve himself. All this was still part of our routine of sleep deprivation.

"Scruffy! No!" I heard the cellist yell. And then "SHIT!"

Her announcement that the dog had chased a skunk under the deck arrived more or less simultaneously with the skunk's own announcement through the open windows that had been admitting the refreshing night air.

The dog is now quarantined in a pen while we wait for the store to open where we hope to obtain de-skunking chemicals. The ever-helpful Internet provided a couple of alternatives with great reviews.

Because the incident happened under the deck, the overspray is wafting in through the foundation vents, so the basement now smells like skunk. We have to figure out how to rinse away the residue from the space beneath the deck, an area we would not want to enter at the best of times, let alone now that it harbors a prodigious stench.