Dunedin Diary: Wednesday

We stopped by the new Frenchy’s Market on our way home from our causeway walk this morning. It’s located in the old Tampa Bay Pools store on the Dunedin Causeway. Frenchy’s has thoroughly renovated the building. It’s across the street from their “Northern Most” Frenchy’s restaurant. The Market has a limited menu of steamed food that you can eat at the few tables out front. Mostly it’s about selling fish, shrimp, clams, crab, and beef in a seafood/meat market style. There are some sauces, dips, salads, fresh vegetables, too. The decor is well thought out and pleasing to the eye. The market opened for business on Monday.

The array of product and variety is impressive. John pointed out that the market is essentially a refrigerator/freezer for the restaurant across the street. Whatever they don’t sell by seven gets transported to the restaurant across the street. Therefore, there’s little waste. That’s his theory anyway.

There was lots of cloud cover this morning, making for a very pleasant walk. The wind was blowing at 9 mph. Temperature was in the lower 80s.

Toby is patiently waiting for his morning walk. He’s having a much better day today than yesterday when he was a little demon.

We ran into one of our dog walking friends this morning. They have a new puppy to go along with their well-behaved adult dog. I asked the man what his new puppy’s name is. He said, “‘Sasha,’ short for dammit.”

We laughed a knowing laugh and I told them about Toby’s multiple thefts yesterday. Because I’ve had a day to absorb it, I can now relate his other harrowing movements from yesterday.

I was vacuuming while John was away. Toby doesn’t care much for the vacuum, and he has become more hostile to it over time. I usually just ignore him until he gets bored and settles down.

I was vacuuming in the bedroom and Toby was barking trying to anticipate the next move of the vacuum. He miscalculated, panicked, and jumped in one giant hop from the carpet to the top of the dresser. Then he scrambled from one end to the other knocking the lamp and a glass plate against the wall and made a flying jump into the bed to make his escape. Miraculously nothing was broken. He did manage to snag one of the attachments from the side of the vacuum on his flyby, so I spent the next ten minutes trying to bribe him into giving it back. Instead of cleaning the house, I’m chasing Toby through the house throwing treats on the floor.

I eventually wrangled the vacuum cleaner part from him and deposited him into his crate while I finished vacuuming.

Being a responsible pet owner, I took a break between vacuuming and mopping to take him out to pee. (Playing keep away from me made him mighty thirsty.) Our backyard had been treated for grubs, so I had to take him out the front. Since it was only a quick pee pee break, I attached his leash to his collar instead of his more secure harness.

After he peed, he decided he wanted to play and wouldn’t let me pull him into the house. Because of his small head, collars slip off easily and are useful only if the dog wants to cooperate.

I glanced down the street and saw our neighbor walking in our direction with her two very large German Shepherds, one of which has dog issues.

The more I tried to corral Toby inside, the better game it became for Toby to not only resist but to wiggle out of his collar, which he eventually did.

He started racing around the yard in circles, darting to the neighbors, and running around the outside of the house. I was afraid if he saw the two German Shepherds he would take off to greet them and it would be a disaster.

Thankfully, my neighbor saw my distress and turned to go in the opposite direction, and I was finally able to coax Toby inside. I was hoarse from calling him.

He watched me mop from inside his crate with his full harness on. (I think that’s like closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.)

To calm my nerves before bedtime, I hung my new painting in the bathroom. That’s one dog who will obey the “stay” command.

Rain was predicted this afternoon so I drove to Weaver Park to exercise, watching the storm front slowly cross the sound in front of me. I made it home just in time. So we’re all sacked out on the sofas waiting for the rain to pass.