The dog days of winter

The dog days of winter

Abigail had the honor of finding our first geocache of 2017 on Sunday evening, and not too far from home.


By Allan Olson
A couple months ago, in a moment of what can only be described as weakness, I granted my niece permission to get a dog. Since she is staying with us right now, I have that authority until she has her own dwelling. For a few months I had been saying absolutely not, but for some reason I relented and she jumped at the chance. Within eight hours there was a new dog at our house. My wife and I soon realized that our dog really doesn’t like puppies, and neither do we. They require way more maintenance than either of us care to experience again.
On Thursday night, another dog kept coming around to our place. I was 98% sure it didn’t belong to any of our neighbors, and the kids were even more convinced it didn’t. At 10 p.m. I sent Nikolai out to the garage to shut off a light off that he had left on, and he discovered the dog curled up in the back of the garage, already tucked in for the night. He came back in, naturally concerned about the dog. He got my niece out there to check it out, and of course she was concerned, too, and decided that the stray should come inside because the temperature was dropping. They pitched the idea to my wife, but she said, “It’s not me you have to convince.” I heard them talking, and felt another moment of weakness, and capitulated. 
They brought in, gave it some food and water, and put in the kennel. It laid their quietly through the night and in the morning they even had difficulty getting it to come out. The kids walked it around outside and brought it back in. I posted a photo of the dog on Facebook and despite several shares, likes and views; I was no closer to finding the owner. I brought the dog into Cass Lake, located a Leech Lake Police Officer and we headed over to the pound. 
We hung around town for awhile, and just before going home, I checked my voicemail. Like most people in the area where I live, the Pennington Store is the go-to source for me for things of this nature, and they had found the owner for me. I called the owner and let him know how to get his dog back. We introduced ourselves outside the police station. We headed home and he went inside to claim his dog, and we figured that was the end of that. 
The next morning, at 8:00 sharp, the kids informed us that our little friend was back. It took a little coaxing, but we convinced him to come back in the house. He went back to the same room we had kept him the night prior, and laid right down. I called the owner again, and he informed us he would be on his way. The kids gave the dog some attention, but mostly he just laid quietly and waited. The owner showed up and the dog quickly got up, ready to go back home, all done exploring once more.
New Year’s 
Our New Year’s Eve was probably the quietest it’s been in several years, possibly even prior to our having children. We had only two guests this year, with the majority of our normal guests for this event unable to make it. I was okay with the quieter house for a change, and I think in the end, my wife was too. The kids probably would have liked it better if some of their cousins had made the trip, but it wasn’t meant to be. The evening was spent snacking and eating along with playing games and watching a movie. We didn’t bother with any alcohol, as the food was plenty enough to make us want to sleep. It was still a very relaxing and fun evening. The next day, the six of us just laid around doing as little as possible until the afternoon, when we played a game of Pay Day, and then Abigail and I went to find a geocache. We ended the evening stuffing ourselves with a meatloaf dinner and watched another movie.
It was a very relaxing couple of days; it was nice to get away from the normal routine of rushing everywhere. I avoided going into any towns after Friday, which was fantastic, and especially not leaving the house on Saturday.
I hope everyone had a great New Year’s holiday, and here’s wishing everyone a spectacular 2017.
Please remember to watch out for the buses that are carrying our most precious cargo. Also snap a photo or two to preserve a lifetime of memories. Thanks for reading, and have a great week! Feel free to drop me a line at cltimes1@arvig.net or stop by the office for a visit.


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