Rio

My sister is staying with us for two months. She's from Iowa. Actually, as I write, she is having her second hip replaced. Since she has no other immediate family, Lizzie and I are having her recoup in our home. No kudos, please. What were we going to do, leave her out on the street to die?
Rio! It's another story. "It" happens to be my sister's pooch. It's a bichon. I looked up 'bichon' in the dictionary and it's a french word for, "pain in the ass"!
Sis takes Rio wherever she goes. It's been to church more often than St. Frances of
Assisi except it sits in the car for an hour. Rio has a wardrobe larger than Imelda Marcos, more toys than my grandchildren combined. The mutt has a special diet, too.
We have to hide a certain pill inside a liver pouch. Most animals, at dinner time, get Purina dog chow and water. Rio has a menu.
Lizzie and I had our last pooch in '94. It was a wonderful dalmatian, Casey, by name.
But when Casey died my desire for an animal went out the door. Why start all over, again---feeding, bathing, veterinarians etc. Then, after five or six years, they up and die on you. Not fun. If I was forced to get another pet it would be a chicken. At least you can eat those when you get tired of them.
Rio has to be walked in the morning, for certain. All that sniffing, at what, something else's body functions. Then he has to urinate fifty thousand times. All the time I'm yelling at him, "take a dump, take a dump"!
My job for today is this. I have to watch the dog all day to make sure it doesn't mark it's territory on our carpets------just like it did when it was her two months ago--------in six different places.
Four times I walked into the dining room and asked, "who left the unwrapped tootsie rolls on the floor"? I'm glad Rio isn't a Labrador. Tootsie Rolls are a whole lot better than Ball Park Franks!
We have a large field behind our condo. It's where all dogs go to do their duty. If you happen to be a canine you can go out there and sniff to your hearts content. I'm out there with a plastic bag on my left hand. I've often thought, "would this bag fit over it's head"? Not for long mind you, maybe five minutes. Standing out in that field, in all types of weather, can put all sorts of crafty and devious thoughts in my head.

Number 1 son is a writer. We've often talked me writing a Pulitzer Prize winning book. One of these was one written by Mitch Albom called, "Tuesdays with Morrie".
My son thought of my predicament with the dog and suggested I write about my experiences with it. A great title would be, "A BM for Rio".