A desert winter's night

It's been below freezing over the past some nights. But last night it was down around 10 degrees Fahrenheit. Our dogs have free run of the yard within the stone wall. They can find shelter from rain near the house (in the front between the front door and the garage and the covered patio in the back). But last night was going to be too cold. So we prepped the house as best we could: Covering the couch with sheets, picking up all the CD's & DVD's, trying to make sure that breakables were out of harm's way, pushing back the coffee table to give them room in front of the couch, clearing off the couch of all the stuff that tends to stay on it, throwing away trash, putting the cats' food & water on the counter, and moving the catbox to the garage. We also left the kitchen window open slightly -- the cats' usual way in & out. Then after we ate supper, we let in the dogs. We closed out bedroom door and Lucy the youngest cat slept with us most of the night. Dog set the alarm for midnight -- so he could get up and let the dogs out for a bit. I even got up with him.

Now that was a sight. I had picked up all the trash lying about and put it in the kitchen trash can. But I neglected to put that can out of the reach of the dogs. Oops -- bad mistake. I first saw shards of the aluminum foil I had wadded up strew in an area behind the couch. I dreaded looking in the kitchen (I saved that til morning). When I went to sit on the couch I saw what looked like a plastic glass on the floor. I picked it up and found it to be the Parmesan cheese shaker with the shaker lid chewed off and all the cheese gone. I told Dog guess we'll be buying some more Parmesan.

When we let the dogs back in and went back to bed, Dog reset the alarm for 4:30. When I finally got to the kitchen in the morning, I found it not as bad as it could have been. The bread wrapper that had had like 4 slices of bread left was on the floor and the bread gone and some other things was strewn about. But at least they had not knocked the can over and emptied it. I was thankful for small favors.