Photo By Arif Budiman
Yesterday marked the sixth year anniversary of when Murph picked us out at the animal control shelter and we broke down and brought him home. Since we don’t know when Murph’s true birthday is, this is the one we go by. And since Murph’s birthday marks the end of the Team Pryor September Celebration Extravaganza, we had to wrap it up right.
Double Parkin’ It
Murph loves to take walks and go for rides, and if you combine those with a trip to the park…wow. That’s a big day in Murph’s world. After we did our morning tour around the block so he could do his duty, I loaded him up in his birthday chariot (a.k.a. the car, but you should have seen his tail wag when I dubbed it a birthday chariot) and ferried him to the park.
His favorite park, to be exact. Concord. The park’s loaded with paths. There’s the path that winds past the library, which we’ve dubbed the Bunny Hill Route because of all the bunnies we spot on the hill behind the library. There’s the loop around the ancient oak, and another further up that goes by some soccer fields. Then there’s the River Walk, Murph’s absolute favorite because it parallels a creek he likes to climb down and splash around in.
There wasn’t much splashin’ to be had, unfortunately. We’ve had a very dry summer which means what water is in the creek has been stagnant. One time I made the mistake of letting him play in similar conditions and he got extremely sick. So that was a birthday bummer, but there were squirrels and chipmunks galore along the path for him to chase after so…Score!
For our evening walk we went to Owl Park. We’ve never seen any owls there, but maybe it’s because we’re too busy. You see, the park’s laid with a paved path, but at a few stretches it turns into a boardwalk that goes over swampy sort of land with tall grass. Murph LOVES, and I do mean LOVES, romping in tall grass. His most favorite part of tall grass is running top speed through it. (With me trailing behind desperately holding the leash sprinting to keep up and praying I don’t fall and hurt myself.)
Birthday Carrot Cubes
One of Murph’s favorite foods is carrots. When we lived in Jacksonville, Publix used to sell a doggie frozen yogurt called Dogsters. They had a few varieties and we tried them all, but the one Murph went gaga for was the carrot.
But ever since we’ve lived in Nashville we haven’t been able to find any. So I decided to make my own version. I poured some carrot juice in ice cube trays, let it freeze, and voila…Carrot Cubes!
Well, it might have been the first day of fall, but after a hot run through the tall grass at Owl park, those carrot cubes were a big hit. (Which he got after we sung the traditional Happy Birthday song.)
Judging from the way he conked out before nine and was merrily chasing things and making barking noises in his sleep, I’d say he had a great birthday.
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