Roast Dog Recipe

Ingredients:
2 lazy indoor dogs
1 yard of dirt
1 bowl water
1 sun

Set outdoor temperature to 100+ degrees. Use full sun for even roast.

Steps:
1. Place dogs and water in dirt. Dogs may run at first. Lazier dogs will settle faster.

2. When dogs have settled, set timer for 15 minutes. Check on dogs every 2 minutes, or leave door partly open.

3. Dogs will turn themselves over and will apply water as needed.

4. If dog begins to whine or bark, check for doneness. Older dogs may be done sooner. How to test for doneness. Your roast dog is done if: voluntarily comes to back door; has a sweaty animal odor; is hot to touch; tongue hangs out.

5. Remove roast dog from yard after 15 minutes or when done. DO NOT OVERCOOK.

6. Allow roast dog to rest until cool.

Star's Poem

Haiku to My New Pink Best Friend

by Star

My new pink friend plays

chase with me but when I win

he is a bad sport.

The loser, being a bad sport (aka dead)

We've broken some temperature records here in the Austin area this summer (74+ days in triple digits, including a temp of 112 a few days ago, which tied the all-time highest temp ever recorded in our area).

The heat is taking a toll not only on us poor humans but also on the local wildlife. Some of the smaller critters, like the Mediterranean House Gecko (pictured above), have managed to slip inside to cool off. And Star is waiting for them.

Today's flattened gecko corpse is Number 6 in a pretty steady stream of summertime gecko corpses that I have found in the middle of the bedroom floor.

Star has been busy making friends with them.

"Um... My new best friend isn't moving anymore. Can you please fix it?"

Star is friendly to a fault with her gecko friends. She play-bows to the gecko, flops over and wiggles on her side, licks it, and taps it with her paw. Unfortunately, due to the fact that Star is 60 lbs and the gecko is less than an ounce, Star's playful moves make quick work of the gecko.

After a while, the excitement wears off, and Star lies down beside her mangled friend and nudges it mournfully with her nose. Then she walks off to look for a new friend—preferably one that isn't taking a sudden nap.

Number Six is in the minority, however. Most of the geckos make it out of the house alive; I do a "gecko sweep" before bed every night and carry outside any live geckos that I find. Often I will ask Star to observe while I carefully scoop up the live lizard and place it outside in a potted plant. I hope that through our modeling of appropriate behaviors, eventually she will realize that geckos do not want to play with her and need to be set free outdoors.

"Being older and wiser, I already have learned to just say no to geckos."

What is "too hot" for a walk?

Dogs need to go on walks, right? I hear that from pretty much every dog trainer I interact with. Everyone agrees: dogs need to walk. They need it for exercise, socialization, and training purposes.

So up until this ungodly summer, I was walking Star regularly. And it was going pretty well. Star walks great on a leash, and I've found her to be very reliable in worst-case scenarios (off-leash dogs charging us) as long as I keep my cool, say "leave it," and keep walking.

But now it's in the 100s every day. We have no sidewalks; you either walk on the asphalt or the grass. At these temperatures, asphalt is not an option for dog paws, and the grass isn't really grass, it's sticker burrs, fire ant mounds, broken glass, and automobile fluids.

I've been walking with Star at 10 PM for the last few nights, when the temperature drops into the 90s... but the asphalt still feels hot beneath my feet, and it's so dark that I can't see the broken glass, ant mounds, and all the rest. It's also too dark to see loose dogs and suspicious people; thank goodness the dog we ran into last night was a bit lost and frightened, but not really aggressive (Star and I helped it find its home after I made sure it was friendly). And because we're not walking on a sidewalk, it's not much distance between us and passing cars.

Walking in the morning might be a better option, because it's only in the 80s and the pavement is cooler. But I'm not a morning person...

And then there's Star. She's got no stamina at all. She's good on a walk for about five minutes, then she's just HOT. I swear she acts just like a two-year-old child, dragging her feet and mentally willing me to pick her up and carry her.

My final option is to build an enormous mirror and reflect all the heat back toward the sun, a la Futurama.