A birthday, footlongs and staples.
The trip meter tallied 1580 miles when all was said and done. Last Friday we all piled into the car and drove from TN to PA to celebrate my mom's 80th birthday. It was a surprise party - and she was surprised first by the party itself, then by the appearance of my brother from TX then me and my crew from TN. A good time was had by all 78 people that attended.
During the evening of the clean-up party (which was the next day - hey, any excuse for a party!) I received a call from the people that were babysitting my two male greyhounds (Baker & Bogie). They also have two male greyhounds (Jack & Quanna). Apparently, my Baker and their Quanna got into a bit of a tiff and had to be taken to the emergency vet. They claimed that Baker made the attack because he was standing over their dog when they got to the scene ... I can't really speculate on that, however, Quanna may have started it and Baker just finished it. In any case, my hound had two 1" scratches between his ear and eye and a 2" scratch on his front leg requiring a total of 5 staples. Their hound ended up with a 5" scratch down the side of it's neck which took a great deal more staples. No biting was involved and when they were cleaned up it was just nasty skin cuts. I hung up the phone feeling like sh*t.
Every time we get back to visit my mom, we take a side trip down to Meadville, PA for Hank's and Eddy's - and no amount of dog hoo-haw was going to put the kibosh on that. Eddy's has the best foot long hotdogs - ever. They're Smiths's wieners with sauerkraut, chili sauce, onions, mustard and cheese. After downing a couple of those it's off to Hank's frozen custard. This ice cream is made with the original 1950's churns - only a couple are left in the entire USA. It is the best ice cream ever. Absolutely.
Tuesday was our return date and after the 10 hour trip, we unpacked and sped off again on the 45 minute trek to retrieve the hounds. Picking up the hounds from the sitters was awkward at best. They said it was the only incident between all four hounds and afterward they acted like the best buddy chums. We paid Baker's emergency vet bill (you can imagine the cost) and offered to pay for theirs as well. They declined, explaining that "stuff happens" and we parted ways with forced smiles. They are much tighter in the greyhound community and I suspect that I won't be going on another vacation without the hounds for a very long time.