Fastitious Me

'You're so fastidious about your car,' she said. The car she'd removed a full trash bag of fast food detritus from before we made this little junket to Shoal Creek.



I've been here before, but it was different. I came by bike, last time, my first official 'bike tour' where we hauled our own stuff, though I didn't haul that much in hindsight. Brian and Corinna packed their bikes and Brian's trailer, and me with my little rear rack, I kind of took up the slack.



When we got groceries and booze in Smithville, I expressed trepidation that my bike was maxed out. When I emerged from the liquor store with a pint of Evan Williams, they had strapped all the groceries onto my bike. That taught me.



Anyway, this was an attempt to get my kids away from their usual vices, YouTube and Tumblr and whatnot, and neither of them were receptive to the idea. And since we were in the car, Corinna wanted to bring the dogs as well.



This is something I struggle with. I love the dogs, but it occurs to me to get them in the car with us basically never. A trip to the vet is about the extent of the car rides a dog of mine can expect, to the extent that the late Barley the Dogfaced Boy actually hated car trips because he associated them with the unpleasantness of going to the doctor.



Corinna tries to avoid car travel and taking the dogs along seems to make it more palatable to her, a way to make a distasteful mode of transit more useful by getting the dogs some off-leash running.



Me, I was having a hard enough time cutting through the attitudes of teenagers, and it had rained a lot that week, so the dogs were getting wet off the puddles and wet grass. Mo managed to turn her attitude around, and Em actually caught on that there was a historical reenactment opportunity to be had at the park and really got into it. Sheba took an unseemly interest in the chicken coop, and I realized that all our talk about getting some laying hens might not be ill advised on the basis of city zoning or neighborhood association busybodies, but because the birds would need professional bodyguards to stand a chance. I learned the hard way about how dogs aren't necessarily a chicken's best friend, and while I hear there are herding dogs that protect the flock, Sheba is clearly not one of those breeds.



Then, as we were going to the car, Sheba found a very deep mud puddle and laid down in it. Corinna saw my horror and said, 'Relax, it's just rain water.' No, it was stagnant rainwater in a depression at the center of a pasture, and now this nasty animal was going to get in my car and stench it up.



And apparently not wanting my car to reek like a dog soaked in the dregs of a swamp is fastidiousness. I'm pretty sure it's the first time in my life anyone has accused me of having this characteristic.