Greetings from Phoenix – the whole family is here which means Mulligan also got in on the family vacation. He proved to be quite a traveler despite spending lots of time in the back seat of the truck. Of course Burl put the seat up and installed a platform he built for Mulligan and then added his food and water dish along with his feather bed and favorite toy.
Trust me, the SPCA will not be coming after us!!
Yesterday was a VERY long day – we left at 7:45 and before we had gone 30 miles, Burl remembered that he forgot to pack my bike pedals. GRRRR! He was the self-appointed packer of all biking gear and it wouldn’t have been a big deal except I’m doing a triathlon while I’m here and can’t ride without pedals. DUH!
So we returned home, got pedals, and left again at 8:45. It was 11:15 p.m. CST when we arrived at our hotel in Albuquerque and 15 1/2 hours of traveling is about twice my enjoyable limit!
The good news is, I drove less than 200 miles so the rest of the time I got to read and knit. I finished one Christmas gift, made a baby gift and started another Christmas gift – plus read several short stories in John Grisham’s new book “Ford County”. A very productive day!
We had a picnic in western Oklahoma mid-afternoon and Mulligan got a long walk which held him for several hours. When we got to the hotel, I took him out for about 10 minutes and then he crashed on his dog bed which we put in our room. He’s used to getting up during the night and going outside to eat or whatever but he slept like a log – just like we did!
Today was a much shorter day since we only had about 450 miles to cover instead of 850 like we did yesterday. We had breakfast in Gallup and then stopped at a great rest stop just inside Arizona and Burl had his morning nap with Mulligan and I got our exercise. Normally we drive to Flagstaff and head south on I-17 but today we opted for a new route taking 87 south from Winslow and coming out on I-17 at Camp Verde. We already know we want to take this road on the motorcycle because it was smooth, curvy and lightly traveled - plus it took us through spectacular scenery and we escaped the boring I-40 offerings which we’ve seen often.
We were anxious to get to Mike and Annie’s to see our little Devin and it was fun to hear him talking and saying our names – I’m Nyah Nyah and Burl is Yeah Yeah which are the Chinese names for paternal grandparents. Cool, huh?
What was really interesting was seeing Mulligan interact with his dog relatives. Roxie and Rocko are little white furball teacup Maltese and after Devin, they definitely rule the household. Roxie immediately took to Mulligan but Rocko had to make sure Mulligan understood the canine pecking order!
Just a few days ago, Mike and Annie rescued a 15-month old German Shorthair Pointer named Lainie so she’s not only adjusting to the two tiny terrors but now had Mulligan invading her territory! So far, so good – all the dogs seem to be getting along well and are playing nicely.
For us as parents, we’re quite relieved since if Mulligan had failed this test, we’d have to stay home all winter since I won’t be a snowbird and leave him behind.
Just hope he doesn’t freak out when he doesn’t get to sleep in our room tonight – he has to stay downstairs like a “dog” and he doesn’t understand that concept!




And they appropriately decorated it with a little bicycle.