Honeybee

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This post is completely devoted to my dog-in-law, Honeybee.  Honeybee is a mixed-breed (a.k.a. a mutt), with a lot of character.  To illustrate I would have to post a million anecdotes of goofy things that she does, but that would bore you.

Honeybee is a silly dog, but has a lot of dignity.  She tends to look at you through the corner of her eye, just as in the photo above.  It is as though she is thinking deep and beautiful thoughts, but wants to keep an eye on you all the same just in case you're going to do something amusing.  This glance looks flirtatious sometimes, but I haven't succeeded in capturing it perfectly on camera.

Honeybee loves to go on walks, and gets quite excited when she sees her owner put on her sneakers.  She wears a huge grin while she gallops along on the trails we take when walking her.  She likes to visit her doggie friends next door (this is in the country, so the doggies next door live a quarter-mile away).  They are kept in a cage (a nice roomy one, so it's not a hardship).  Honeybee goes and barks at them furiously, her tail wagging, and then comes home smiling.  I suspect that she knows that if the neighbor dogs were out of the cage, she would be nursing some painful bites.  She's 11, but they're much younger.  In this next one Honeybee is pretending to be mad and snarling.  You can tell from her eyes that she's a terrible actress.

[2011/8/8]

Well, here's a new story that emerged over the weekend.

Honeybee is left home by herself, now since the family is growing up and leaving home.  She does have her pet cat, Bigfoot, but he isn't much company for an intelligent dog, really.  Honeybee is left to gobbling up any food Bigfoot happens to knock off the kitchen table, and that's the extent of their voluntary interaction.

One morning, the gentleman who, apart from Honeybee and Bigfoot is the sole occupant of the house, decided to lock up the house when he left for work.  Now it came to pass that, later that day, the young lady, his sister, who had just moved out into her own apartment, came home to ferry out a few additional items that she needed, and found the place all locked up.  She had, much to her frustration, to gain entrance via the kitchen window.  However, she caught the leg of her pants on the toaster oven, and fell unceremoniously to the floor.

As was her custom, on occasions when she was precipitated onto the floor unexpectedly, she cursed all of nature and mankind at length, before she noticed Honeybee.  "I swear," she recounted to us, "that dog was laughing at me!"

I have to agree; I have never seen a dog with a broader grin than this particular one, and it is with deep regret that I find myself without a single photo of her laughing.  The minute you take out a camera it seems that the dog composes herself into a semblance of great seriousness.  I declare she knows that a photo is being taken, and that it behooves her to look as solemn as a deaconess.

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