February 6, 2014

White Dog only needed to be told once, "You must finish YOUR dinner before you get tonight's special treat." She was at her bowl and eating without a second's hesitation.

She, and the rest of the White Dog Army, had spent the afternoon smelling lamb shanks braising in the oven along with root veggies. It was a perfect dish for yet another cold winter night. They came out of the oven shortly after Steve got home and while the WDA ate their "normal" dinner of chicken, rice and a vegetable medley of the week, Steve carved the tender succulent meat from the shanks.

We had prepared enough to serve several purposes beside tonight's dinner...a tagine for the weekend... shwarma sandwiches...lamb and lentil currry. There were seven shank bones, more than enough to feed an Army.

We decided not to risk Oso's finally stable tummy and instead gave him a bit of duck jerky. Each of the others was promised a bone of their own upon completion of dinner. This was VERY exciting news to the WDA's newest recruits, Taiko and Bella, neither of which had ever (at least as best we could tell) experienced the treat that is White Dog's favorite and which makes all swoon.

When WD finished her meal, Steve handed out shanks. Taiko and YoYoMa dropped to the floor right in the kitchen, not to waste a second before diving in. White Dog took her prize to her "fortress" behind the red chairs. Puff took hers to the blanket by the water dish. Bella dashed out, grabbed her bone, took two steps, stopped, set it down, licked it and smacked her lips. Then she picked it up and scurried under the momma chair.

For some time all Steve and I heard were the sounds of canine bliss, the crunching and gnawing and soft grunts that told a story of how truly pampered this Army is. Oso, in my arms, was more than content with his piece of jerky and snuggling under the blanket...long before the shank frenzy was over, our little old man was happily snoring away.

Of course, I DID say there were SEVEN bones. There are only six members of the WDA and Oso had no bone which means two remain. After a blizzard of white volunteers to handle the extras, I suggested that maybe we just needed to add two more members to the Army....no one thought that was funny or a reasonable solution. So I guess we will just wrap them up and put them in the freezer for some future time when we are short of bones...or until the WDA conspires and figures out how to "liberate" them from cold storage.