Do you know how happy it makes me to be able to go outside and not freeze my butt off? It makes me incredibly happy. Last night (or I should say, early, early this morning) Millie wanted to go outside. I’m not sure if that is what she wanted, but that is the outcome. Both dogs rarely leave the bedroom after we’ve turned the lights out. There have been occasions recently when I can hear a single bark coming from the hallway. That usually does the trick for me because I never want to take the gamble that if I don’t get up and let her out I will wake up to a steaming pile of…you know what. It would actually be the Great Hunter because he always gets up before me, sometimes hours now as I tend to sleep later than I used to (but to be fair to me, I go to better later than he does).

So last night at 2 a.m. and then again at 3 a.m. I let the dogs outside. Since I’m always cold, I put on my winter coat (the Great Hunter teases me about that) when I let them out. The Great Hunter has them incredibly spoiled because he always stays outside with them. It’s not like they can get out of the yard and it’s not like our friend the hawk is going to be able to swoop down and carry one of them off, it’s something he’s done since they were puppies. Generally, I stay on the deck.

It was pleasantly warm last night while I sat on the deck watching as they ran around the yard and sniffed at everything (because we all know everything smells better at night). As I sat there watching them, I thought about how much light pollution there is in the city, that I could see them in the middle of the night. Granted they are white (or in the case of Dolly, yellow) but unless you’ve been somewhere that it is REALLY dark, you don’t realize it. My son’s house is like that. His house sits in the middle of four wooded acres and when it’s dark, it’s really dark. We used to have a camping lot in a recreational park that was really, really dark at night. At night we couldn’t see anything outside our camper, until the lots across the gravel, one-lane road were sold and the people who bought them installed a dusk to dawn light…

So Spring is here. I’m happy. April is my favorite month of the year. Everything is turning green and blooming and I’m not cold all the time. Hopefully, some of the ten pounds of grass seed I planted? strewn? seeded? last week will come up. And my garden will go in in a week or two.