The Learning Curve

Being a dog, life is pretty simple for me. Food, water, a warm place to sleep, a bone to chew on, letting the wind flap my ears while my head is out the window, snuggles with my favorite human (Mom), and, of course, my stuffy, and I'm pretty content. But humans seem to require a lot more. And, apparently, living in an RV is a learning curve to satisfy their more complex requirements.

We arrived in SC to visit Dad's daughter and her family for Christmas. The first night we just parked our roving home outside her house and crawled into bed when we got tired, which was pretty quick considering we'd been on the road for 2 days. The next day we found a site to boondock for a few days. That's a term that means dry camping, or living in the RV without being hooked up to facilities in an RV park. These boondocking sites are pretty easy to come by if you join boondockerswelcome.com. There are literally thousands of sites across the country where you can stay in someone's yard or field for 1 to 5 days – for free!!! I like that word because it means Mom and Dad have more money to spend on treats for me.

Anyway, we found a pretty nifty place in a big field owned by a nice man named David where Sammy and I can run around and go wee when we need to. There's a chicken farm not too far away and we can hear the rooster in the morning. Reminds me of home before Mom sold all the chickens.

Dad finally got the water tank filled but he can't figure out how to get the hot water running. I'm not sure why they would need hot water but it seems to be pretty important for taking a shower and washing dishes. I've never had a bath, and being very short haired, Mom says I might not ever even need one. I guess if I did though, I'd want the water to be warm. We stopped at the Camping World in SC to ask about it and they think Dad just forgot to turn on a bypass valve. Mom is sure hoping that's as simple as it sounds.

Dad also got the generator running to recharge the batteries. This is important because if the batteries go dead there won't be any heat in the morning. Days in SC at this time of year are in the 60s and 70s, but the nights get down to 40 or so. There was actually a frost a few nights ago. That means it would get too cold for this short haired guy if we didn't have heat. I really like being warm.

One of the things that Mom had a hard time with is making the bed. There's not much room to move around it. At first she climbed on the bed and tried to get the sheets and blankets placed while

kneeling on them. That didn't work very well, especially since she has an extra hard time maneuvering because of the walking boot on her leg. She came up with an ingenious idea. She gets into bed and pulls the covers up over her and straightens them while Dad throws them in her general direction. Looks pretty funny to me but it seems to get the job done with a lot less huffing and puffing. I love bedtime because I get to climb under the covers and curl up next to Mom while Sammy curls up next to Dad. It's really hard waiting while they do their nightly bedmaking mambo but I've learned the more patient I am, the quicker they get this job done so I can settle in for the night.

While my folks are figuring out the ins and outs of RV living, Sammy and I are having fun meeting new people and thoroughly sniffing out all the new places we stop. But who knew there was so much learn? Certainly not me.