Tynan putting on his best face. Looking good, man! He’s bringing you one of the rugs “on the frame” for this week. “Australian Welcome” is just about done; there are just 12 more little triangles to color in. For some reason this rug seems to have taken forever!
Hey, it’s me Tynan! I’m back again. She couldn’t come up with a good topic for this week’s blog,so she put it on me. Thanks for the favor, Mistress. Not! As if I just have a ready-made post just sitting around my in dog-bed. I’ll take some advance warning next time, sister!
Things haven’t changed much since I last wrote. My fur is still a problem. We live in New Mexico. Sure, it’s high desert, not as bad as Pheonix or Tucson where they close the airports when the tarmac melts. (How is that a real thing???) But Albuquerque is nonetheless in a freaking desert. It’s been in the mid and high 90s for a few weeks, and they still haven’t taken me to the groomers. Again. A long walk that they took me on one morning a week or two ago almost killed me. Thank God for Starbucks! The master, he goes in to buy our refreshments. Leaves me to wait with the mistress. After a l-o-n-g time – do they not see my tongue hanging our of my mouth? – he comes back out with: 1) an iced coffee for himself; 2) a white iced tea for her, and 3) a cup of ice water! What? Not only is it not the iced caramel machiatto that I requested, it’s a cup of water. Just water. No whipped cream, no caramel drizzled on top, no nothing. Poo! Blech! And have you ever seen a dog try to drink from a cup? Not the easiest thing to do. My swollen, over-heated tongue loses half of the liquid while she holds the cup in front of me. At least she went in and had the cup refilled. Thank God for small, miniscule, itty-bitty favors.
Just look at all the fur on me! I wish she’d put the ceiling fan on high. And the AC even higher. This High on Hooking Dog deserves more respect. And a damn haircut!
Not that I want to bore your with my grievances, but they’ve been promising me that we’d go hiking all spring-into-summer. And yet, and yet, we haven’t done any hiking. First there was her big RA flare-up, then he had to one-up her with a big, old gout attack. Both feet. I did kind of feel sorry for him. No walking really for weeks with me and the mistress. But he’s feeling much better now. Finally talked to a doctor, and she’s getting by enough, but are we going hiking, preferably somewhere cooler, like up the Sandiasor to Nambe Falls where we could even get wet? No, not at all. And now that this stupid New Mexico drought had gotten so bad, they’ve closed all the national and state forests and such. Didn’t want to, but people are stupid with campfires and cigarettes, and forest fires are a real thing here. So, we’re sh… out of luck. What’s a dog to do but lie on the bed in the air conditioned air and under the ceiling fan…
I’ll tell you though, there’s a definite bright spot in this hot, summery, New Mexican dog’s life.
Sorry, couldn’t find a pic of my new best friend Darlene, but here’s one of her rugs. Ask her who the designer was. I’m a dog, not a rug hooker.
Vacation’s coming! Yesiree! Yep, the humans are going on vacation in August, the two of them alone on a river cruise. (Can’t wait to hear how they resolve the whole problem of her light sleeping and his industrial snoring. If you have any ideas, write’em down in the comment section below.) Me, I was supposed to go to one of those doggy “resorts” – resort, my ass! – but one of my lovely hooking ladies – Darlene – and Rex her husband have offered to let me bunk at their place. You should see it: Trees and real grass! Not that fake putting green like we have here. I burn my pads on it! Their yard’s bigger than ours too. Lots of places to sniff out geckos and rabbits. And to do my business in private, if you get my drift. Best of all is their liberal offerings of treats. One time I was there and Rex brings me out a big-ass bowl of lunch. Lunch! Mistress up and tells him, Oh, Tynan doesn’t eat lunch, Rex. Bitch queered my action. Still, I got a half of that bowl and some other treats from Mary, another one of my hooking babes. She lives near Darlene and Rex and might take me for a walk or something that week. She has a good house too. Lots of birds; always an excellent thing. I might catch one one day. If I try a little harder. Maybe. When it’s not so warm.
That’s my story. Today. Tune in again to see if she lets me have the laptop again. Hope you’re
No. it’s not too exciting. Yet! Slowly working our way around the perimeter of the “Big Boucherouite.” Hoping to have more time to work on it in the coming month. Remember that it’s got a due date – March 1 – in order to enter it into next year’s Fiber Arts Fiesta here in Albuquerque. Check out the into here. Can enter starting January 1. You don’t have to be local!
cooler than I am. Or at least have good AC and a haircut.
Tynan, the High on Hooking Dog
Notes from Laura:
Tynan has a haircut scheduled for later today. he’s just not aware of it. He’s not usually too excited to go there, though it’s not as bad as going to the V-E-T.
Apparently, Nambe Falls is open, and they allow dogs. We’ll try to get up that way later this week. Don’t tell the High on Hooking Dog, though. It’ll be a surprise.
Tynan the Welsh Springer Spaniel here. After using my likeness so many times to sell rugs, she finally let me write the damn blog. I’m choosing to tell you all about my, I mean, our trip to Pagosa Springs, Colorado, last week.
First thing to get off my chest: Freaking cheapskates should’ve sprung for the whole week at the condo. First time in two years I get out of New Mexico (sure, she’s jaunted off to Tucson two Januarys in a row to rug hook), and they give me just four nights away and out of the desert heat. Arses, both of them.
Monday:
The master and I leaving the Wines of the San Juan Winery in Blanco, New Mexico. There are two bottles in that purple bag he’s carrying. And nothing for me.
So, the ride from Albuquerque to Pagosa Springs is just under four hours IF you take the most direct route. Do we take the most direct route? NOOOOoooo. Hey, I’m as good a car traveler as any other dog, but it’s still not my most favorite activity. (Favorite activities involve food and belly rubs.) Did they ask me about driving the long way just so’s they could visit a winery? NOOOooo. The Wines of the San Juan place was in the middle of nowhere. Really. But they were good people and even let me in the tasting room. Someone could’ve tossed me a pretzel, but at least there was AC. Apparently, my humans liked the wines because they picked up a bottle of the Serendipity Merlot and another of the Rosé of Dolcetto. Do they know how many Frosty Paws they could’ve bought for the same price?
Since we’re almost always in the middle of nowhere in New Mexico and Colorado – most of the ride was two-lane highway – they are so lucky I don’t puke in cars. More importantly, there was nowhere to stop for lunch. Okay, the chances of them buying me lunch are pretty much a big goose egg, but a dog can dream. I could tell she was getting a little cranky. All those pretzels he ate in the winery were definitely NOT gluten-free. She got nothing. Just like me. Ha!
The ride was kind of cool, especially as we moved from the high desert browns and tans and the juniper greens to the lush pines and aspens and all that grass on the cattle ranches. Man, being from Massachusetts, I’ve never seen so many cattle ranches. I’m not complaining. Who bitches about steak…on the hoof? She took tons of pictures – far more than any one person needs, if you ask me, which no one ever does – like she always does, even made him stop the car so she could get out and focus better. Perhaps I would’ve liked to have stretched my legs too. Nah, I just wanted to get there. Besides, I had the whole backseat to myself. At least they put my comfiest bed on it.
Part of Chimney Rock National Monument just west of Pagosa Springs. We didn’t go here, just drove by it a couple of times. But I think a return trip is going to happen.
Finally, I can tell we’re getting close to the place. They start discussing groceries and whether it’s cool enough to leave me in the car while they run in to pick up dinner stuff. I HATE it when they leave me in the car. Or at least that’s what I let them believe. So’s I start my usual whining and crying when they turn into the parking lot. Hunger clearly doesn’t agree with them; they tell me to shut up. What I put up with. I lie down in my bed perfectly comfy.
The view from the condo’s deck. Nice. Just look at all that green grass.
Fortunately, it doesn’t take them long, and even better, the condo’s less than a minute from the grocery store! They don’t even leash me when we get out of the car! The place was great! Surrounded by all this long, green grass. Real grass, not that fake shit we’ve got in our backyard back in Albuquerque. I pee (of course) then rub my face and whole body in the grass. So soft, so cool after those 105° days during the heatwave in the desert. Reminds me of the old place back in Massachusetts that we left behind. With the chipmunks which we don’t have in Albuquerque. I miss chipmunks, though the little punk geckos are pretty fun to hunt. But I digress.
The condo freaked me out a bit when we first got there. Strange sounds; damn, my own toenails sounded so loud on the fake wood floor. And I had to be careful all the time or I’d slip. I much prefer carpet. The deck was pretty cool. Real wood. I liked hanging out there, but I wish they’d have let me off to catch that stupid cat that sashayed by.
That night we went out to dinner at Kip’s. It was great. They bought me a plate of fish tacos. NOT! I sat in the car then got to hear about the tacos and fresh salsa all the way home. Typical.
Tuesday:
Tuesday morning was good; the mistress took me for a walk. On the leash. Not optimum like in the Bosqueat home where I get to run free most of the time, but okay. Or it was till we took that wrong turn that kept us out for 90 minutes instead of the hour she planned on. Idiot. I’ll give her, she didn’t do that again. After breakfast – theirs, not mine, but at least I scored some banana, I love bananas – we…get in the car again! Didn’t we drive enough the day before??? They say we’re not going far. And we’re going on a little hike. Okay, I like to hike.
The most beautiful part of the Pagosa Valley. looks like a freaking movie set. I’m telling you.
We drive east, back through town. I can’t lie, there’s good scenery: mountains; lots of horses; the San Juan River and even river rafters; more steak-on-hooves and ranches that look like they’re straight out of a John Wayne movie. We go up, up, up on our way to the Wolf Creek Ski Area.
The master and I at the sign for the Continental Divide Trail up near Wolf Creek Pass. The idiots took pictures of this same sign back in 1995.
There was still snow up there! And this is how dumb my humans are. We come to a roadside stop for the Continental Divide, and they realize that they’ve been there before, back in 1995,
when they traveled around Colorado. They’d driven the same road (albeit in the opposite direction, from the east) on their way to Durango. Duh! We turned around at the ski area because our goal really was the hike to see Treasure Falls. Of course, there were more stops to take pictures before we got there. But the Falls were pretty cool.
That night we ate at the condo. Because it was vacation, I got a couple of bites of their steak. She didn’t even hassle him about how much it would cost him if I got pancreatitis from eating human food. Hey, I walked and hiked that day.
Wednesday:
Can you believe this, after our walk and breakfast, we get in the car again! Apparently, we were headed for Durango. Why? It’s not like they hadn’t been there before. They wanted to see if it was different. Duh, it’s been 22 years! Have you not heard that you can’t ever go home again? At least it was only an hour in the car. We left the alpine greens and headed back to the desert browns. I have to admit that Albuquerque seems a lot greener than Durango. (Never mind that I’m mostly colorblind. A dog can tell these things.)
The French crepe dude’s cart in Durango. And I’ve still never gotten to try a crepe.
So the idiots were kind of disappointed. We got caught in local traffic driving in. They seemed to think that the place was a crap-load bigger than in 1995. (Duh.) Eventually, we found a parking spot and headed into the Old Town/downtown area. Talk turned to lunch and how they had to find a place that had outdoor seating that allowed dogs. Pooh. I have great manners, and since I’ve become desert dog, I absolutely adore AC. Amazingly, they found a little stand with a French dude who made crepes – yes, crepes in the Southwest – and decided to stop there. Apparently, the crepes were quite yummy. Not that they gave me any, claimed there were green chiles in them. Right.
But there was a bright spot. Several, in fact. Most of the shops let dogs in! And several even had water and – get this – treats for us canines! At the expensive shoe store I managed to score two Milk Bones. Woo hoo! They liked me; found me quite attractive. And, since I’ve lost a couple of pounds and got the slimming haircut, I have to say that I am looking fine.
Thursday:
Yeah, this was supposed to be a day of rest. All we were planning on doing till we went out to dinner was to finally let Murphy’s ashes go. Murphy was my big brother. They’d adopted him out of Colorado six months before I arrived as a pup in 2008. He’d just turned 12 then and managed to live till he was 16 and a half! I think I can take some credit for that. I was five when he died. Five! They’ve been holding on to his ashes since then! But again, Murph was a Colorado dog, so taking home wasn’t a bad call.
My old buddy Murphy, the Colorado dog who spent his golden days in Massachusetts.
Murph was a cool dude, drove the idiots crazy those last years. (I loved it when he pissed on the mistress’s hand-painted cupboard in the foyer. Ha! And he was bullet-proof, would just look at her like “What? What? I’m old. What are you gonna do to me?) Anyway, he got them good last week too. They knew they wanted to let him go in a river somewhere kind of private rather than in the middle of Pagosa Springs. Mistress finds a river on the map not too far from the condo, though it required traversing the forest uphill on a dirt road. The master loves that shit in his Honda Accord. Not! Gets better. After his constant “Are we almost there?” she tells him “It’s just around this curve.” And it was, but it was a DRY river bed. I laughed and I laughed.
Where we let Murph’s ashes go on the San Juan River in the San Juan National Forest. Pretty sweet, no?
Now they’re desperate. It’s our last day in Colorado; dude can’t go back to New Mexico with us. She tells him there’s a place on the completely other side of town…she thinks. Okay, they want to do right by Murph, so we head back east toward Treasure Falls. We find the parking area and the trail. But her map is sketchy. Not a lot of info. We head down the trail towards the river. And get maybe a third of a mile before the path just…ends. We turn around, head back to the car. They’re testy. “It has to be farther up the dirt road.” (Another dirt road; he loves that.) “No, the dirt road goes uphill, up into mountains.” “We can’t tell that; the river is to the right. It has to cross in front of us near here.”
As usual she breaks him and we head up the dirt road. Lo and behold! Maybe a half-mile up and down the road we find the river. We have a little ceremony (me from the car so that I don’t go swimming), and now Murph is running free in the San Juan National Forest. You go, guy. I miss you. And I’m still laughing because what should’ve been a half-hour commemoration took us two hours! Even in death, Murph wins.
FRIDAY:
After our daily walk, we packed up and were out of the condo by 10:00 a.m. Thank goodness, they opted to take the more direct route home. One more drive through the center of Pagosa Springs, a right turn onto Route 84, another two-lane, and we were on our way. We only made three stops. We’d never been to Chama where the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad is. We checked it out, used their bathrooms. The humans want to go back one day to take the train ride. I’m guessing that dogs are personas non grata, so perhaps I’ll be left at a doggy hotel for that trip.
Rug yarn at Tierra Wools in Los Ojos, New Mexico.
Back in New Mexico she made us drive two miles out of our way to visit, yes, a freaking fiber place, Tierra Wools. The master and I are in agreement here about these kinds of stops. At least they let me in to hang in the AC. She didn’t buy anything, but made sure she took pics of the rug wool colors for when she needs some. The master rolled his eyes like he always does.
We made one more stop at a cool place called Echo Amphitheater. While I was grateful to get out of the car to stretch my legs, it was NOT my favorite place. They might as well name it the “Fuck-Your-Dog-Over Amphitheater.” Yeah, the idiots thought it was great fun to call me and have it echo from the rock formation. I had no idea who was calling me and where the voices were coming from. Next time I’ll stay in the car, thank you very much.
And, just like that, we were home by around 3:30 in the afternoon. Our vacation over. I miss Colorado. It was cooler up there, and we’re back in another heatwave here. Ah, well. At least they’re talking more get-aways. In October it looks like we’re heading back to New England for the first time since we moved out here two years ago. And then in January, she’ll probably take us to Tuscon. No, we’re not going to the Old Pueblo Rug Hookers Hook-In with her, but the next day, we’re hoping to drive down to Puerto Peñasco, Mexico, for a week. Very cool!
Hopefully, she’ll let me write more of these posts rather than just pose with her rug of the week. You’ll have to find that on the High on Hooking Facebook page later this week. Until then, thanks for reading.
Signing off and hoping I get to write again,
Tynan
Tynan the Welsh Springer Spaniel of High on Hooking
The rug that generates the most talk when folks come into my booth at the Rail Yards Market is the one I call “Welcome to New Mexico.” Many of you already know its story; that I started it right before I left Massachusetts late last July to move to Albuquerque. In my mind I’d work on it while the child and I crossed the country on our new adventure. I pictured myself contentedly hooking in motels each night as I decompressed after a day of driving. That didn’t happen once, not even when the kid spontaneously combusted in Scranton, Pennsylvania, when she thought her cell phone died. (I swear that I left at least a year of my life on the side of the highway there…)
No, I didn’t hook at all on the road. First of all, it was difficult just getting our things in and out of my Honda Fit each day. If you haven’t seen one, it’s a tiny car, and I’d packed it to the gills. Truthfully, it was enough every evening to find some dinner, catch up with important emails, call Tom (who was still back in Mass waiting for the movers), and brush my teeth before I fell asleep over my magazines.
The sanity-saving, hit-or-miss rug.
Hence, I started the rug in earnest when the kid and I arrived at the house we were renting till we found our New Mexican castle. (Therapy!) It was designed to be a rug of convenience in that I was using t-shirts in the colors of the high desert and no set design. Old t-shirts in reds, browns, greens, and such are pretty ubiquitous; better, I’d found that Albuquerque had Savers stores. Savers has for years been my thrift shop of choice for used clothing to deconstruct and then hook with.
The hooking was done right quick – by the beginning of September. The finishing would have to wait until we moved (again) and I had more table room. To me it was an alright rug; it served its purpose, certainly, but I didn’t love it. Imagine my surprise when I put it up for sale at the Rail Yards this June. It was the mat that everyone pointed to when they perused my stuff. “Love that!” “Look, it’s got a Zia!” Even, “Hey, Sue, you should buy this one for your office.”
An aside: For those who don’t know about the Zia sun symbol, here is a description from Pueblo of Zia:
The Zia logo is used by the state of New Mexico on both the flag and license plates.
The symbol originated with the Indians of Zia Pueblo in ancient times. It’s design reflects their tribal philosophy, with its wealth of pantheistic spiritualism teaching the basic harmony of all things in the universe. (http://zia.com/home/zia_info.html)
Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised by its popularity. Zia suns are all over the place here: on our license plates, on t-shirts, worked into company logos, and so on. Silly me for thinking it would be seen as touristy or, at best, kind of kitschy. I mean, I’m from New England, but I didn’t have photos of sailboats or lobster statues throughout my colonial home.
A few weeks back a woman came through my booth; she had a marketing background and did a lot of work with arts and/or craft shows. The first thing she told me (after saying that she loved my work, that is) was that I needed to have more Zias. that people would eat them up. And that my mug rug concept should be “expanded,” that I should hook a larger rug, big enough to hold four mugs. That “if I hook it, they will come.” (And, concomitantly, they will pay more.)
What the hell, I thought, Let’s try it. Tom and I ran to Savers a couple of days later (if I go on Tuesdays, he gets me a senior discount of 30%!). There weren’t four matching mugs that would fit the New Mexican bill, but I did find two colored turquoise. Fine, we’d start small-ish. Below is what I came up with (minus one mug for the pic).
“Coffee for Two, NM Style” really came with two mugs. Sold!
Fast-forward to this past Sunday. Everyone loves the “Welcome to New Mexico” rug, but, of course, no one wants to pay for it. (I know the owner-to-be is out there…) Lady comes in, is looking for a gift for her mother. Takes her a while to decide on one with the “perfect” colors that will match her mom’s home. I realize suddenly that I don’t have my Square, that I left it in the car. Tom makes a run for it. Lady walks around the market with her husband while we wait. Tom and she arrive back at the same time. I start to input the info into Square. “Wait!” she says excitedly. “Can I have this one instead? I think she’ll really love this one.” The Zia rug with its matching mugs is $10 more. Of course, you can!
So, I’m about to start making a lot more New Mexican-themed rugs and mats. That’s okay. I find it an interesting challenge to come up with different designs that don’t bore me, that have some panache beyond the typical tourist crap you find in Old Town Albuquerque. But I’m not one to design according to others’ preferences – unless they’re paying for a custom rug, of course. Fortunately, these will tend to be smaller rugs. For myself and my own “artistic sense,” I usually have another rug running, something that’s less work and more…therapy. Right now that’s a bedsheet rug. Pictures will soon be available.
“Desert Gone Wild” is a rug that sold two weeks ago. Color, for me it’s all about the colors.
What about you? What do you like to hook? Landscapes? Geometrics? Portraits? Florals? Realistic versus stylized renderings? I know many love to do seasonal pieces. Me, I love pumpkins and other things fall, but I’m not a lover of Christmas rugs. It takes so long to make one, how can I put it out for six weeks at the most? Weigh in below!
