You Just Made it Mad!

The snow and ice are an old dog's nemeses, of course, and her being half-blind doesn't help. But somehow she makes it work, staggering through snow drifts with a drunken enthusiasm.

Tonight, however, she stands on the top step of our stoop, hackles up. staring in horror at the five-foot-high wall of black plastic trash bags stacked up against the snow bank outside our door.

I walk over to it, and give the nearest bag a solid kick to reassure her, but she seems unconvinced as she finally skips to the sidewalk and veers away from the wall of shiny darkness to trot down the sidewalk and find a safe place to pee.