I’ve been so busy kvetching about all things agarita that I’ve failed to keep you up on the WWTs. So here goes…
Partway through the walk, however, she was stopped cold along with the others. Of all things, I had attracted an admirer. A little black and white terrier type darted out from his yard to check me out, front and back. We did some mutual sniffing before I moved on with the ladies. Then he suddenly reappeared at the top of the hill, wanting more.
Instructions on packages of pectin make it sound like a piece of cake-- which is so not true. Mary and Maverick met defeat time after time (and boy did I hear some salty language) in the jelling department. Actually the first time Mary had beginnner’s luck. But the next three times she and Maverick boiled the juice with sugar, lemon juice and fruit pectin, they were forced to repeat the process when none of it jelled.
They had to empty all the jars back into the pot, add more pectin and bring it back to a boil-- which can be a booger since it will boil all over the stove if you don't watch it like a hawk. (I heard more salty language the times this happened.) The last go round, Mary added enough Certo to stiffen a wet blanket.
They say those who rise to to fame and fortune take their exalted status more seriously than those who were born into it.
Take me, for example. Five years ago I was a mixed breed Chihuahua ranging the streets of Austin. With heartworms. Since my rescue I've become a pampered princess, one who just participated in a doggie coronation in a velvet gown trimmed in ermine. (OK, the ermine was fake but you get the picture.)
Do I feel the grandeur more than a dog who came into the world with a pedigree? Well I haven’t asked my famous cousin, Sadie, how she felt after winning best-in-show at Madison Square Garden this year. My guess is, she took it pretty much for granted. Even when she met Donald Trump.
Me? I savor every little perk or notice that comes my way. But I also feel a growing sense of hauteur, now that I’ve entered the world of privilege. I’m trying not to snoot the hoi polloi of dogdom, but it’s hard not to feel superior when you’ve been given a title--even if it’s a silly one like Duchess of the Indestructible Chew Toy.
I have to be mindful, however, not to reveal my background by exhibiting a “let them eat dog biscuits” attitude. The last thing I want to have said about me is something that Sadie’s mistress (my mistress’s cousin) once said about a gauche arriviste: “He’s a pig in the parlor.”
They say what goes around comes around. Well that certainly came true this week. Dog's honor.
The story begins in Tarpley, where my master and mistress went on Saturday to harvest more agarita berries. This time they employed the upside down umbrella technique, and branches laden with ripe berries yielded close to 15 pounds. Lewis and Mary were elated.
For two days, that is.
Now for some time Lewis has been complaining about my scratching at night, claiming it keeps him awake. Well duh—dogs itch. But on Tuesday, the tables turned: while beating the bushes they both got bitten all over by chiggers. (For a number of years there have been no chiggers at Tarpley because invading fire ants ate their larvae, but since the fire ants left due to the recent drought, the little red devils have apparently returned.)
For the past couple of nights, my master and mistress have been up and down all night, scratching and doctoring themselves with Afterbite. Now who’s keeping whom awake? (I just hope my master catches the irony.)
As to today’s walk, four ladies moved in a moderate pace about Olmos Park, passing the house of their member, Madame Mayor. She had to be at one of many city meetings but had taken time to decorate the pug statues in front of her house. This time, they are sporting graduation gowns and hats.
Three of the other WWTs had compelling reasons for not attending: one was on her way to Brazil; the others were in Germany and New York. My travel destinations may be more mundane—Austin and Tarpley—but they’re just as fun. That is unless the chiggers are biting.
On Wednesday, four WWTs met next to the campus of the University of the Incarnate Word to visit a new nature preserve. Dr. Bonnie McCormick, chairman of the University’s biology department, and Helen Ballew, director of the Headwaters Sanctuary, led us on a tour of the 53 acre site set aside by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word.
Riparian was not in my vocabulary until a couple of weeks ago, when Mary went to a riparian conference in Tarpley, along with other landowners along Hondo and other nearby creeks. I sat in during part of the presentation and learned that riparian refers to a zone near a creek (people underestimate what dogs can learn—a pity).
Undeveloped but not pristine, the riparian Headwaters Sanctuary along Olmos Creek--which feeds into the San Antonio River--is plagued with non-native plants and trash delivered via flood waters. Yet, a pair of Mexican Eagles nests in the secluded space and small mammals like foxes are seen there, along with a lengthy list of bird and native plant species.
Speaking of native plants, a noxious one lurks along the brushy trails: poison ivy. When I inadvertently walked through some, Mary started carrying me. Both of us had to take baths when we got home, just to be safe.
After the balance of the land is restored, I’d like to go back to this evocative place. Hopefully they’ll consider poison ivy removal, even if it is a native. Until then I’d prefer not have to endure another scrubbing like the one I got.
Mary and Lewis took me to Austin on Saturday to visit Maverick’s dog, Chiugurh. I also got to check in with the chickens, though they hardly give me the time of day. You’d think they would be afraid of someone of the canine persuasion. But not these girls. Chiugurh and I roamed freely among them as they hunted and pecked about the back yard.
On Sunday morning, Mary completed a project that had begun a week before in Tarpley. While in the country, she and Maverick took a notion to harvest agarita berries. And as Mary’s mother used to say, it’s more than a notion deal with the agarita bush. That’s because its leaves are spiny like holly and the berries are not much larger than B-Bs.
Now there’s some clueless dude on the Internet that talks about picking the berries one by one. But the time-honored method, passed down by Mary’s grandmother Maverick, entails spreading an old bed sheet on the ground and beating the branches. (Several years ago, a guest introduced her upside down umbrella method, but it didn’t take.)
Despite the difficulty of maneuvering the sheet (or in this case a throwaway plastic tablecloth) under the low-lying branches, the harvest went fairly smoothly. But that was just the beginning. The toughest, most time consuming part of the procedure entails separating the berries from the twigs, leaves and sundry insects that have also fallen onto the sheet.
Mary took it in stages, floating the berries in a pan of water, removing detritus and draining. After repeating the process several times, she brought it home and did it again. And again. Once the berries were more or less all that was left, she boiled them and strained out the juice.
The easy part came yesterday in Austin: matching the juice cup-for-cup with sugar, adding pectin and a dash of lemon juice, and boiling briefly. The yield was only two and a half small jars and I was never offered any. But I’m guessing that agarita jelly must be heavenly since they’re already talking about going through the hellish process again.
Which is fine with me because while they wrestle with sheets, sticks and pans of water, I can run leash-free in the country with my buddy Chigurh. Life doesn’t get much better than that.
