This trip was a comedy of errors, so I'm going to share some of the events that happened on Thursday morning, when my best friend Kim and I set out for Waldron before 9:30am, relying on the GPS in her phone, on which she didn't know how to activate the audio. So I was trying to navigate, but never used a GPS before, and with things flying by so quickly at 70mph, following the route without audio instructions proved to be a problem, so we ended up having to turn around 2 or 3 times, but eventually we made it there just over 4 hours later, and it was worth the trip, even just to see her farm and all the babies in the kennel. She grows her own food, both produce and animals, and she has a horse, a few cows, a goat, sheep, chickens and ducks ... it was my kind of place! We spent an hour and a half there, and even had fresh baked cookies before setting out for home with my new puppy, a female I named Shiloh in my lap.
All went well, until there was again a question about reading what the GPS was saying, so she pulled over near a house with a horseshoe driveway, and after stopping, tried to pull a bit further forward to be entirely off the road, and that's when it happened.
Turns out the front driver's side wheel was right at a culvert we couldn't see over the front of the car, so when she tried to inch forward a bit, that wheel fell into the culvert, leaving the rear passenger wheel over 18" off the ground.
Here we were, in the middle of nowhere in rural Arkansas, staring at the car in disbelief. So she went up to the house and knocked, and of course a huge redneck opened the door. It was windy and cold, probably around 40º that far south, with intermittent rain, and he came right out without a coat to take a look, and proceeded to call a friend with a truck that was nearby, telling him that this blonde's car was in the culvert, even though I wasn't driving.
But before he finished the call, a pickup with a redneck couple in it pulled over, got out, grabbed a chain and a strap from the back, since they didn't know which would work in our situation, and they pulled us out of there in less than 10 minutes, so after thanking them all profusely, we were back on the road in about 15 minutes. Ya can't get that from a towing service, and I marveled at how amazing it is that the Lord always has angels standing by when you need them, some of which show up in redneck packaging. 
We got 'lost' again, but finally made our way up to Ft Smith where we enjoyed a very late lunch with Kim's daughter and son-in-law, and I got to meet her beautiful new grandson who just turned 2 months old, before heading back toward Fayetteville after dark; but once again, the silent GPS got us even worse in the pitch blackness, with signs and lane changes going by so quickly we suddenly found ourselves in Oklahoma.
Back to Ft Smith where we called her daughter from a parking lot, who just happened to be heading north that evening with the baby, so she met us in the parking lot and led us through the maze toward familiar ground. We didn't get back here until around 9pm; the estimated 6 to 7 hour trip taking 12 hours, and she still had an hour plus to drive home.
Friends like that don't grow on trees, believe me, and I couldn't ask for a better one, she was such a trooper.
Steve wasn't really wanting me to get another animal, much less a puppy, but even he had to smile when he saw Shiloh, and before long he said I picked a really good one, and said she was 'condensed cuteness'.
She's definitely a lap dog, and for only 2 months old is doing very well with the training, using a peepee pad since she won't be going outside because she could end up being a tasty morsel that a raptor could pick up and carry off, so she'll only be outside when I'm carrying her most likely. At night I was worried she'd pee on the bed, so I put a pad under her and kept checking, and I put her down to do her thing when I got up during the night, and every time she went right to the pad, used it, and got put back on the bed, so for 3 nights now she's been able to sleep with me without me having to do laundry in the morning.
Taz, on the other hand, isn't too happy about this at all because she growls and barks at him; but he's getting used to it and has started ignoring it instead of fleeing from a dog ¼th his size.
So here's my precious new bundle of joy, and believe me, Shiloh really brings it. Unlike the Chows, the male of which I used to call Lumpy Dumb Dog because they're not the brightest, Shiloh is as smart as a whip, and learns really fast, much faster than I would have thought, and she surprised me when I realized she had learned her new name already by Friday morning. She immediately turns to me when I say it, and she already understands when I hold up my index finger and tell her to wait for me, which she does now, and also when I tell her no, although she tries to act as if she doesn't hear that as long as she can get away with it. Oh yeah, she's just a bit over 3½ pounds, and she allows me to put clothes on her as if she's been wearing them her whole 2 months of life. Y'all might even see me captioning pics of her that I put on the cheezburger site.
Condensed cuteness really does say it all about his little one, and I just decided that will be my first caption of one I do of her. My little angel is right next to me, asleep on the arm of the recliner right now, but when this little one plays, she plays hard and we have a great time. She's a hoot, and y'all have just got to see this!!!
