Honest, Officer, My Dog Was Driving

My days of being a minivan driver are numbered. I won't go into details about upcoming vehicle test drives, but we're definitely heading in a new car direction. Anyway. Since I won't allow the dog into my new vehicle, in a burst of guilt I decided to let the dog have as much in van time as possible before Moby (the van) goes bye-bye. Therefore, today I let the dog accompany me and the kids on their rides: Hannah to the middle school bus stop, and Mary to the elementary school (as she missed the bus AGAIN!!). The first ride was fine: Judah sat in the front passenger seat and the girls rode in back. But on the second trip, after dropping Mary off at school, Judah (who was in the back seat) thought it would be fun to torture me. So he jumped from the back seat to the middle seat and stuck his snotty wet nose in my ear. That made me jump. Then he saw a squirrel out the window and went ballistic - whining, jumping, running back and forth across the center seat until finally leaping onto the front passenger seat where I'd put my purse. He landed square on my purse, which holds my PDA and my cell phone. He got a back leg stuck through the purse handle, and in his struggle to get into the seat he shoved his butt against my right shoulder. I swerved and nearly sideswiped a parked car. I managed to get stopped, put the gear into park, turn on the emergency flashers and remove the dog's leg from my purse handle and my purse from underneath the dog. I'm fortunate to live in a small town where the side streets have little to no traffic after 7:00 am, when all the bedroom-towners go to work. (This town is about 70% bedroom-towners who work in Cedar Rapids, and my husband is one.) But I digress. So I get the dog and the purse untangled and continue home. Later this morning I get to take Moose Mutt with me again, this time to Cedar Rapids, but the joke's on the dog since we're going to the vet. But when I get back I have to get the van washed, and then (by spousal order) I have to vacuum up all the dog hair and clean the snot marks off the inside windows because tonight we're test driving the Expedition and Carl wants to see how much the dealer will give us for Moby. I'm guessing the dealer will offer about, oh, say 25 cents. So I'm still looking for a buyer for Moby, my white Windstar.

FOOTBALL UPDATE: I lost again but remain 7th in the league.