Today is my birthday and I’m starting to get really old 😀  In any case, I decided not to go out to lunch, but to continue to hand strip my Irish Terrier, Jessie.

This is the first time I’ve attempted stripping and the only reason I did this is because there are no hand strippers in Honesdale or anywhere near and Jessie’s coat is about 3-4 inches long.  In civilized France the dog salon around the corner from me handled this tedious, unpleasant task.  An Irish Terrier’s coat should never be clipped or cut because it will lose both the red color and the weather proof texture of the undercoat; small sections or hanks of hair must be plucked out by hand or with the aid of a grooming knife or comb.

Oddly enough, this doesn’t hurt the dog and the hair comes out easily all the way to the undercoat because it is dead hair.  It just makes the groomer and dog wish for a quicker, kinder death than that suggested by hour after hour of stripping boredom.

Jessie and I began on the new, deluxe, super duper grooming table that I purchased at an outrageous price; Jessie with a noose around her neck to keep her on the table and me to the side, brandishing my stripping comb.  She almost hung herself twice, trying to get off the table and chase the cats who kept slowly sashaying by, staring at the dog, hoping to witness their first dog hanging.  After an hour of this, with very little progress, I took the dog off the table, locked her in the kitchen and bolted a glass of red wine.

Never give up is my motto!  Calmed by the wine, I discarded the stripping comb, grabbed the dog, took her to the front porch, tied her to the metal chair I was sitting in and began with thumb and forefinger to hand pluck the hair from her body.  This was much better. Jessie was calmer and I began to make progress.  Thirsty from the wine chugging, I got up from the chair to go inside for water.  Jessie bolted down the front porch stairs, rolling and dragging the heavy metal chair behind/on top of her, injuring the pad of her left foot with a deep cut from some sharp area of the chair.  I treated her pad with hydrogen peroxide, gave her a Tylenol and she gratefully got into her bed for some much needed rest.  I called it a day also and drank more Bordeaux.  In the picture above you can see that the hair has been stripped down her back to the dead white root, from her shoulders to her tail.

A nice haul of birthday presents from neighbors Caroline and Linda, my husband, son Brian and daughter Jade who really turned the day festive with loads of presents and a cherry pie.

And there were noodles!

Beef, Mushrooms and Spinach Noodles

1 pint vegetarian pho broth

1 cup fresh shiitake mushrooms, sliced

1 bundle dried udon noodles

1-2 cups fresh baby spinach

8 ounces rib steak, cooked rare to medium rare and sliced

Add the mushrooms to the broth and bring to a boil.  Add the noodles and boil for 4-6 minutes.  Remove from the flame and stir in the spinach.  Add the steak slices, then divide the noodles between two large bowls.