Photo of the Week: "Spanky In a Suitcase"

Okay, okay, I know I keep using photos of my pets as "Photo of the Week" candidates. But I can't help it, and can you blame me? They're all so darn cute and funny.

Anyhow, this is Spanky relaxing in a suitcase. It's an old, beat-up suitcase that I borrowed from my parents and took with me on my honeymoon, and I absolutely hated it. It had four rickety wheels, but one came off, and it had no extending handle for easy pulling. So essentially I had to drag it around each airport, and it was big and flat and heavy and awkward. Holes had started to develop all over it, and it was just plain annoying and cumbersome.

Well, I emptied my clothes from the suitcase after we got back from Hawaii, and left it sitting open on our bedroom floor. At one point I had just washed one of the dog's blankets (an old comforter from Target), and had folded and tossed it into the suitcase for a moment as I cleaned our bedroom. But before I had a chance to put it away, Spanky fell in love with the damn thing and made himself a little nest.

So now every time I head upstairs, whether it's to use the washroom or put something away, Spanky runs up there with me and immediately gets into his suitcase, expectantly looking up at me. I'm not sure if he thinks we're going away again and that he'll be taken with if he stays in the suitcase, or if he just finds it to be a nice cozy little bed. Perhaps both are true, but he is one happy little dog when he's safe and secure in his old suitcase.

I don't have the heart to take the blanket out and give the suitcase back to my parents...yet. Maybe he'll get bored with it and forget about it. He still likes sleeping in the crack formed between Pete and me at night, so he hasn't totally abandoned the luxury of our soft bed for his little traveling den. But he sure takes lots of naps in that old suitcase. Perhaps he dreams about going on trips with us to fun places like dog parks, Petsmart, camping....