Hot dog!

When Cliff and I took our walk just before noon yesterday it was muggy and hot.  Iris doesn't take heat very well, but she wanted to go along.  Somewhere out there in the pasture she wandered away from us and disappeared; she's done this before, and always shows up at the house before too long.  I do worry a bit, but not too much.  
It was probably a half-hour before she came dragging home, panting harder than I thought was possible.  After getting a big drink, she went to the coolest place she could think of:

Right on top of the vent where the air conditioner sends out cold air.  This dog knows how to cool off fast.
We are really making progress with her:  I've left her with the run of the house three times, if we were just making a quick run to town; when we get home, she comes out of her favorite spot, my bathroom, where she likes to lie on the floor in front of the sink.  I've found nothing amiss in the house after our absence.
All the time (almost three months) we've had her, I have shut her in the pet taxi at night.  Keep in mind that when we first got her she got on furniture and counter-surfed in the kitchen.  And then of course, with a new dog you never know just how well house-trained they are.  
Iris would go cheerfully to her little kennel when I'd say "Go to bed", and I'd shut the door behind her.  
But the last two nights she has gone to bed on her own around 8 o'clock.  So I left the door open.  
The first night she stayed in there, as far as I know, until 3 A.M. when Cliff got home.  Then she chose to sleep on the kitchen floor, right below the crock pot where my roast was cooking.    
Last night, she spent the whole night in her kennel and, in fact, stayed there quite a while after I got up.  So I guess she feels at home there now.  
When you get a "second-hand" grown-up dog, you don't usually have to potty-train them, and they're past all the chewing that puppies do; but they do come with baggage from their past, and it takes awhile to figure them out.      
Pioneer Woman has a cute little doggie entry today; I know lots of people get sick of pictures of her basset hound, Charlie (I've read the complaints in various places).  But this series of pictures cracked me up... be sure and look at them all the way to the bottom of the entry.  Click HERE.