There was no bright light flooding our bedroom yesterday morning to make Jackie and Jillie noisily restive, anxious to get out and start the day with anticipatory action. The atmosphere in the bedroom, reflecting what was outside our windows was dark, the kind of morning dark that makes you want to turn over and go back to sleep. But Jackie and Jillie weren't having any of it. They obviously felt they had been quiet and respectful of our rest for long enough, and finally let us know in no uncertain terms that it was wake-up time.

Since it was also raining heavily, they also, however, weren't in a mood to get out into the wind and rain, but necessity called. Just as well for them that they can seek shelter from the rain under the deck, with its four-foot height while relieving themselves, escaping most of the rain during a downpour. In the time it took for us to wipe them down afterward, set the table for breakfast and begin initial breakfast preparations, once again as happened the morning before, the rain began petering out.

We decided we'd do just as well to go along at that point for a ravine walk and gamble on the rain stopping entirely and not returning until we reached home an hour or so later. So that's just what we did. Although it looked, given the sky full of ragged, grey clouds, that we were taking a chance, we were wearing light rain jackets and our puppies' rain jackets were stuffed into one of my pockets.

So, given those circumstances, it was surprising as we tootled along the trails in the forest, to come across others out and about, unlike yesterday when there was no one else. Not only were people and their dogs out, but so were great hordes of Japanese beetles, devouring vegetation to their nasty little hearts' content.

The thimbleberry shrubs are still putting out those outstandingly pretty pink flowers, even while others that had emerged a month earlier, were ripe enough to pluck and eat. Though we weren't ourselves eating them, we accommodated our little dogs' ever-ravenous appetites by picking the ripe berries and offering the glistening little treasures to them. Everywhere we looked, from the trees to the shrubs and the bracken, all shone with the lustre given them by the rain just ended.

There was plenty of action for Jackie and Jillie as it happened when we kept coming abreast of other hikers and their dogs. Acquaintance with a beautiful young Standard-size poodle looking like a blown-up version of our own two little companions makes one wonder; do they know they're related? do they relate in a more especial way to one another because they share the genetic strain of a special breed? We'll never know.

For our part, we find much to admire in the breed that is so highly intelligent. The Standards tend to be calm, not nervously neurotic like our two little dwarfs. They're good-natured and patient and above all, silent unlike yappy Jackie and Jillie. Their beautiful physical conformation is admirable, and their loping gait extremely graceful.

On our return home, we did the usual brief turn in the garden, noting that the carpet roses are once again in bloom. They seem to be constantly blooming, unlike shrubs and climbers. We've a pink one in the back and two in the front garden that bloom white/yellow/pink, transforming shades as the blooms age.

We're still waiting for the fascinatingly tardy Hibiscus shrub that bloomed non-stop last summer to finally open its buds. We can see the pink of the buds but the flowers insist on hesitating forever, uncertain they want to face the world, glorious as their blossoms are. The pink zinnias, on the other hand, are finally branching out nicely as they did the year before when that part of the garden was opened for the first time, as an extension of an older garden bed.

And the largest of the Canna lilies is also in perpetual bloom. A beautiful, large plant, its blooms appearing as though the drama Queen of all they survey surrounding them. And the garden was rewarded amply when the sky finally shed the presence of clouds allowing the sun to send its glowing rays down on the landscape. With only a few interruptions of distant thunder as the day wore on.