Dog Days of Summer

Meet our new puppy, Aspen.  She is a Mastweiller - a cross between a Mastiff and a Rottweiler, with a very sweet temperament. At 4 months old, she’s 43 pounds, and if you could see the size of her paws, you’d know she’s going to grow to be a very big dog. This is the 9th dog we’ve had over the years. And she will be, by far, our largest dog.  Her parents are both brindle in color, but her looks favor the Rottie in her. Our 4th dog was a purebred Rottweiler that we loved, so when Aspen was born, we claimed her out of the litter of 10 puppies. No regrets…she’s a great companion to our miniature Aussie, and she adores our cat as well. 
Which brings me to the topic of this blog post. When I was growing up, my mom used to talk about the “dog days of summer”, usually in August,  when the temperatures soared and everyone was uncomfortably hot and sticky. I asked her what the term meant, and she would repeat what had been handed down to her as folklore: the hot, dry days of summer where even the dogs lazed around and didn’t feel like eating. Because of how hot the last few days have been, and because it’s August, the thought of my mom and her odd sayings came to mind.
So I looked up what “the dog days of summer” ACTUALLY meant. The topic is fascinating. And it does relate to hot days, includes August, and is centred around a dog - but not the way in which my mom had been taught. Here’s a link if you want to read up on it. It’s a short and very interesting read, which helped me see how rooted in ancient mythology many of our oldest sayings are! By the way, do you have any strange phrases your relatives used that don’t seem to make much sense? I’d enjoy hearing about them…and I think it would make a very interesting topic for a book! https://www.almanac.com/content/what-are-dog-days-summer
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