We sure can't call it the 'Sunny South' today! As I write this, Hurricane Opal is flexing her arms outside my office window, pelting it with raindrops the size of hamsters. Television coverage has gone straight from O.J. to Opal, with every channel picturing soaking-wet news anchors, each "beaming in" from a different location as they jockey for the position most advantageous for portraying the worst/best damage . . . how you make that discrimination between worst or best of course varies from whether you're a news anchor or an unlucky homeowner.

We're lucky. The eye of the hurricane isn't supposed to come any closer than about 30-40 miles and we're well stocked with hot chocolate mix and popcorn --- the necessities for weathering any storm so far as I'm concerned, along with what my husband foolishly considers necessary; candles, bottled water, canned food and batteries.

Whoever said animals are good barometers for impending bad weather obviously never met ours. While the weathermen are shouting dire predictions for our quarter of the country, our dogs are all cuddled comfortably and unconcernedly in their favorite positions in their crates. Ordinarily, they'd be draped all over the bed or couch, or beneath my desk, but at the moment they're in solitary confinement, being almost unrecognizable as English Cockers. In fact, they look more like the victims of a mud-wrestling match gone bad.

If I could have three wishes right now, I'm afraid that before requesting world peace and millions of dollars, I'd have to wish that my dogs could learn to bathe themselves. Actually, maybe I would only put it ahead of world peace, after all peace won't give me clean dogs, but millions of dollars could buy me kennel help -- and lots of other cool stuff besides.

If only the dogs knew how much trouble it is to hoist them one by one into the tub, lather them up, rinse, lather again, and rinse again. Then they make it even harder on themselves time after time by refusing to believe that they must stay in the tub while the flea shampoo, then later the creme rinse works! By the time I haul their dripping carcasses to the drying crate, I'm bitterly chanting my mantra 'I love my dogs, I love my dogs' hoping if I say it enough, I'll believe it again. Luckily no one ever calls me looking for older pets on these bath days, for I'd sell them all down the river in a heartbeat!

I'm certain that if the dogs had an inkling of the trouble it causes me they'd abandon their latest hobby. Mole Vaulting. If this were an official Olympic event they could just send us the gold now, for my fuzzy ones are truly undisputed champions at the sport.

Once upon a time, we had a lawn, a lovely herb garden and several perennial flowerbeds. Then we fenced the entire thing so the little darlings could have almost an acre more room to run. Why we felt that they needed so much room I can't remember anymore; but, the end result is a lawn with more craters than the moon, an herb garden with way more aeration than it really needed, and brown stumps that used to be stalks of beautiful cannas, marigolds, mums and zinnias. It rather gives the impression of a nuclear test site, but it's all the work of seven very determined English Cockers faced with an invasion of MOLES!

Once upon that same time of long ago, we'd let the dogs out for an afternoon romp and they'd quickly take care of their "nature calls" then run and play and chase each other. Their playful yips and yelps would fill the afternoon air and we would smile as we watched them cavort together.

Now, their forays into the yard are quite different and our smiles are fewer and farther between and even when they appear they're rather strained.

When the dogs know an excursion is imminent they strain against the door, whining and yipping, willing it to open, so that when I finally turn the knob they spill out onto the porch bringing to mind the joke snake that jumps out of a peanut can in the face of an unsuspecting victim. Then the race is on.

Moles must be incredibly stupid as well as blind, for even with the warning of twenty-four feet thundering across the ground, they don't always dive deeper in their burrows in time. Dirt, or mud depending on the season, flies in the air as the dogs begin their excavating. More often than you would believe, or I'd like to think about, a little black velvety body lies in state on our back porch. Once they're deceased, and they've been vaulted through the air a few times, (hence the name of the sport), the dogs lose interest in their victim and are off again to find one with 'new batteries.' "Here mom, you can have this one. Its broken."

My scolding has little effect other than to perhaps urge them to dig faster in case they are about to be hauled off the excavation site and dragged inside by the scruff of their neck. Dixie and Rose are the worst. They dig so fast that before I even realize they're on another trail, they've already dug an enormous trench and there's nothing visible but two big white, wiggly butts in the air.

Today we're well protected from invasion by the enemy (in any form), by a moat that partially encircles our castle, aka farmhouse home. The dogs had followed a mole tunnel, digging about 8 inches deep and 20 feet long. (Yes, twenty feet! They're determined, if nothing else.) Before I could find the rake and fill back in the ditch, Hurricane Opal and ten inches of rain visited, filling the tunnel/moat with water. Apparently moles pack down the edges of their tunnel pretty well, for it shows no sign of draining any time soon.

You'd think that would deter my fuzzy loved ones, but no! On their last foray, they splish-splashed to where they left off and began their search for mole survivors, forcing me to realize again that they are perhaps not as smart as I would like to believe.

So once again our bedroom reeks of wet dogs, (for some reason this is not a scent romance novelists ever mention in a bedroom scene) and the floor around their crates is covered with a fine brown dust as the mud on them dries and becomes one with the rug.

Rose snores, Ygerna fitfully searches for the perfect sleeping position, Audi and Matilda are on guard duty watching for Brillo the cat, and Dixie gives quiet yips as she dreams out the battle plan for the next big excursion. For a few minutes at least, until nature calls again and we must face Miss Opal and the moles, all is dry, warm and quiet and good in our little Southern world.

In honor of the dogs' new hobby,  I penned new words to the chorus of Randy Travis' old hit single "Diggin' Up Bones."

DIGGIN' UP MOLES

By Babs Land

We're diggin' up moles, We're diggin' up moles.
Dividin' little creatures from their souls
We're fillin' up the front yard with lots of little holes
When mama leaves us alone we're diggin' up moles.

We're diggin' up moles, We're diggin up moles
Exhumin' little creatures without souls.
Be careful where you're walkin' . . .there's lots of little holes
When mama leaves us alone we're diggin' up moles.

Please don't applaud. Just throw money! Or, maybe mole traps.

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