The Sweet Smell of Freedom

See this vent?

Not the awesome ceramic chicken my parents gave me, (one of the few "decorative" things that made the move to London) but the random vent in the wall of our kitchen. I suppose this vent is there to, well, vent. But I must say it doesn't do a very good job. The other day I turned on the oven to bake a blueberry crumb cake (shout out to Ina) and forgot that butter had melted on to the tray at the bottom of the oven. Well, when I opened the oven to put the cake in smoke poured out into our kitchen and living room. That little random vent didn't do anything! I finally opened the window and that helped dissipate the smoke, not to mention gave the chicken a breath of fresh air. But this posting isn't about the vent not doing its job when I burn stuff. The vent serves another, far more important function. It is Riley's opening to the world. Her porthole to the sweet, sweet smell of freedom. The smell of her dog walker, parks, walks, other dogs, tree stumps, mailboxes, food dropped on the ground, dare I say rear ends, all the things dogs find tasty and interesting. Observe Riley in action:

The vent happens to be right above her food bowl so she eats, then takes in the smell of the outside world. Probably two of the most awesome things a dog can do in a day. And whenever she thinks her dog walker has arrived she runs over to the vent and sticks her piggy nose all up in there and breathes deeply, I guess hoping to identify Marta's smell. I have no idea if she can actually smell Marta from so far away, but I don't want to defeat her dreams, so I let her continue. I laugh at her, but she doesn't seem to notice. What's unfortunate is that ANY car that stops in front of our place is assumed to be Marta's so Riley is let down at least 15 times a day. There is a fairly long curb across the street, no parking allowed, but cars stop there all the time. Marta does to pick up Riley, the workmen working on the apartment (I should say "flat") across the street, delivery men, people who just stop and sit in their cars for what seems like 30 minutes doing nothing, every one of those vehicles is liable to be Marta so Riley must investigate and smell and sniff and use her precious vent. Now the vent is all covered in dried up dog slobber, but since I know she'll keep on sniffing, there's no sense in cleaning it. So this little vent that is really quite unsuccessful at venting the kitchen air, actually serves a very important purpose for our dog. What a vent it is!