Friday, August 6, 2010

The Landing of The 'Assembly Required'

We had gotten down to the park later than usual (I have the day off), and were heading for the dog beach, so Max could do a bit of swimming. As we approached I caught sight of a vessel of some type coming around the bend, and clearly planning to land.



Run! It's The Vikings!

Eh, maybe a little skinny for Vikings. Plus I don't remember any wind turbines in the Kirk Douglas movie. Plus I don't think they flew under the Stars & Stripes. But that could be a Viking trick!

Oh well, they seem friendly enough.

"Hi. Remember me? I'm Max. Your dog. Let the nice men land their funny looking boat and throw me some balls."

And so history was made.

And so dog history was made.


"Congratulations. Welcome to Washington Heights. Now throw me a ball."

Dallas and Rob were still there when we left, but planned to head over to Hazzard's Launch Ramp, over on the other side of the river, just north of the bridge. Since the Assembly Required got here mainly on the currents, they need to get picked up. Hope everything's copacetic, guys. Kudos on the raft. She's yar.

It's rare that I blog about something right after it happens, as my necessarily patient readers know all too well, but I figured I'd make an exception for such a momentous occasion. I'll get back to dog blogging soon.

(editing this in later) Well, look who scooped the Times.

Okay, their account is a little more detailed--though completely fails to mention Max being the first (perhaps only) dog to swim across the Assembly Required's bow (I think that was the bow, anyway), and we all know you haven't been formally welcomed to our city if you haven't been welcomed by a dog.

Anyway, the Times blogger was absolutely not there to interview them when they landed--I didn't see anyone else with a camera, either. Not sure where that other landing photo came from. I suspect a staged photo op. Like Iwo Jima. And Apollo 11. ;)

7 comments:

Katie K said...

Well done and very funny.

DC said...

Thanks for the great pictures and the account of the landing. How fortuitous that you would be there for all us fans of The Assembly Required.

Anonymous said...

Excellent coverage competing with the Times; and greetings to Max from Dov and Truman, 2 Newfies-on-Hudson, in Rensselaer (150 miles north)

Noah Vale said...

At the beginning of your story, where you described the beach where the landing took place, you used the phrase "centered around." It should be "centered on" or "revolves around" because something cannot be in the center and around the center at the same time. The expression "centered around" makes no sense.

Chris said...

Well, of course not. The English language never makes sense. That's how you know it's English.

If you do a brief online search, you'll see the phrase 'centered around' occurs with great frequency, and not just on blogs--in academic articles--about Samuel Johnson, even--I find quite a few articles on math that use it as well. I also find it in quite a few New York Times articles, which I assume is how you got here to begin with.

So if you're going to correct this egregious grammatical error at its roots, I can only advise you not to start with a dog blog. Because dogs just don't care about grammar. It isn't edible, you see. I bid you good day. ;

Chris said...

OCULUSNY, Max belatedly sends his regards to Dov & Truman, and hopes to do a bit of dog-paddling with them someday. We've only got one Newfie swimming at our dog beach that I know of, so it's good to hear that the Hudson is getting its fair share of them further upstream. :)

Josh said...

Hi, I'm brand new to the area and my dog Penny and I are starting to get acquainted with the Rocky Run. I'm intrigued by this dog beach and wonder if you might advise me how to get down there from the run.