Merlin's Diary

Happy Gotcha Day to Me!

2012-01-19T19:02:00.000-06:00

So a funny thing happened yesterday. Mommy came home from work with surprises for me and said, "Happy Gotcha Day!!" There was

FRENCH FRIES!!

A CHICKEN SANDWICH!!

MOMMY'S THUMB!!! um...oops.

and there was a new squeaky toy with SIX SQUEAKERS in it and then I got some ice cream too and while I was eating my ice cream Mommy happened to look at the calendar and see that it was January 18, not January 19, so it WASN'T my Gotcha Day yet! BOL!! Mommy can be awful goofy sometimes. She laughed when she realized what she had done and said that I would have a quieter, actual Gotcha Day today. She came home tonight with sweet and sour chicken and wonton soup for me! I got some chicken bits in with my food and some of the chicken broth with a couple of wonton skins in it (but none of the pork filling because I can't have pork). It is my 11 year celebration so it seems right to celebrate it twice, once for the first 1 and once for the second.

In case you wondered what I looked like when I first came to live with Mommy here is one of the first shots of me. It was taken about a week after my adoption. I could sit comfortably on Mommy's lap back without towering over her.

The pound where I'd lived for a few months and was rescued from just days before I was to take that final walk thought I was 6 months old. They told the rescue people I had just gone through my 6 month growth spurt which meant that I was almost as tall as I was going to end up being. The rescue people told Mommy I would probably end up about knee high at most, but boy were they wrong! I was probably not even 5 months old and the growth spurt I had just had was my 4 month one so, once I got to Mommy's house I grew and grew and grew. By the time I stopped growing I was three feet tall at the top of my head, which means that Mommy can pet me while standing up without even straightening her arm all the way and when I sit on her lap it looks like this:

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T16:27:00.011-06:00

This post is to both say "Happy New Year everyone!" AND be my December update.

December was a busy month and a fun one. First off, Mommy bought her annual bag of nuts in the shell which she thinks looks "Christmasy" and, besides the tree, is the only Christmas decoration she puts up. I love it when she sets them out in her stemmed glass bowl because it makes it so easy to help myself. Here is some proof of that:

Second, we have been having a really mild winter so far. It hasn't gotten down to below zero cold at all. I have therefore been insisting on being allowed to hang out on the porch. I don't know if I mentioned it, but a few months ago a friend of Mommy's from work gave her two old down comforters FOR ME!! Mommy put one in my second rag bed (which I had never really found comfortable) and she made a big pillowcase with a drawstring out of an old sheet and a hunk of rope for the second one. Because I had enough beds in the house I Mommy kept these two out on the porch for me to use. I REALLY liked my new feather beds and I got into the habit of insisting on being on the porch so I could sleep on them. Mommy finally drew the line when it was about 25 degrees and I insisted on being outside on my beds. She peeked out the window at me and saw I was curled in a very tight circle and shivering a bit, but I refused to come inside until she gave in and brought my feather beds in too. One is now in the kitchen where my travel bed used to be and the other is in the bedroom half on top of my regular bedroom bed. Sometimes I sleep on the feather bed and sometimes I sleep on the regular dog bed and use the feather bed as a pillow. It is very comfy.

In November I had some tummy troubles which I didn't mention in my last blog update because they are so common. So anyway, because of the tummy troubles I was sometimes pooping in the house so Mommy put the puppy papers down in the back room for me. I didn't use the papers for three weeks so Mommy picked them up one Saturday when she was cleaning the house. The following Monday I pooped in the back room. I thought it was funny, but Mommy wasn't amused.

Also in December Mommy made the fabulous Emily Cookies that Emily made for me when I had my toe amputated. They are the best cookies on earth. Mommy made two batches and I helped by picking up any spare bits that fell and taste testing when they came out of the oven. They were sitting on the counter cooling FOREVER and I only got four or five of them and then Mommy packed them up in containers and I only got four or five more of them and then she put all but one of the containers in the freezer and told me that I had to wait until Christmas to have them! I know she left one container out to give me cookies from, but that is just wrong. Then on Christmas SHE GAVE AWAY almost all the cookies!! Oscar got some and Benji and my cousin Missy and I only got one large container!! This is totally the wrong way for a Mommy to behave.

Right before Christmas Mommy had a day off and she needed to have her car serviced so I got to go along to the car place! I had been there once before when I had just gotten out of the emergency vet after my bleeding ulcer and couldn't be left alone, but I mostly slept through that. This time Mommy brought me in and I said hi to people and then Mommy took me outside and we took an hour long walk down a bike trail that wasn't far from the dealership. It wasn't a very interesting bike trail being mainly a trail for people to get to and from a train station, but it did have good sniffs. When we got back to the dealership and went inside I was greeted by a lady who said, "There's the dog!" I was not surprised by such a greeting because I KNOW I am very important, but Mommy was taken a bit aback. When she went to the service area someone called out, "The dog is here!" More proof of how important I am, and the service guy came out and told Mommy he'd been looking for us as our car was just finished and the keys were at the cashier's desk. Mommy said, "See, they were looking for you because they were asking about ME." but I know that wasn't true because when we got to the cashier's desk all they gave Mommy was our keys, but they gave ME a cookie.

Finally in December we had Christmas. We went down to Grandma and Grandpa's new house and spent the night. I wore the Merlin Cam both days and took some shots. Mommy's youngest brother was there and Grandpa's college friend and his wife came for Christmas Eve dinner. Mommy cooked the meal.

Mommy cooking.
I'm told it was good, but since it contained pork I wasn't allowed to have any.

Mommy's youngest brother and Grandpa and Grandma in the living room

The Christmas tree had gifts for me under it but I wasn't allowed to touch even though Grandma got to open a present on Christmas Eve just because Grandpa's friend's wife brought it for her. This was no fair.

The most disturbing thing about Christmas Eve was that at night when I got tired I and wanted to go to bed after my night walk (where I saw a FOX by the way!!) I couldn't find our room. We always stayed upstairs in Mommy's oldest brothers' room which later became Mommy's grandma's room. This house has NO UPSTAIRS!! I found our suitcases in Grandpa's office, but there was NO BED in the office! I therefore wandered around with Jack in my mouth whining. Mommy brought me into the office and pointed to the couch and said. We are sleeping here. This was TOTALLY wrong because I AM NOT allowed on couches at Grandma's house so how was I supposed to go to bed??!
When the guests left and Grandpa and Mommy's youngest brother were getting ready to go to church (Mommy and I don't go to church) Mommy worked some magic and made A BED appear out of the couch!! It was amazing and I climbed right on and went to sleep.

The next morning Mommy and I woke up before everyone else and Mommy hid the bed again.
Then we went for a VERY long walk. We found a nice park and walked some of the paths, but Mommy wouldn't let me walk all of them because she said they were too long and I still needed to walk back to Grandma and Grandpa's house. I was kinda mad about it, but then when we were 1/2 mile from the house I decided I was done with walking and wanted to cut through the backyards of the houses and go straight back to the house. Mommy said that was no and we had to walk the whole 1/2 mile. I was very tired when we got back and I decided to nap while Mommy and her brother played cards and dominoes and Grandma and Grandpa even played dominoes too! Then Missy and her family and her mommy's brother and his son came for Christmas and I got to open my presents! Because there were so many people in the living room Mommy and I sat under the piano.
I got a stuffed animal and a cloth ball which I tore apart within about 3 minutes, some more nuts, Mommy cookies, a big bone, and a tug toy. Grandpa and Grandma were in charge of putting the wrapping paper into a big garbage bag.
They have a gas fireplace in the living room, but it was too hot to turn it on.
After presents everyone went downstairs to look for a certain game. I'm not supposed to do stairs by myself, but I did.
I was worried about going up by myself after the game was found, but Mommy walked behind me and kept her hands on my hips just in case and I made it up without falling. They played the game and got really loud because Mommy and her brothers and her brother's wife take games very seriously. Missy and I hung out in the dining room to be safe. Then they had dinner and Missy and I couldn't have any even though it was turkey and I can have turkey because Missy CAN'T have turkey or she throws up. After dinner when everything was all cleaned up and put away Mommy and I went home and I went straight to bed on our proper bed that doesn't hide.

Finally, Mommy calculated how many miles we walked this year and it was 944.6. 867.9 were regular walks in town and 76.7 were hikes. That is less than normal, but not so bad if you consider that I was on limited walks for quite a while due to my toe amputation. You can see our Imaginary Walk to Alaska and Back if you want.

I hope you had a good holiday this year, and for those of you who don't get an actual physical copy of our Christmas card, here is what it looked like:

Happy Howlidays!

My Monthly Diary for November, 2011

2011-12-03T16:12:00.007-06:00

This month Mommy and I took a three hikes which I wrote about earlier so you can go back and read about them if you haven't already. I earned my hiking badge. Mommy had trouble getting a photo of it, but I wanted to show you the nice tree picture on it.

Mommy sewed it onto my backpack with my other badges

Rover wearing my backpack.
Those are my Dog Scout badges, my PD badges
and my Relay for Life bronze team captain badge

All my county badges, and my TT and CGC badges

Mommy's favorite badge is the one with the skunk, but she thinks the one with the fish is the most appropriate for me, even though we aren't sure what fish have to do with hiking. We still keep all my badges on my backpack even though I can't wear it anymore since I broke those vertebrae.

Besides hiking this month we had all the leftover candy from Halloween. It was great. Mommy kept the candy out on the livingroom end table and I helped myself to some of it each night. I had trouble opening the box of Milk Duds that I took one night so I brought to Mommy to ask her to open it for me. Can you believe she opened it, but then she ate all but one of them! If I'd known she was going to be such a pig I'd have worked harder to get the box open on my own.

This month we also had a really big wind, not as big as the one that made Mommy take me on The Dumbest Vacation Ever, but it was big enough to knock a 10 foot long branch off the neighbor's tree into our yard. I helped Mommy by breaking the twiggy parts off. She appreciated the help and the branch is now in the corner of our yard making the base of our new brush pile. We had a really nice brush pile in our yard for a couple years which the birds, small mammals and reptiles liked a lot. I liked it too because it was full of bird, small animal and reptile smells, but then Mommy had some men come in and trim our trees and they took away and chipped our whole brush pile before Mommy saw what they were doing. We know they thought they were being nice, but both Mommy and I, not to mention the critters, were very sad about the loss. Mommy had been saving bush trimmings and fallen branches to make a new pile, but it was a sad little one. this new branch has really improved it.

Finally this month Thanksgiving happened. Mommy made pumpkin pie and I got to lick the mixing bowl which was wonderful. Then Mommy and I went down to Grandma and Grandpa's new house. I hadn't been in the house since they moved in and I spent about a half hour sniffing in every room. I came and got Mommy at one point and whined at her. I wanted to know where the squirrel window was. They had a great squirrel window at their old house. Mommy showed me where they had a sliding door for me to look out, but I didn't see any squirrels. Grandpa says they are there because he keeps seeing them raiding his bird feeder. Grandpa's college friend and his wife were there. He is the friend who has Alzheimers and he is more forgetful now, but he still liked it when came over to sit on his feet. Grandma forgot I was there at dinnertime and she tripped over me while I was lying down nice and quiet next to Mommy. Mommy had to catch her to keep her from falling and I decided it would be safer to spend dinner under the table if people were going to try to stand on me. I didn't get any turkey because of my tummy, but I did get some mashed potatoes, a bit of roll, and pie crust. I wore my camera so here are some shots of Grandma and Grandpa's house:

There is cheese on that coffee table and I didn't even try to steal it!

The sideboard with its holy light

Looking out from under the table

I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving and got some turkey and mashed potatoes and pie. Remember to be good so that Santa Paws will bring you presents next month!

Hike 10 or Hike 15 or 16...The Last Hike

2011-11-23T17:05:00.004-06:00

Up until a couple of years ago Mommy and I had the Thanksgiving tradition of taking an all day hike and then stopping by a friend's great big Thanksgiving gathering for pie on the way home. (Her friend is the oldest of 11 kids, which is an awful big litter for humans, and with all the spouses and kids and in-laws and leftovers like Mommy they rent a church hall for the gathering and the church isn't far from our house). It was fun taking those hikes because hardly anyone is on the trails on Thanksgiving Day and we'd get to see a lot of wildlife, but then a couple years ago Mommy's oldest brother stopped inviting Grandma and Grandpa to come to his house in Minnesota for Thanksgiving. When that happened Grandma and Grandpa decided they wanted Mommy and me to come to their house for dinner along with some old friends of theirs. So no more Thanksgiving Day hike.

So, we started a new tradition and now take a day before Thanksgiving Day hike. Mommy's work has a 1/2 day the day before Thanksgiving Day and Mommy doesn't do 1/2 days so that gave us the day for a hike. Today we took the last hike on the county hiking challenge. It was a wildcard hike which meant that we got to pick our own place to go so we went to the savanna that is not too far from our house. Mommy had to do some laundry first and I was VERY impatient to get going, but we got out around 1 p.m. The preserve wasn't empty like on Thanksgiving Day, but there were no bikes and no screaming kids and only one person who thinks that hiking means you talk loud on your cellphone so we got to see a lot of wildlife after all. Shortly after we started our hike we spotted two cooper's hawks circling over the savanna and then a third one came swooping out of the trees by the wetlands and flew so low over our heads that Mommy actually flinched! It flew off to join the other two and they all circled and swooped around the prairie. When we got to the wetlands we were suddenly mooned by a good two dozen ducks all at the same time. That seemed a bit rude to me, but Mommy laughed and said something yummy must be in the water. A little further along the hike we saw a flock of Canada geese hanging out debating about continuing south or staying at the savanna for the winter and then we spotted two sandhill cranes hunting mice in a burn area. I watched them quietly with Mommy for quite awhile, but then I couldn't take it anymore and I had to bark at them. Mommy made me move along at that point. After hiking a bit more we came to the wildlife watching area and we spotted a great egret! We see snowy egrets a lot, but we've never seen a great egret. He must have been a migration straggler. Then four more sandhill cranes flew overhead. I think they were going to go visit the ones we saw hunting mice. Maybe they were going to have Thanksgiving together. Finally, just as we were about to finish our hike three deer came bouncing out of a small clump of trees and ran right alongside us!! This was WAAAAAY too much for me and I dragged Mommy along behind me as I totally forgot my hiking manners and chased them. When they disappeared into another clump of trees I barked and hopped around trying to get them to come back out and run some more, but they didn't.

The wildcard hike was listed as counting as one hike, but, since we did a 3.6 mile hike for our wildcard Mommy isn't sure if it would officially count as two hikes so that is why we aren't sure if we are at 15 or 16 for the official count. Doesn't matter though since we only needed to do 7 hikes to earn our badge. I was very tired by the end of the hike, probably because of the deer chase, and I wasn't sure I was going to be able to hop in the car, but I did manage to climb in and I fell asleep as soon as the car started up. Mommy ran a couple errands with me in the car, including picking up my hiking badge, and I gave her the stink eye each time she came back to the car and woke me up.

Despite all the critters we saw I didn't get a single picture of one. Here are some of my shots I thought you might like though:

looking across the savanna

there wasn't a cloud in the sky

stopping for a drink

Doesn't this one look creepy?
Mommy liked the way you only see the guy's feet and shadow.

Hike 9 or Hike 14

2011-11-16T17:03:00.006-06:00

Mommy had the day off today. So, after doing the yard work that she skipped doing on Saturday so she could take me on Hike 8, we headed out for Hike 9. Mommy put this hike off for last because the last couple times we had been to this trail about two years ago we had not been impressed. We knew the preserve was being restored, but we didn't hold much hope for it. Before the county bought it the area we were hiking in had been a farm and a long vacant campground. When we had been to the preserve before the "trail" had been rotten asphalt roads which led through weedy farmland down to a little lake with a destroyed shoreline. There had been biting flies, fleas, ticks and mosquitoes in such number that we spent most of the hikes either running or swatting and we got totally eaten up. And, to make matters worse, both times lounging on the picnic tables by the parking lot were male prostitutes in hot pants! Middle aged men were practically waiting in line for their turn. It kind of takes the enjoyment out of one's hike having to pass that on the way to and from the trail. So, Mommy decided that if we didn't get to this trail this year it would be no great loss. Also, she figured if we waited until a cold day after a frost the bugs might not be there and the prostitutes might be wearing more clothes.

Well, we have to say that this preserve won the "Most Improved" award! First of all, there was only one middle aged man sitting in a truck in the lot and he may have just been there to eat lunch, because there were no prostitutes to be seen. There were also no bugs. The asphalt had all been removed and gravel trails had been put in as well as a couple of mowed trails through beautifully restored grassland. The weedy farmland is now a very nice savanna and the grasses were waving and making a "shhhhhhh" sound with the wind for our whole hike. There was also a very nice little patch of aspens which had to have been there last time, but we sure don't remember seeing. When we got down to the lake the shoreline had been restored and a couple of fishing piers had been erected. We are told there is another hike you can take on the other side of the lake and Mommy says we will probably go there some time soon to see what it is like. All in all it was a very enjoyable 1.8 mile hike. Mommy didn't know it, but she had ended up saving the best hike for last.

Here are some photos I took:

The savanna

A little pond down a hill. The brown around it is the dried prairie grasses which were going "shhhhhh"

The fishing pier

The restored lake with more savanna on the other side

Hike 8 or Hike 13

2011-11-12T17:16:00.003-06:00

Mommy was working in the yard and was about to start digging more leaves into the vegetable garden when she looked at me and said, "You know what? Today is too nice a day to not go hiking. Especially since they say it might rain tomorrow." So she put down her shovel and off we went on our 8th hike for the county challenge. This hike was 2.6 miles long so it counted for 2 hikes which brings our total up to 13. We haven't been to this preserve for about three years and boy has it changed! It used to be a hike through great big old trees, but now it is a hike through great big stumps and windfalls. Remember earlier this year when we had the really big wind that made Mommy go crazy and decide we were going to live like pioneer dogs with no lights even though it was scary dark out and also that caused her to take me on the Dumbest Vacation Ever where we drove all our food to Grandma and Grandpa's houses? Well, Mommy thinks that that is why there are a lot of big stumps and windfalls. She thinks that nasty wind took down a bunch of the old trees and they knocked down a lot of the smaller younger trees too. There was also a gigantic pile of dead trees in one part of the hike. It was almost as big as our house! We aren't sure why they were there. Maybe they were invasive species being piled up for burning or maybe (we hope not) they had gotten emerald ash borers in them and were waiting to be hauled away. It was a very sad looking preserve.

There were still a lot of younger trees and the river that the hike runs along was still there, although there were some big trees tipped over into it too. There were enough trees that I got to see a big bunny, or deer as Mommy insists on calling them. He was hopping through the scrub and I barked at him to tell him to stop hopping. I also saw a great big V of geese heading to their winter home and a great blue heron flying to the river. Maybe he was related to the one who hangs out by the lake. We veered off the official hike at one point so we could hike down one of the mowed prairie trails and it was flooded. I walked through it with my boot on and then was not happy about having to wear a soaking wet hiking boot for the rest of the hike. I don't understand why Mommy wears shoes on hikes, they are a pain in the neck. I wore my camera but I got only two shots that weren't blurry pictures of my chin and neither showed the trees or the river. Here they are anyway:

Here is a shot that was taken as Mommy and I were arguing...um...wrestling over...um...fighting about...um discussing...um putting on my hiking boot because I had walked my bootless limit of 1 1/2 miles:

We aren't real sure where this one was taken. It may be by the gigantic pile of dead trees that we passed. If it is, then the lumpy/hilly shape on the right would be the far edge of the pile:

My Monthly Diary for October, 2011

2011-11-06T13:18:00.004-06:00

Well, this month, to make up for me being on limited exercise in September because of my toe amputation, Mommy and I did A LOT of hiking and walking. I did a post for each hike so you can skim down and read them. I am very, very happy to be back on the trails even if I do still have to wear a boot if I'm walking on crushed gravel for more than a mile. I will have to wear that boot until I get enough callous on my stub. The big thing that happened this month was that Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred came into town to see me. You may remember that we were supposed to go on vacation with them in September, but Mommy had to cancel because of my toe. Auntie Naomi and I were both very sad about that because she had already bought me a present and because we had to cancel the vacation, I couldn't get it. This would make anyone sad. So, Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred made a special trip down to see me and give me my present. Mommy says that isn't true and Auntie Naomi had come down to see a doctor and they stopped by to see us on their way home, but I know the whole doctor thing was just an excuse.

Mommy changed her work schedule so she could have the morning off when Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred came to give me my present. It was an Empty Nesters Canada goose, which is kind of like the Skinneez skunk that I have and love. I like the toys without stuffing because the squeakers are easier to squeak and they can easily be used as tug toys too. I thought that maybe, since we had missed the previous visit, Auntie Naomi would have two presents for me, but she didn't. I kept checking her bag until Mommy got me a big dog milkbone, which was sort of like a second present. After we had fun and I played with my toy, Mommy and Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred left so they could go eat breakfast at a dog-unfriendly restaurant. They came back afterwards though so I could see them again and then they went home. A short time after they left Mommy went to work. Well, that night I forgot that Mommy had changed her work schedule so Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred could visit me, so when Mommy didn't come home at her usual time I got worried. Being worried gives me a tummy ache so I threw up, and then I peed on the plant stand and I pooped in the back room just to cover all the bases. Mommy was not happy when she got home that night. The throw up and the poop weren't the problem because she knows when my gut goes bad, it goes bad, but it was peeing on the plant stand that got her mad. I think that the plant stand seemed like a perfectly logical place to pee. When I'm outside I pee on plants and Mommy hadn't watered the inside plants for almost a week so I did it for her. She did not agree and I got told, "Shame on you!" when she discovered what I had done. I hate hearing, "Shame on you!"

Anyway, my tummy stayed upset for almost a week, and I had to take Pepcid and eat oatmeal and eggs until my gut calmed down, but I didn't throw up or pee or poop in the house again. Mommy thinks that maybe part of it was that I was drinking out of the dirty birdbath in the backyard, so she took it down. I've had some tummy troubles on and off since then, but Mommy is used to that. She knows it can take me a good month to get everything back to normal, plus I'm still licking my toe sometimes and excessive licking gives me a tummy ache too. Mommy says I am a delicate hothouse flower.

Finally, we had Halloween at the end of the month again and I dressed up like I was being eaten by a big orange spider. (You can see a picture of that in my previous post) Mommy wasn't sure I was going to wear a costume this year since having to wear the Comfy Cone for a month ruined what little fun there was to be had in wearing things on my head. I have to admit after an hour of wearing my costume to greet the kids I told Mommy I wasn't wearing it anymore. That meant that I didn't get any treats after I greeted the kids, but it was worth it. Then for the last hour I went to bed and refused to say hi to the trick-or-treaters. Mommy says I'm getting to be an old fart. I do fart a lot, but I don't think I'm THAT old.

Hike 7--Halloween Hike

2011-10-31T16:20:00.005-05:00

Today is Halloween so Mommy took the day off. She always does that because she knows that if I had to spend the afternoon having strangers knocking on the door and not being able to open it she'd find a big mess when she got home. She could take a half day off, but she figures it is better to take the whole day and have fun. So, today we took our 7th, or 11th, hike. It was a 2.9 mile hike so it counted as two.

We've never gone to this preserve because it is relatively new. It is a glacial lake surrounded by wetlands, prairie and a small oak forest. It used to be a farm so the wetlands were all tiled and drained and cultivated and the county has been bringing it back to its natural state. We didn't know what to expect from this forest preserve but it was very nice. Mommy said we should have done it two weeks ago because it would have been spectacular during color when the fall wildflowers were still in bloom. As it is, we seem to have done the hike just a few days after half of the prairie was mowed.

That is the sad thing with the newer preserves. In order to get the right plants growing they have to plow the ground up a whole bunch, then they seed and plant new trees and stuff and then, for a few years after planting they have to mow the prairie in mid-summer and fall. This kills off a bunch of the invasive plants, and lets the replanted natives grow better, but it means that there are some very ugly times of year for awhile. After the native plants are established and most of the invasives are gone the county burns the prairies occaasionally to help the plants. Mommy likes walking after the burns because you can see how all the plants send up new shoots through the soot. I prefer mowing because the small animals don't all run away for a few weeks like they do during the burns and I can sniff for a lot of mice and voles and stuff.

The lake in the center of the preserve is still being fixed up so you can't go down to it, but you could see it from a bunch of spots and it is very nice. Also, where they hadn't mowed the prairie, Mommy enjoyed "the ghosts of wildflowers past". That is what she calls it when the plants all go to seed and instead of having an expanse of purple and yellow and red and orange flowers you have an expanse of seeds still clinging to where the flowers were so you see white and black and brown ghosts of flowers. This was very fitting for a Halloween hike if you ask me. The best part about the hike was that we saw two trumpeter swans flying overhead AND, by one of the woodsy areas, I scared a coyote!

Mowed prairie

Unmowed prairie
(they always mow down about 4 feet on either side of the trails because a lot of people are stupid and complain when things come out of the prairie straight onto the trails in front of their bikes, or if they pick up ticks on the trail.)

Mommy heading towards the oak woods in the distance. You can see a little red and yellow.
Imagine what that would look like during color!

Heading home.
(Mommy liked when she accidentally got some shots of me so she is leaving the camera on on our rides home now.)

Aaaah! I picked up a tick on my hike!
Just kidding. That is me in my Halloween costume.

Hike Six

2011-10-23T16:58:00.006-05:00

Or is it nine? Mommy and I took the longest hike on the county challenge today. It was 3.9 miles long and counted for two hikes. This means we have done six actual hikes, but have credit for doing 9 hikes now. Mommy chose to do this hike today because it was cool and overcast with a little breeze. We have done this hike when it was warm out and I get very overheated and we have also done it when it is cold out and Mommy has nearly frozen because of the wind that hits the trail. Today seemed like the perfect day. The hike goes through sedge meadows and by oak forests and up and down moraines. Unfortunately on one side of a large chunk of the hike is some ugly "more money than common sense" mcmansions with big expanses of lawn and no trees. This is why the wind whips onto the trail, there is nothing to slow it down when it goes through the ugly houses.

Mommy and I don't understand why people would want to have nothing around their house except sod. If they were out playing croquet or polo or golf on their lawns it might make sense, but they never are. Mommy said if she had to live in a place like that that had all that bare space and no trees she would dig up 1/4 of her lawn for a veggie garden and then put in a great big pond in the middle of what was left and surround it with wild and domestic flowers and grasses with a little flagstone sitting area by the water. She says the neighbors would hate her.

Anyway, Mommy was right and it was the perfect weather to hike this trail and I got to hike the last 1/2 mile without my boot on. It felt kind of weird at first and I kept looking down at my foot to see what was biting me, but after awhile I got used to it, and when Mommy checked my foot afterwards there were no sore spots! Mommy says I can try 3/4 of a mile barefoot next weekend if we hike. It was a fun hike and we saw lots of birds and squirrels and I found a chipmunk hole and I saw two deer! I was perfect and quietly watched when it was one deer, but when the second came out of the woods I lost it and started jumping around and barking. It was waaaay too exciting. I also saw two CATS being walked on leashes at the trailhead! That was very strange. Unfortunately when we got back to the trailhead we saw the cats' mom walking around with empty leashes. She said the cats had both managed to slip their leads and vanished when she got distracted by a neighbor and wasn't paying attention to them. Mommy asked me where the kitties were, and I looked around and sniffed and stuff, but didn't find them. We hope she finds them before dusk because one thing we saw an awful lot of on the trail was coyote poop.

Walking by the oaks

Mommy is pretty sure this picture was taken
when I was jumping around and barking at the deer

Mommy liked this shot

Back to the car

Hike Five

2011-10-16T17:45:00.005-05:00

Mommy and I did our fifth county hike. Since two were long and counted double that means I have earned my badge. That doesn't mean we don't plan on doing all the other hikes on the list though if we can. Mommy has been sick all weekend. She didn't feel good on Thursday night and worse on Friday and then, because she was running a fever, we spent all day Saturday in bed except when she went to the grocery store and did a load of laundry and picked some late tomatoes and raspberries. Today she still wasn't feeling great so all she did was go back to the grocery store because, "Shopping when you have a fever means you forget to get the stuff you went to the store for, like toilet paper." and she also made some spaghetti sauce out of some of the tomatoes. I was such a good boy about not getting any walks yesterday that Mommy felt I really deserved a hike today, but because she still didn't feel great she chose the shortest hike for today. Also, that hike is all mowed trail again so I didn't have to wear my boot. It was only one mile long.

We don't go to this preserve except when it is on the hiking challenge because it isn't the nicest place. Before it was a forest preserve it was a gravel pit and it must have been in really bad shape when the county got it because the trees are very small and the prairie is just starting to get some real plants in it. The trail on one side runs down the right-of-way for a long stretch of high voltage power lines so you are walking under the giant buzzing pylons. Another side runs right next to the interstate highway. Mommy says when we walk there she always hopes nobody loses control of their car because we'd be in trouble if they did. What was the gravel pit is now a nice little lake that you can hike around though and Mommy says the preserve serves its purpose because it is built in the area of the county which is mostly multifamily housing developments and malls. Mommy says if she had to live in one of those housing developments or work all day in one of those malls she would probably spend a lot of time at the preserve just to keep her sanity.

Anyway, the hike didn't take long, although Mommy did want to sit down around the 3/4 mark so we did and I ate a lot of treats out of her bag and looked to see if there were fish in the lake. If there were, they weren't by the shore. There must be some because there were fishermen on the shoreline and one of them had a bell on his pole that kept ringing. It was a nice little walk for a dog who is such a good nurse for his sick Mommy.

The lake

Mommy and the mowed trail and recovering prairie

High voltage lines

Some of the little trees

Another Hike!

2011-10-12T17:37:00.005-05:00

Mommy had the day off today so we took another hike. This time Mommy chose the second shortest hike in the challenge. This one was only 1.2 miles and it had mowed trails instead of crushed gravel so Mommy said I didn't have to wear my boot! It is so much nicer hiking barefoot. We had been warned by a friend who also does the hiking challenge that when she did this hike on a Saturday there had been a whole lot of very bad off-leash dogs with rude owners. It is illegal to be off leash in the regular county forest preserves because of all the threatened species that live there. There are FOUR preserves, each at least 40 acres and totally fenced in, that are made just for dogs to run free in so there is no reason to break the rules, but some humans are very stupid. Anyway, Mommy wanted to do this preserve on a weekday to lessen the chance of me meeting up with an unruly off-leash dog so this seemed like a great day to do it. Would you believe we saw 3 off leash dogs anyway?! Bad humans like that make it so that us dogs with good humans get banned from the forest preserves. GRRRRR. Mommy and I don't see why people don't understand that.

Despite the bad humans and their dogs Mommy and I had a good hike. There was one spot on the hike where there wasn't a grass trail but an old asphalt access road (this preserve used to be a YMCA campground). That road was a little rough on my toe, but I don't seem to have done any damage to it. There was a nice lake, but it was way down a very steep hill and I declined when Mommy offered to help me try to get down to it, my back legs have been acting up a bit today so I decided to be the smart one and just look at the lake. I didn't get any pictures of the lake though because there were so many things to smell, what with all the dogs that run around there, that all my photos but one were of the ground. Mommy laughed when she saw them.

GroundMore groundThis ground has some little flowers of some kind

It is fall, can you see the leaves on the ground?And Mommy!

My First Post-Amputation Hike

2011-10-09T16:43:00.006-05:00

Today was an exciting day because I got to go on my first hike since losing my toe, or rather having it taken by the vet, it isn't like I misplaced it or anything. My foot still doesn't have enough callous on it to allow me to walk barefoot on the crushed gravel trails so Mommy ordered me a hiking boot from Ruff Wear. That way I could hike and not have to worry about the gravel cutting into the scar tissue. Mommy had trouble at first getting my rather weird-shaped paw into the boot because the cuff part is quite tight to keep it from sliding off. I kept managing to get two toes in and the stump caught on the cuff leaving one toe out. So she put a thin sock on my paw first and my foot then slid right in.

Me modeling my boot

Mommy was charging up the Merlin Cam which was taking FOREVER since we hadn't used it for a month, and she had finished packing up all our other stuff, water, treats etc. and I got impatient because I knew we were going hiking so I started to whine. Mommy said, "Don't whine at me, Argentina." which is her weird way of saying "Stop it." so I started barking at her instead. After 2 hours of waiting she gave up on the Merlin Cam and unplugged it and we took it off with an incomplete charge. Mommy thought it might stop half way through the hike so she took her camera along too, but the Merlin Cam made it through the whole hike and beyond.

We chose the third shortest hike on the County Hiking Challenge. It was only 1.7 miles, but Mommy didn't want me to overdo it the first time out. By the way, some of you have asked what the County Hiking Challenge is. What it is is the county we live in picks 12 trails in 12 different forest preserves in the county and it marks them with little signs. They range from 1 mile to almost 4 mile hikes and you have three months to hike 7 of the trails. Trails that are over 2 1/2 miles count as 2 hikes and usually Mommy and I do all of the hikes (except the bad ones that don't allow dogs on them). In the past we would do them in quadrants. We would divide the county into four parts and then do all the hikes in one quarter in one go, but, because of my back and now my toe, this year we are only doing one trail at a time. Pre-toe I did two of the longer hikes so I'm up to 5 hikes now because of the double hike bonus. If you do 7 or more hikes you earn a metal badge that you are supposed to nail to a hiking stick. Mommy has sewn all of mine on my backpack, even though I haven't been able to wear the pack since I broke those vertebrae a few years back. It is a fun program and a good way to see trails you may have missed.

Well back to today. We chose the 1.7 mile hike and off we went. I started out being very excited and pulling Mommy along, but about half way through I realized I was getting a little tired and my paw was hurting a bit. So I slowed down and walked with Mommy the rest of the way.

Me out in the lead and very happy to be on the trail again

This preserve has a combination of woods and prairie and lawns where people can picnic and even a playground for kids to play on. Mommy objects to lawns and playgrounds in forest preserves because she thinks kids should be hiking the trails and climbing trees and jumping off stumps and stuff if they are in a forest preserve and not sliding down plastic slides or sitting on sod. They can do that in their city parks, but I guess other humans don't think that way. Anyway here are some Merlin Cam shots of the hike:

WoodsPrairie turning into lawn

I saw lots of squirrels and chipmunks on this hike and two [Auntie Naomi, turn away] snakes. One of the snakes was right in the middle of the trail and Mommy tried to get a picture of it, but I decided to take the oportunity that arose when she was trying to get her camera out of her hip bag to knock her hand aside so I could grab some treats out of the treat bag. She wasn't very happy about that. She did take a picture of me trying to find the first snake after it slithered into the grass to hide.

Me looking for the animal Auntie Naomi doesn't like

[Okay Auntie Naomi, you can start reading again.] At one point I recognized a branch of the trail as being one that leads off to one of my favorite hiking spots that we only do on cool spring and fall days because there is no shade there. There IS a lake with fish which I love and usually ducks and geese and sometimes swans and often horses. I wanted to turn off to go that way, but Mommy said no, we needed to stick with the marked shaded trail because she didn't want me to overdo it by hiking too far AND it was 80 degrees out so it was too hot to hike in direct sun. She also said I was too smart for my own good since I normally see that branch going the other way when we are coming back from taking a woods side hike while doing the lake hike. I hate to admit it, but Mommy was right to not let me take the longer hike. I was VERY tired by the end of the little hike we did and was more than a little happy to see the car. Mommy hung the Merlin Cam on the back of the passenger seat like she usually does after our hikes, but she forgot to turn it off, so I accidentally got a self portrait of me on the trip home.

You can see how happy I was to be back on the trails!

My Monthly Diary for September, 2011

2011-09-29T08:30:00.013-05:00

Well, September was nowhere near as fun as August. Remember my owie toe, the one that had a lump on it that we thought was maybe a weird reaction to a bee sting or spider bite? Well, I took the antibiotics and steroids and at first it seemed like the lump was going down, but then it popped right back up again, so back to the vet Mommy and I went. We saw my regular vet and she poked and wiggled the lump and she looked at my toenails and she told Mommy that she was pretty sure it was a fatty tumor in a really weird place, and because of all the damage I had done to the nails on that foot and the fact that I had managed to remove the skin tag on that shoulder, and because it was only going to get bigger, it needed to come off. Mommy was very nervous about this because I am eleven years old which, for my size, makes me a senior citizen and she wasn't happy about having to knock me out. The vet told her not to worry because she would use a special anesthetic that was very safe for old dogs. Mommy then asked the vet if the surgery needed to be done right away or could we wait a week because she and I were supposed to go up to Wisconsin to help move some furniture, and, more importantly, to see Mommy's youngest brother and his partner (Mommy calls him her brother-out-law because the idiots who make the laws say that her brother and his partner can't get married even though they have been together for a lot longer than a lot of people who CAN get married. So, since he can't be her brother-IN-law he is her brother-OUT-law.). Anyway, Mommy and I rarely get to see her brother-out-law so we didn't want to miss the trip. The vet told us to go have fun and we'd do the surgery when we got back.

The lump

So, off to Wisconsin we went. I had a great time. I got to swim and take two peddleboat rides, and because Grandpa was there I got to go for a ride in the big boat, which is lots of fun even though Mommy and Grandma hog the best seats. Best of all I got to see Mommy's brother-out-law who is the GREATEST! No matter what I did he thought it was wonderful. When I'd get in trouble for something he'd say, "Don't listen to your Mommy, sweetie. You are perfect!" When I would squeak my toys he would clap and say, "Yeah!!" instead of pulling a pillow over his head and saying, "Stop it! I have a migraine!" like Mommy does sometimes. When we were having dinner and I was sitting on the other side of the threshold like Mommy likes me to do in the Wisconsin house he called me over to sit by him! At one meal I sat on the other side of the threshold and squeaked my toy and he was busy talking and didn't clap and say, "Yeah!" so I whined and he got worried and asked what was wrong and Mommy said, "He squeaked the toy and you didn't clap. I told you that was a bad thing to start." so he clapped! It was nice having someone around who understood how important and clever I actually am.

But, all good things come to an end and Mommy and I had to go home so I could have surgery. The plan was that the vet would take the lump off and do a bone scraping to send out for biopsy and I'd be home by noon. We went to the vet and Mommy was very nervous about the anesthetic and I was NOT happy about being taken into the back room without Mommy who was in the waiting area talking to my vet. When the vet came in back she gave me a shot that made me happy and not all that worried about Mommy not being around and being put up on the big table in back for an x-ray or having my foot shaved for the surgery. Then the vet said, "Oh dear." and I got put back in a cage in back, but I still wasn't too worried about it because of that shot. She went away and called Mommy and told her that I needed to have my toe amputated!! She had seen a weird lump on my x-ray and in the past when she has seen weird lumps like that on black dogs' toes it has ended up being a really bad form of bone cancer that gets very aggressive if a bone scraping is done. Mommy was NOT happy about that call, but she agreed we couldn't risk me losing my front leg since my back ones don't work right, and the vet had assured her that my walking wouldn't be affected by one missing toe so into the operating room I went to get my toe cut off! Because this was not a lumpectomy anymore it meant that I wasn't coming home at noon either, but the vet knew I would make myself sick if I didn't get to go home until the next morning (which is normally what she would do with an amputation) so she told Mommy I could come home around 3 p.m. When Mommy came to get me I was still very woozy but I was sure happy to get out of the vet's office and back home. Mommy had moved her mattress to the floor of the living room so that I could sleep there with her, since I couldn't climb while my foot was all bandaged up and when we got home she brought me over to it so I could lie down, but I got myself back up and staggered into the kitchen and stood by my Milkbones because I ALWAYS get a Milkbone when I come back from the vet. Mommy said I wasn't supposed to eat anything so soon after surgery, but I refused to leave and kept tipping over, so Mommy gave up and gave me the "ears" off of one small dog bone and I was happy and went back to bed.

Sad Post-op Me

Because of the nerve damage in my hind end that day and the next I kept falling over or my back end would slowly sink down to the ground when I stood up so Mommy made me wear my lifting harness at all times so she could catch me if that started to happen. It was strange wearing the harness inside, but I didn't object. I DID object to not being allowed to walk for more than a quarter mile at a time and I refused to poop for three days. Mommy said I needed to poop so I wouldn't get sicker like when I broke my back, and she even tried to get me to poop by driving me to some of my favorite pooping spots. Finally, Mommy gave in and went against the vet's orders and let me walk a 1/2 mile and I agreed to poop. I also refused to pee for the first two days because I WILL NOT pee like a girl, and I was too unstable to lift my leg. Dignity is everything you know.

Me Wearing My Lifting Harness

On day three I decided I was sick of being stuck in the house so when Mommy went out to the porch with the recyclables I went out too and then I refused to come back in the house. It was only 50 degrees outside so Mommy covered me up with a blanket so I wouldn't get chilled. I stayed outside for about 3 hours.

Me on the Porch

Mommy had to go back to work after a few days and I had to wear a CONE. Mommy and the vet knew I would freak out with a normal cone so Mommy went out and bought something that looked like an innertube. When she put that on me I laughed at her because it didn't block me from getting to my foot AT ALL!! Mommy returned it. So she ordered something called a Comfy Cone which is like a plastic cone but it is soft and you can bend it into different shapes. The first time Mommy went to put it on me she opened up the Velcro strips that hold it together and I got really scared by the noise and took off screaming out of the room. Mommy caught me and put it on me, but there was something on my head so I tore around screaming again. Mommy wondered how in the world she was going to be able to go to work if I couldn't wear the cone, but then, while I was hanging out on the porch, she realized that she could put it into the shape that worked for me, and, if she made the collar it was attached to tight enough, she wouldn't have to open it in my presence. Then she discovered that she could really bend down the top part and to be safe she tacked it down with some thread and I actually wore the cone without screaming through the house. It DIDN'T mean I was happy about it though.

Me in My Comfy Cone

Everyone was really concerned about me when they saw me walking with a sock over my bandage on nice days and an IV bag over it on wet days. Lots of people at Mommy's work asked for updates on me and Emily, who works with Mommy and was on my Relay for Life team one year, baked me two bags of really yummy chicken flavored treats in the shapes of M's and W's and little vets. After the first few just for being me, Mommy decided they would be my special "Putting on the Comfy Cone" treats. I get one for putting my head in the cone and one after Mommy clicks the collar closed. I hate the Comfy Cone, but I can't resist those yummy treats.

Me Getting a Yummy M (in Shawnee pose)

Mommy and I were supposed to go up to Wisconsin with Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred for a special weekend festival and Auntie Naomi's birthday, but because of my foot we had to cancel. Mommy was very sad about that, but she hopes we can do it next year. Finally, after FOREVER, okay two weeks, and a million trips to the vet for bandage changes, or maybe it was three, I got my stitches out and don't have to have a bandage on my foot anymore. I DO have to still wear a sock on most of my walks because I have a sore spot on the non-toe and I need to build up a callus. I can walk on the foot just fine though if I don't overdo it and scrape the sore spot and I can take long walks again! Mommy has ordered me a boot so that I can go back to taking hikes without having to worry about the gravel on the trails and that will be great because I'd hate to not earn my trail badge this year. I still have to wear my Comfy Cone when Mommy isn't around (and sometimes when she is) because I'm licking the sore spot too much. I think that is mean.

My Toeless Foot

Oh, and the vet techs and receptionists were worried that I wouldn't be able to paint with a missing toe on my painting paw, but Mommy doesn't think that is going to be a problem. I pretty much retired from painting when I turned 10, but Mommy plans on having me paint something for Relay for Life next year if possible. And FINALLY AFTER REALLY REALLY FOREVER, or maybe it was three weeks, we got the results of the biopsy on the original lump and the bone lump and it ends up that both were benign fibromas. The vet says fibromas on bones are rare, but then, I'm me, and weird rare medical things are my specialty. So, Mommy and I don't have to worry about that nasty bone cancer that black dogs get! Hooray!!

My Monthly Diary for August, 2011

2011-09-02T20:58:00.004-05:00

This was an eventful month.

First off, I had my birthday. I turned 11. Mommy took me to the Tastee Freeze for a Pup Cup. Yum! Then a few days later Mommy was slicing bread for herself for a sandwich and when she turned around briefly to get something I jumped up on the counter and stole a slice and ran off to the porch and ate it. Yum again!

We had a nice cool day in the middle of the month and I wanted to walk to the forest preserve, but Mommy said no because it is too long a hike for me these days. I WAS NOT happy to have to go home, but then later that afternoon Mommy took me in the car to the forest preserve and we got to take a hike there. That was good and a little over 4 miles after a 3.5 mile morning walk did seem rather long to me after all, so maybe Mommy was right that I shouldn't do the 8 mile walk to and from the preserve. I guess that is a bad part of being 11.

Mommy has been busy a lot of weekends helping Grandma and Grandpa move to their new place (where I took the Dumbest Vacation Ever) so we haven't gotten to do a whole lot of hiking this summer. But Grandma and Grandpa are officially moved in now so Mommy says our weekends should be more free from now on and we can do our normal county hiking challenge. That is good because I'd hate to not earn my county hiking badge. I've gotten one each year that I have lived with Mommy.

The big thing this month though was that Mommy and I took a vacation up to Wisconsin and Pelles came too! We had a whole week in the woods at the lake which was great! About a week before we left one of my toes on my left front foot suddenly swelled up and the swelling didn't go down. Mommy called the vet to try to get an appointment for me, but she couldn't get one before we left, but the vet said not to worry and go anyway, but go see a vet if the swelling got worse. We were glad the vet said it was okay to go. I went swimming a bunch of times and Mommy took me for a lot of rides in the peddleboat. The first time we went out in the boat I got in fine, but had a real hard time getting out because the seats are so slippery and with my back end not working right I couldn't stand up to hop out. So after that Mommy had me wear my lifting harness and with her help I could get back up on my feet and out of the boat just fine.

There was lots of wildlife around. I saw deer and we heard something squealing in the woods one night and there were a bunch of birds, some of whom I barked at and some who went after me! The little humming birds did not like when Mommy and I were sitting out by their feeder one day and they kept buzzing us and chittering. We weren't trying to drink their nectar so I don't know why they were so mad. We also kept hearing a funny call and then saw that it was a baby pileated woodpecker calling for his mom to come feed him. He was as big as mom so it seems funny that he expected her to feed him. Mommy says that is what teenagers do.

Angry Hummingbird

Pileated Woodpeckers (the baby has the punk hairdo)

I also chased chipmunks and squirrels and FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER I didn't have to wear my leash whenever I was outside. I think it was because I was such a good boy. Mommy said it was because I've slowed down enough that she can catch me now. She only made me wear the leash on walks and after dark. After the first couple of days I decided that I was done CHASING chipmunks and changed to STALKING chipmunks. I would see how close I could get to them before they ran away and when they did I'd take a couple steps towards them and then go do something else until they came back. One time I got right up to one! It was right under my mouth and I couldn't believe it. I tried to grab it, but the little stinker ran right between my legs and got away before I could bite him. I think that was cheating.

Cheater Chipmunk

Mommy and I took three hikes too. I wore my camera for the second hike on Lumberjack Trail outside of Boulder Junction and here are some of the pictures I took:

The trailhead

Mommy Hiking

Silly Mommy set my camera wrong so I only took pictures for the first 40 minutes of the hike, which was a shame because there was some nice water we saw (and I swam in) after that. Oh well, humans, what can you do?

For our third hike we were doing the Bearskin Trail starting in Minocqua and as we were heading towards the trail a group of people stopped us and asked Mommy if they could take my picture. Mommy said yes and we posed for them and I got pet. Then, just as we were getting to the trailhead another group of people stopped us and asked Mommy if they could take my picture. We posed again and I got pets. As we were hiking I kept expecting people to want to take my picture and pet me, but nobody on the trail did. I don't know why, after all, I am quite the star and the paparazzi were wanting to take my picture in town. Anyway, after the hike Mommy and I decided to walk around the town a bit and I got stopped AGAIN and asked to pose. Of course we did and I got pet. Mommy said it wasn't the paparazzi and I shouldn't get a big head. It seems the people were in town for a wedding and were on something called a "scavenger hunt" and they needed to get a picture of a black and white dog with its owner. Mommy gave the last people my e-mail and asked them to send us the picture, but they didn't. Mean people. As we were heading back to our car we passed a group of people and heard one of them say, "No, it is just a solid black dog." Mommy said they were going to be kicking themselves when they got back to the gathering and discovered that I have a white blaze on my chest and what Mommy calls "headlights" on my ears.

A couple days before our vacation was over I started to really lick my toe again, and then I decided to chew off the toenail next to the bump and then I noticed that I had a skin tag on my shoulder so I tried to chew it off too, which REALLY made Mommy cringe. So, Mommy called our vet, but she was on vacation too, so Mommy made an appointment with a different vet and we came home a day early so I could go see him. He was kinda young and new for a vet, but he was nice until he took a needle and stuck it into my toe!! Then he went into the lab/surgery area and we could hear different vets talking about what he got from the needle. He came back and said he thought maybe it was a cancerous tumor and we could do two things, one was cut the lump off my foot and send it off for a diagnosis, but Mommy pointed out that I can't be knocked out so they'd have to do it just giving me Valium and using a local, which would be hard, and the other choice he gave was giving me a steroid ointment, but Mommy wanted to know what it would do to my tummy when I licked it off, which I was going to do. He couldn't answer that so Mommy said, no offense, but we were going to wait until my regular vet came back in town and get her opinion. Our regular vet called Mommy the next day and told her that she thought maybe it was a weird reaction to a bee sting or a spider bite and wanted me to take a low dose antibiotic/steroid pill and see what happened. So I'm taking pills for a week and will go see her next week so she can see my toe for myself and decide what to do from there. I'll keep you all updated on what happens with my owie toe.

My Monthly Diary for July, 2011

2011-07-31T20:53:00.022-05:00

This was a crazy month! First off, Mommy has been shopping around for a lifting harness for me to help me up and down stairs and stuff. She couldn't find the one she wanted so she decided to make me one. She didn't want to have to make the vest part from scratch so I got to go to a place called Bass Pro Shops to try on hunting vests. I was very good in the store trying on the vests so Mommy took me to a part of the store where they have GREAT BIG FISH in a tank! There was also a person in the tank cleaning it. I found it all very interesting. I was disappointed however when the check out people did not have bones. What kind of check out people don't have bones? Anyway, we got home with the vest and Mommy put it on me to figure out how to attach the lifting straps. That is when I realized that she expected me to actually WEAR the dorky vest she had me trying on!

Dorky vest

Well I pouted so much she gave up and decided to return the hunting vest and make a new vest from scratch.

Then we had the Big Storm which I wrote about in a previous post. Then Mommy and I took the Dumbest Vacation EVER, which I also wrote about already. Then Mommy made me the lifting harness and the day she finished it she got an e-mail from someone who sent her a link for a harness they liked. It wasn't the harness Mommy was looking for, but the one above it on the website was!! Mommy called the company and got advice about fitting me for it and ordered it that day.

Mommy felt so bad about the Dumbest Vacation Ever that she took me for a really short REAL vacation to Wisconsin. We went up on a Saturday morning and came home on a Sunday night. Mommy had hoped it would be cooler up there than at home, but it wasn't, but at least we had a nice lake to swim in. When we got there I ran down to the dock and was shocked to discover that the peddle boat was not out in the water! I stood on the dock and stared at the empty spot and whined. Mommy said, "Nobody put the boat in, and it takes two people to drop in, so we can't do the boat this time." Then she opened the boathouse door to get the cushy things I like to lie on on the dock and there was the peddle boat! I ran up to it and looked at it, then looked at Mommy, then looked at it, then back at Mommy, then I whined, then I sighed and lay down by it. Mommy said, "Fine, fine! I'll try to MacGyver it in for you." and then she went and got a garden cart and some rope and managed to get the boat out of the boathouse and into the lake by herself! I knew she could do it! I got four rides in two days so it was well worth it. We tried out the lifting harness Mommy had made for me and it worked well, but Mommy thought the one she had bought would be better, but it hadn't arrived by that weekend. Besides boating I got to swim and look for fish and take a short trail hike that I like to a hidden lake where I get to swim. It was a good short vacation.

A couple days after we got back the new harness arrived. Mommy said this was a very good thing because she could use it to get me down into our basement when the weather got to the 100s during the day. I didn't mind being in the basement, but I really resented that she put the baby gate up at the bottom of the stairs like I was an irresponsible puppy or something! She said she did it because she didn't want me to try to go up the stairs by myself and wind up falling down them while she was gone, but I still think it was demeaning. We've slept on the porch almost every night during July because it was so hot and Mommy spent a few days down in the basement with me cleaning it up because it was the coolest place in the house.

Then last weekend Mommy said we were going to take another dumb vacation, but if I was very good I might get a pet fish! So, Mommy put the empty ice chests into the car and we drove down to Grandma and Grandpa's house. There had been a really big rain storm the night before so we had to take a strange route down there because some of the roads we would normally drive were flooded and closed. The strange route ended up taking us by the pet store where Mommy was going to get me the fish, so I didn't really have to be a good boy, because we stopped there FIRST and got my new fish friend. He is a betta and we named him Pelles. (Pelles is the Welsh name for The Fisher King in the King Arthur stories for those of you not up on your Welsh Arthurian legends) Mommy took me into the pet store and I checked out all the other fish in the tanks while Mommy read the instructions for the "Betta Buffet" Mommy picked out a bowl for the fish and the gravel and then I chose a plastic plant and a plastic dinosaur to put in the bowl. The instructions said you got two plastic toys, but I was only interested in the dinosaur, so Mommy picked a plastic skull. Then Mommy held the cups of betta fish down for me to see and I decided I liked Pelles best. He was unusual looking as all the other fish were blue or red or purple, but he is white with red and blue on him.

Pelles

The people in the pet store all commented on how I was the first dog they had ever seen who was interested in fish and Mommy told them that she was buying the fish for me. They laughed that she was buying me a pet. Then Mommy, Pelles and I drove down to Grandma and Grandpa's house. Grandma didn't believe that I was interested in having a fish until Mommy put him up on the counter and then brought me into the house. I went straight to the counter to watch him swim around and Grandma had to admit that I liked my fish! Then Mommy left Pelles on the counter and went out to get an ice chest and when she came back in I was standing with my front feet on the counter and I had the lip of the fish bowl in my mouth and I was trying to lift it up so I could put it down on the ground. Mommy said that was VERY NO behavior and I needed to keep the fish on the counter. I don't see why, after all, he is MY fish. So, anyway, Mommy helped grandma pack up some dishes and sheets and towels and stuff and then she put a whole bunch of boxes in our car and then she went downstairs and filled our ice chest with all the food she had taken down there on the Dumbest Vacation Ever and then Pelles and I got in the car and we drove to Grandma and Grandpa's new house. Pelles went onto the counter in there and I had to sit in an empty back room by myself while Mommy and Grandma and Grandpa brought in three cars full of boxes. Then Mommy filled up her ice chests with all the food that she had left at THAT house and Pelles, Mommy and I headed home. At first Mommy put Pelles' bowl on one of the end tables, but then she decided the spot was too dark and secluded so she brought up the table that my birdies used to live on and put Pelles bowl on that. That night I stole Pelles food and tried to open it, but Mommy caught me and told me THAT was NO too. I didn't know pet ownership came with so many rules. I love watching him swim and I check on him each morning and whenever I come in from my walks.

Pelles on the end table

Finally this month Mommy and I went to visit Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred at their place in Door County, Wisconsin. I was very upset when Mommy took Pelles out of the house and didn't come back with him, but she said he couldn't come on this vacation and Benji's mom was going to babysit him. Even without Pelles I had a great time at Auntie Naomi's house. The night we got there Mommy put on my new lifting harness and we went to something called a "campground" to visit with Auntie Naomi's daughter and her boyfriend and his parents. I'm not sure what a campground is exactly, but it seems that the people build a fire and then sit around it and eat and drink and talk. I napped for most of it. Mommy says I'm not the camping type of dog which is why we've never done it, and I was happy to get back to Auntie Naomi's house and go to bed. The next morning we went to a place called Cave Point County Park that I had been to the first time we went up there to visit. Mommy remembered that I liked it a lot and she wanted me to get to go there again. It was great. We walked a little bit down a trail and then Mommy used my lifting harness to get me down on a rocky slab where I could play in the water and people could admire me. It was very crowded so there were a lot of people there to admire me.

Are there fish out there?

Then we went back up to the trail (Mommy used the lifting harness to help me back up the rocks) and we walked a bit further down the trail to see what the shore looked like from there. I wore my lifting harness as my walking harness so that Mommy could help me if we got to an obstruction that I couldn't cross on my own. There were a bunch of fallen trees on the trail so the humans were slow, but I got around all of them on my own.

Hurry up!

Eventually we got to a bit of rocky beach where there weren't a lot of people and I wanted to go back down to the water so Mommy said okay and helped me down with my harness. I wanted to go down to that section of beach because there was a HUGE pile of dead alewives on it. Alewives are little invasive herrings and they die off in big bunches when the lake gets really hot really fast and then they wash up on the shore. Well, Mommy got as far as saying, "Don't..." when I dove into the pile and started to roll and roll. It was heavenly!

Alewives!
(You can see my lifting harness really well in this shot)

Mommy didn't think it was great though so she went back to the trail and gave Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred her stuff and then we waded into the lake and Mommy tried to rinse as much of the dead fish stink off me as she could. Mostly what she managed to do though was get the dead fish stink on her. After that we went back to the car and we drove to the Pamida with all the windows open for some reason. Mommy bought shampoo and laundry soap and we went back to Auntie Naomi's house, but I wasn't allowed in. Instead Mommy and I got in our car and we drove down to the beach by Auntie Naomi's house and went in the water there. The shore was really mucky and Mommy lost her shoes in the muck and had to get them out and then rinse them off in the lake before putting them back on. I was really rather tired for yet another swim and so I didn't want to go back in, but Mommy said I had to and we waded into some water up to my belly and then Mommy pulled out the bottle of shampoo and the swim turned into a BATH!!! That was very mean. Then Mommy washed my harness and we got back in the car and went back to Auntie Naomi's house where Mommy changed into her pjs and put all her clothes and our towels into the washer. Everyone had lunch on the porch since Mommy was still too smelly to be allowed in the house and after lunch Mommy took a shower. (Mommy had planned to shower first, but Auntie Naomi was hungry so they ate first).

Mean Mommy washed off all my fish stink!

I was very tired that night so I stayed home ALL ALONE for the first time at Auntie Naomi's house while Mommy and Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred went out to eat with the people we visited at the campground. I was a good boy and didn't even throw up or anything.

The next day Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred took us to see the cabin where they used to stay before they moved up there and then we took a Feed the Fish tour. Feed the Fish is a movie that your humans may have seen. It stars Tony Shalhoub, who grew up in the area, and it was filmed all around there. They showed us the places where major scenes took place and then the little green shack that Tony Shalhoub owns and in the movie looks like it is in the woods, but is really by the lake. We got out of the car so we could walk by his property and I made sure to pee on it.

You can't see the green shack but my right hind foot is kind of pointing to it.

Mommy says we are lucky Tony Shalhoub wasn't there or we might have seen this:
After the shack we drove by a barn that in the movie looks like it is right on the lake, but it is actually in the woods! Those movie people are weird.

After the tour we had lunch and then we packed up and headed home. On the way we stopped at a point that is 1/2 way between the equator and the North Pole.

If I'm half way to the North Pole, why is it so hot?

Then at one point on the drive Mommy stopped the car and we sat and sat and then the road lifted up right in front of us!

Some people got out of their cars to look

Then the road went back down and we could drive on it again. Mommy says it was a drawbridge and it opened up to let this boat go by:

After that I pretty much slept the whole rest of the way home. Vacations are tiring and this month has been exhausting.

Dumbest Vacation Ever!

2011-07-14T13:53:00.002-05:00

Yesterday Mommy got all our ice chests out and two ice chests I'd never seen before and took all our food out of the deep freeze and fridge and filled them up. Ice chests mean vacations right? So I thought, "Cool a trip!" Mommy took the chests and put them in the car and I sat behind the car to be sure I got to go on the vacation. Mommy and I got in the car and we drove off and we ended up at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Mommy took one of the chests in and put the food in it into Grandma and Grandpa's deep freeze, then she helped Grandpa change a lightbulb and then we got into the car and drove off again. This time we ended up at a house I'd never been to before. I thought, "Okay! Here is the vacation place!" and I was excited to go into the house, but when I got inside the house was empty except for a folding card table and chairs. I checked every room and looked out the windows and sniffed everything I could sniff while Mommy put the food from the other ice chests into the fridge and freezers in the house. After I'd sniffed everything, I followed Mommy around confused and even went down the stairs (very slowly) behind her even though she said I wasn't supposed to. When she had emptied all the food out of the chests she put them back into the car and got my long leash. She told me this was Grandma and Grandpa's new house and I was the first dog to see it. Then she said Grandma was going to be here soon and we needed to wait outside since the air conditioning wasn't on in the strange new Grandma house. Grandma came and Mommy hooked me up to a tree in the back yard of the house by a nice group of gardens and then she LEFT!! Grandma was working in one of the gardens so I whined a bit and then settled down and waited to see what would happen next. Mommy came back about 15 minutes later and said, "Thanks for letting us put our stuff in your freezers until our power is back on." and we got in the car and drove home! I couldn't believe it when we pulled into our own driveway!! That was the DUMBEST vacation I have ever been on.

Good news wise our power came back on last night so I don't have to play pioneer dog. Mommy wasn't home when it came on and something happened after it did which caused the neighborhood to smell all smoky and scared me too. Mommy isn't sure the power is going to stay on because of the smoke and since it keeps going out again on other blocks, so she says the food is staying at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Also a neighbor stopped us on our walk this morning to tell us that the death of The Squirrel Tree was featured on our local news last night!! A reporter stood in front of it and showed the big hole where the squirrels used to live. He said that the tree was a popular gathering place for neighbors on holidays, but he didn't mention that it used to be FULL OF SQUIRRELS and that one time 12 SQUIRRELS RAN OUT OF IT ONE AFTER ANOTHER. What kind of reporting is that?

Big Storm!

2011-07-12T16:53:00.007-05:00

Remember this winter we had SnOMG? Well we had a big storm yesterday morning that was a summer equivalent. The day started off really nice. It was cool and sunny at 7 a.m. They were saying there was going to big storms later in the day, but Mommy and I figured there would be no problem going for our morning walk. We got to the town proper and Mommy looked west and saw a HUGE BLACK WALL coming towards us fast. She said, "Merlin you need to pick up the pace." I didn't want to and dragged behind her in my "log on a rope" impersonation. We got to the squirrel park and I wanted to go in, but Mommy said, "I owe you a squirrel park later. No park today." I stood mule still because I HAD POOPED which meant I got to go in the squirrel park. Then it started to drizzle. Mommy dragged me towards home and said, "You are going to regret this you know." and I have to admit she was right. We were still a good two blocks from home when the wind got really strong and it started to rain needles SIDEWAYS. It HURT! I sure picked up my pace then. Mommy and I were practically running home, but we were fighting the wind the and being stung by the rain. When we got to our block there was a loud CRACK BOOM!! and we saw a tree a couple houses south of ours crash down into the street! Mommy and I sprinted past all the shaking trees and got to our house and discovered that our mulberry, which is taller than our house, was touching the driveway. It hadn't fallen down, but was just bent so low that its branches were touching the ground. We had to push through the branches to get to the house then we went in the gate and onto the porch. Mommy turned around to pull the porch door closed because it was being blown all around by the wind when CRACK BOOOOM!!!! the elm tree next door split in half! Luckily the half that fell down didn't hit anything but it was scary. We went inside and I got dried off and Mommy changed into dry clothes and then the carbon monoxide detector screamed and our lights went out. I got really scared because I hate the carbon monoxide detector, but Mommy unplugged it then called Benji's mom to make sure none of the elm had hit her house. It hadn't, but she pointed out that the tree across the street had fallen down at the same time! Mommy called work to say she wasn't coming in right now as it looked like a hurricane and then we sat in the window and watched the storm. When the storm was over we went out and helped clear the tree out of the street and pull the branches that were in Benji's yard to the curb. Then Mommy went to work.

When she got home she took me for a walk and I talked to a bunch of people who were out pulling branches to the curb and just staring at places where their trees had been. Then Mommy got in the car and went shopping! She came home with two big bags of ice and she set up an ice chest like we were going on vacation, but then she put it in the basement and the other bag of ice she put in the fridge. Weird. Then we sat on the porch and I wanted the fan and lights on but Mommy lit hurricane lamps instead and told me that that was how the pioneer dogs lived. I think those pioneer dogs were nutty. It was DARK and so quiet you could hear the owls and bats and stuff, plus it was hot and there was no fan. This morning Mommy still wouldn't turn on the fan, but we took a walk around town and Mommy brought her camera so we could share pictures.

Our neighbor Amy gathering up some of the elm tree logs for their wood burning stove

Amy taking a break to pet me

THE SQUIRREL TREE FELL DOWN!!!

Where did the squirrels go?

Anyone home?

How is that balancing like that?

Nom nom nom

Can you see the workers cutting up the big willow that broke?

Here they are!

Mr. Vulture is looking for casualties

Don't think they are getting out of their home any time soon

I got to go swimming at the end of the walk

Mommy says that it is very likely we are not going to have lights or fans until Saturday!! (Mommy had to drive far away to get electricity to put this blog entry up for me.) I'm not sure I want to be pioneer dog for that long, so if you know the CEO of the electric company, please bite him on the leg and tell him to hurry up with that work!

My Monthly Diary forJune, 2011

2011-07-03T12:59:00.003-05:00

This was a pretty quiet month for Mommy and me. We decided to take it easy after my fall down the stairs to let everything heal up. It took about three weeks for me to get almost back to my normal self, but I am still slow and a bit limpy and I've been getting tired after about 5 miles so Mommy took me to see the chiropractor. She said my back was fine and that slow and limpy and getting tired faster is now my new norm. It seems that since I don't feel my back feet like I should I'm walking kind of funny. I also don't seem to be able to make my ankles and knees bend quite right anymore so I am compensating by using my hips to lift my feet off the ground. That way I don't foot scrape, but it is why I get tired a lot faster than I used to. My hip muscles just aren't up to the new task I am setting them to. Mommy says she knows how that is since her knees don't work right and she uses her hips to lift her feet off the ground too.

Another reason we haven't done much is it was much hotter than it should have been in June. We had days in the upper 90s early on and then big storms. Then more hot days. Really hot days are hard on Mommy and me because we don't have air conditioning, but on the good side it does mean that I get to spend time swimming in the lake. I took quite a few evening swims with Mommy and sometimes we went for Pup Cups afterwards, but other times we didn't. I don't understand how you can go for an evening swim and not follow it up with a Pup Cup. That's just not right.

One great thing that happened this month was that the four kids who I see on my evening walk sometimes found our house and they came into the backyard and played with me! It was very exciting and I played You Can't Get the Toy from Me, and Kick the Ball Up in the Air So I Can Bounce it with My Nose, and Tug-of-War with Sticks and Toys. Mommy broke up the playtime after about an hour when she noticed I was gasping for breath and limping a lot, but it was great fun while it lasted.

I did take Mommy for an 8 mile morning walk early in the month. We had had one of the big storms and it was a cool Sunday morning so I thought the long walk was in order. Mommy said, "We shouldn't do an 8 mile walk. We should do the 5 mile walk instead." but I got stubborn and refused to move until Mommy gave in. That is the great thing about being a 75 lb dog. If you decided you aren't going to move, you don't move. Mommy can't just pick you up and carry you like I've seen happen with some of the little dogs in town. They whine and complain, but they get no say in the matter. Anyway, I decided it was a cool enough day to take the 8 mile morning walk and insisted on doing it. Mommy gave in. Well, after 5 miles I decided that I had walked enough and, since we were at the forest preserve parking lot, I went to the nearest car and sat down and waited for Mommy to give me a ride home. Mommy said it wasn't her car and she was not going to hotwire it just because I bit off more of a walk than I could chew. I tried doing the stubborn bit, but Mommy wasn't having any of it and she went all stubborn herself and she sat down in the shade of a tree by the lot and said she'd wait. We waited for quite awhile and I finally gave up and we continued our walk home. When we got to the playground part of the walk we found a very sad fallen nest with dead baby birds inside. They must have gotten knocked down in the storm that night. I decided to sit by the nest for awhile and so Mommy joined me on the ground. Then we got up and walked to the creek, and I sat on the bridge for awhile. Then we got to the church parking lot and I tried to get Mommy to hotwire one of the cars parked there. She said no, so we sat on the berm by the lot for awhile. Then we got to the old pear trees and I lay down in the shade and refused to move anymore. Mommy took her sweatshirt off and turned it into a pillow and we napped under the pear trees for about a half hour. I decided I could walk again after that and we got all the way back to town and to where Gunner the lab used to live. Gunner's mommy and daddy were working in their front yard and I lay down under their tree and refused to go again. Mommy considered asking Gunner's mommy and daddy to watch me while she walked the 5 blocks we had left home and got the car, but then she said, no, I wanted this walk I was going to finish it. So we sat and watched Gunner's mommy and daddy work and Mommy talked to them some and they came and pet me a bit and then I decided I would walk the rest of the way home. When I got home I ate my milk bone and fell sound asleep. Mommy went outside to work in the yard and the four kids came by and asked if I could come out and play. Mommy said, "Sorry, not this time, he is too tired." I barked hi, but then went right back to sleep.

Oh! On one of my Saturday walks to the lake I CAUGHT A FISH!! I caught a carp in Lake Michigan once when I was younger, but it was bigger than a cat and it scared me when I saw what I had by the tail so I let it go, but this time I caught a bluegill which fit in my mouth nicely. I love chasing the bluegills and trying to catch them and finally all my work payed off! I pulled it out of the water and proudly showed it to Mommy and then I realized that it was slimy and wiggly and pointy and it grossed me out so I dropped it. It plopped back into the water and swam away before I could catch it again. Catching fish would be a lot more fun if they tasted more like my freeze dried salmon treats and less like a wiggly sharp blob of slime.

I also conned Mommy into buying me cheese fries this month. I pretended like I wanted to take the 8 mile walk again, and when Mommy said no and made me turn around right after the Dog n Suds I acted all sad and then pointed out that I could be cheered up if only she'd buy me some cheese fries. Mommy said, "It is 10 a.m. It is WAY too early for cheese fries." I hung my head and looked so sad, then I turned and looked towards the 8 mile hike and looked sadder and Mommy said, "Fine. I'll buy you some cheese fries, but we are only taking the 5 mile walk." I perked right up then and trotted over to the Dog n Suds and told the girl that I wanted cheese fries. It is never too early in the morning for cheese fries.

Finally, I went to see the town's 4th of July fireworks on Saturday. I love fireworks. I like watching all the bits of light appear and I love the ones that fly around like birds (Mommy calls them chasers) and the best ones are the chasers that make screaming noises while they dart around. When the boring ones that are just little flashes of white light with big booms go off I usually turn and glare at Mommy because she should do something about those duds. We went to the feedstore lot to watch with the feedstore regulars, but the elderly foursome whom we usually sit by weren't there this year which was sad. The other regulars were there though as were a bunch of people we hadn't seen before. Mommy brought my sleeping bag for us and a pillow for her and we stopped and got a Pup Cup before the show. We were all comfy on our sleeping bag when a know-it-all little girl about 10 years old and her friend decided to sit behind us. They yammered the whole time about shoes and other non-fireworks things. One of them complained to her friend about the little RV kids in front of us (the RV family are regulars) who were calling out "Oooh!" and "Aaah!". Mommy says she was complaining because they were making it hard for her to hear herself talk. One of the things one of the girls kept saying was how terrible it was to take a dog to see fireworks because "all dogs are afraid of fireworks". What a little idiot. Mommy turned once after about the fourth time the girl said it and said, "If you are talking about my boy, you are wrong. He loves fireworks." but the snotty little girl kept repeating how all dogs are afraid of fireworks and you should lock dogs in small rooms on the 4th of July so they won't get scared and hurt themselves and stuff every 10 minutes or so. Whenever she would say, "dogs" I would turn and look at her because I knew she was talking about me. Mommy would say to me, "Mind nobody's business but your own." and I'd turn back to the fireworks, but it WAS my business since they WERE talking about me. When the show was over the new people (snotty girls included) left bottles and stuff in the parking lot and Mommy and I picked up what we could carry to the garbage so that the feedstore people wouldn't make their lot off limits in the future. Mommy wishes people would teach their kids to behave as well in public as I do.

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 7

2011-06-28T23:00:00.003-05:00

My Camp Diary
Saturday, July 26, 2003

I slept until 7:00 because I was sooo exhausted from that CAT IN A CAGE!! When we did get up I went to look for the CAT IN A CAGE!! I looked under the tables and behind the door and other places I knew a cat could hide, but he was definitely gone.

Mommy packed up the car and I got worried. What if she decided to leave me here? When other dogs came to say hi I barked at them. I then told Mommy that I wanted to sit in the car. It was cool and raining so Mommy said it was okay.

I missed breakfast and the awards ceremony, but Mommy got my patches for me. She said some of the other doggies got 8 patches, but she thought I did rather well with only 4.

We left camp about noon and I slept the whole way home. When we got home I took another nap. Then it was bedtime.

My plans for next week are take a nap, eat some food, follow up with a nap, followed by a short nap, followed by some more napping, dinner, followed by bedtime. I hope I get to go back to camp again in a couple years!

If you'd like to learn more about the Dog Scouts of America or find out how you can go to camp, click here.

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 6

2011-06-28T22:50:00.003-05:00

My Camp Diary
Friday, July 25, 2003

Lonnie reminded everyone at breakfast to keep their dogs under control especially when yellow bandana dogs are around and I guess the Belgians' mommy got mad because she left.

We took a five mile backpack hike and then I painted my best painting yet, "On the Puppy Playground." Then we went to our final Dog Scout test.

On the Puppy Playground
Can you see the three black dogs of three sizes running?

We were in the big room and they wheeled in A CAT IN A CAGE!! They expected us to "Leave It!" for A CAT IN A CAGE!! Some of the other dogs didn't even seem to notice or care that there was A CAT IN A CAGE!! I did though and I barked and barked. Mommy made me leave the room quite a few times. The other dogs would walk up to THE CAT IN A CAGE, look at it and then look away and walk off. They walked away from A CAT IN A CAGE!! I walked up to it and sniffed and sniffed and sniffed and had to be dragged off. Then I barked and barked. Then I stared. The other doggies all passed, but I wanted that CAT IN A CAGE!! Mommy and I had to stay about an hour after class before I could finally "Leave It!" the CAT IN A CAGE. The way they finally got me to pass was that when I would turn away from THE CAT IN A CAGE, I would get to walk up to THE CAT IN THE CAGE!! Then if I walked past it I got to beat up my anxiety toy.

THERE IS A CAT IN THAT CAGE!!!
Photo by Joanne Webber

After all that work Mommy and I took the rest of the day off. We just sat around reading and stuff, but each time we went back into the lodge I checked to see if I could find THE CAT IN THE CAGE!!

All the tired puppies and their people

Mommy and me relaxing
Photo by Joanne Webber

Later, Mommy and I tried something called "Rally-O". We had to walk around a course and do various obedience things whenever we got to a station. Mommy was sure a klutz at it! We tried both courses once and then took a little break and then tried to do them again, this time for a Rally-O patch. I only have so much patience for obedience so, after we did the first course perfectly, I decided that was enough. I'd let Mommy line me up for the second course and we'd do the first station and then I'd jump up and grab my leash and shake it and fight Mommy and refuse to move any further. Mommy tried it three times, but I made sure I did the same thing each time. So, Mommy said, "We quit." and we didn't get the patch. Mommy says maybe we will find a Rally-O group by us since SHE thought it was fun. HMPH!

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 5

2011-06-28T22:40:00.002-05:00

My Camp Diary
Thursday, July 24, 2003

I was very tired last night. I slept until almost 7:00! We took a short walk before breakfast and then we did a two mile backpacking hike. I was very good and walked in the crowd. I didn't mind when a shepherd barked at me. I even walked next to a Belgian for awhile!

After the hike Mommy and I practiced "Leave It!" with food until I got it down well enough to pass the test. (Cheese and peanut butter! They expected me to choose not to eat cheese and peanut butter!) Did another painting for Mommy, but I wasn't having fun. It was a nice one though and she called, "A Bouquet for Mommy." Afterwards I got to play in the play yard with BOTH Emma and Skippy! Then Mommy had my caricature drawn.

A Bouquet for Mommy

Skippy

My caricature
I don't like to look people other than Mommy in the eye

I went for a boat ride on the lake with Mommy and got to swim for a loooong time and I chased frogs too. It was lots of fun. Since I was such a good boy for the whole day and didn't bark at anyone Mommy let me go for a dog's choice walk. I chose to walk down the trail and come back behind the pond. When we got to the pond Mommy called out that I was coming and everyone made sure their dogs were doing something besides running up to me except for the Belgian pair. Their Mommy let them both run straight at me! I got scared and barked and lunged at them and Mommy had to haul me off. She said that they only wanted to play with me but she understood that it wasn't my fault and I was still a good boy.

Mommy didn't say anything to anyone except Alex's mommy, but someone who was down at the pond told Lonnie because she came to talk to us about it later that night. I went to bed early and Mommy made a letterboxing stamp for me.

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 4

2011-06-28T22:25:00.006-05:00

My Camp Diary
Wednesday, July 23, 2003

Shadow woke us up around 4:00 a.m. by throwing up. She had spent all day yesterday swimming, swimming, swimming. She even escaped from our room and tried to run out the door for a swim! She must have swallowed an awful lot of water. After the disturbance, I overslept and didn't wake until the little dogs down the hall barked at 6:30 so I told Mommy to get up. After she was dressed, I got back into bed and went back to sleep. Mommy shook her head and joined me.

About a half hour later we took our walk. Mommy put my food into the training treats bag because I have decided not to eat any meals. We had our first group hike. It was fun. I walked with a doggie named Jade. Jade looked like a littler version of me! Mommy said he was the sport model. Jade didn't want to walk much because he didn't like his pack and he wanted his Mommy (he was with his Daddy). I walked with Emma for awhile too and I even walked beside a Belgian shepherd. I think Belgians are German shepherds with a different hairdo so it was very brave of me to walk with her.

Jade, the sport model of me

Jade and me

After the hike Mommy was talking to some people and I was sitting with the dogs when Katja came up. I kept waiting for her to turn into a shepherd again, but she didn't. She made me nervous, though, so I glared at her, then I puffed at her and finally I barked. For some reason Mommy kept trying to get my attention the whole time I was watching Katja. Doesn't she realize you can't trust a wereshepherd?

Mommy made me take a nap for about a 1/2 hour. Then we went to painting class in the "arfs and crafts" building. Mommy put this funny thing on my paw and dipped some stuff in paint and then had me do that "scrape the tray" trick we had worked on. It was amazing! When I scraped the tray paint showed up on the paper taped to it! I painted a nice picture Mommy named "Walk in Tall Wildflowers." Mommy wanted me to paint another one, but I didn't want to so I just made one swipe of blue paint. Then I tried to walk away and I painted some nice blue marks on the floor. Mommy called the second painting "Operant Conditioning Blues."

Photo of me painting by Joanne Webber

My first ever painting! Walk in Tall Wildflowers.

Operant Conditioning Blues

Paint covered paws

We cleaned up and went for a walk and then Mommy went to put me back in the room for my lunchtime nap. Alex and Shadow were already napping in their crates. When we passed Shadow's crate she went nuts barking and biting at the bars. She had snapped at some other dogs that day too. Mommy told her person what she was doing, and Shadow's mommy decided they would leave camp for the day and move to the motel for the nights. I think Shadow had a bad tummy ache from all that swimming.

Mommy took me to try Search and Rescue. I really thought it was exciting when the other dogs were watching as their humans ran off into the woods. Finally, it was our turn and Mommy ran off in the woods while the instructor held on to me. Then Mommy called and the instructor let go of me. I ran into the woods and found Mommy and then I looked all around in the bushes and up in the trees to see what it was that everyone was chasing. Mommy grabbed my leash and made me leave the woods. She wanted to practice some more after class so we went to a fenced area and Mommy had me wait while she hid. When she called me, I was busy sniffing the fenced in area. She called again and I went towards her, looked right at her and went to investigate other things in the fenced in area. Why did she think finding her would be fun? Squirrels and goats had been in the fenced in area. Finding THEIR smells was what was FUN!

What missing person?
Can't you smell how nice these flowers are?

Passed more of the Dog Scout tests then just hung out with Mommy, did some swimming and stuff until dinnertime nap. After dinner we went to a talk about geocaching and then we played a game called "My Dog Can Do That!" I did a trick nobody else could do!!! I carried a ball across a goal line made of doggie treats. It was EASY for me because Mommy set it up so that I saw a door on the other side of the goal line and then she said, "Get Out!" and I know that means run through the nearest doorway, so I ran straight to the door.

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 3

2011-06-28T22:09:00.007-05:00

My Camp Diary
Tuesday, July 22, 2003

Woke Mommy up at 6:30. I refused breakfast. We took a walk (No shepherds). Then Mommy went and bought me a pack. I look SOOO cool in it! We took a practice walk then went to backpacking orientation. Learned what to put in your pack. A leash, collar, water, water bowl, poop bags, flashlight, first aid kit, matches, id, compass and knife. We tried walking with a filled canteen, but the water sloshed around and made me walk funny so I made Mommy buy a platypus (collapsible canteen) for me.

Mommy made me take a LOOONG nap while she went to a lecture about aggression and had lunch. We skipped the second Dog Scout Class because we had missed the first one last night. I started practicing "Look at the gooood shepherd." with a shepherd named Braxel. If I looked at him and didn't go nuts, I got a treat. Maybe shepherds aren't so very terrible after all.

Braxel the Good Shepherd

Went to the water safety class but was told I could only be a "Puppy Paddler" because I need to stay on a leash, but I already KNOW HOW to swim, so it took no time to complete that course!! Mommy says that means we have free time every day. Then someone said that we couldn't get our patch unless we took the dog scout class which we had skipped the first two of. So, we had to do a make-up of the parts we missed and pass the tests to catch up. It wasn't hard though because it was the first parts of a CGC.

Nap time and dinner again then we went to try carting, but I didn't like the rottie that was there so we left. I got to have some playtime with Emma (I LOVE Emma she's a lab), then we practiced painting again and worked on sitting by shepherds some more.

The lovely Emma

Neva is not a shepherd because she is white

Mommy wanted to go to a PhoDOGgraphy class so I came along. While class was going on Katja came by. I was lying on my side half sleeping when I saw her. I wagged my tail at her and she wagged back. Then she went in her room. That was when I made the horrifying discovery that Katja was a wereshepherd!! She can go from a floppy-eared not-a-shepherd to a German shepherd just by putting her head in the door! I barked hysterically at her, and it took Mommy quite a while to calm me down.

Katja the wereshepherd

I was more than ready for bedtime after our busy day.

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 2

2011-06-28T17:22:00.005-05:00

My Camp Diary

Monday, July 21, 2003

Another sleepless night. Alex had to sleep in his crate and he spent a lot of the night showing his displeasure by clicking his toenails on the plastic bottom and moaning. I just couldn't get comfy on the bed because it was smaller than the one at home and Mommy was hogging all the space. Besides, how comfy can you get when you are on an eight foot lead?

Alex

Decided to wake Mommy up at 6:00 a.m. (that's 5:00 a.m. our time). Finally agreed to poop in the puppy play yard. Mommy tried to get me to eat breakfast, but nope. I want my feeding station. Mommy said, "Maybe you'll eat if we go off to a quiet spot in the woods." She gathered up my food and stuff and wrapped my leash three times around her hand and we went to get some fruit for her. When she was shutting the fridge Kyra, a German Shepherd, came up. Kyra's mommy said, "Can we come by?" Mommy said, "Wait." That is when Kyra's mommy made the fatal mistake of trying to move backwards to be out of our sight. I SAW THAT GERMAN SHEPHERD MOVE!! With a ROAR I yanked the leash out of Mommy's hand and went after Kyra. My food flew everywhere. Kyra's mommy was too quick for me though because she let go of her G.S. and pinned me to the wall with her leg. I kept growling and barking while Kyra tried to let herself out the door. Mommy grabbed my tail and hauled me off to the car. Boy was she mad at me! She said one more of these and we were going home. I gave her a 3 inch by 1 inch bruise on her thumb from yanking the leash too!

Kyra

I had my picture taken for our camp ID and we kind of just avoided other doggies until lunch. Mommy tried eating with me in the dining room, but then suddenly decided that naptime for doggies would be a better idea. I didn't think it would! Another roommate arrived. She was a black and white border collie named Shadow. Mommy told shepherd owners to keep away from me at introductions. Then Mommy went to a class to learn the first stages of how to paint and I had to have another nap. She came back and we practiced this silly Mommy trick where she would click this thing and hand me a treat. Mommys are strange. Dinner, then painting practice. Mommy held a board and if I scraped my foot on it she would click that thing and give me a treat. It was fun for awhile, but then, half way through practice I had had enough so I stopped cooperating. I spit out the treats and paced and whined and bumped Mommy with my head and tried to climb on her lap until she FINALLY got the hint and we went for a walk and quiet time. At least Mommy walked me to the road so I could poop in comfort! I refused dinner again, but then got mad at Shadow when she came over to sample it. I didn't growl, I just gave her my "sideways eyes."

Me learning to paint

The path to the woods trail

Tired me

Flashback to Dog Scout Camp--Day 1

2011-06-28T17:11:00.005-05:00

It is Dog Scout Camp season. Back in July of 2003 Mommy and I went to Dog Scout Camp. We were very excited to go when we signed up, but then two things happened: 1. I got attacked at the dog park by a rottweiler and a black and tan German shepherd which started my extreme fear of big dogs and 2. I tore my ACL which meant that I wasn't supposed to do any running or jumping so Mommy's dreams of letting me try agility went out the window. Even with the restrictions we had fun though. I have decided to re-post my camp diary that was lost when my old Geocities page went away. Here is Day 1:

My Dog Scout Camp Diary

Sunday, July 20, 2003

Didn't get much sleep last night because Mommy had packed bags. She said we were going somewhere that wasn't Wisconsin. We left the house about 11:00 a.m. and we drove and drove and drove and drove. At first Mommy would stop every once in a while and roll down her window and throw something out into a basket. I tried to fetch what she was throwing the first few times, but my seatbelt held me back. After a while I got bored and decided to nap. We stopped at a gas station and I drank some water and peed and ate some of the breakfast I refused this morning, and then we got back in the car for more driving. It was past my dinner time by the time Mommy stopped.

We were in a place I had never seen before. Mommy left me in the car and went into a big building.

Then she came out and moved the car and started to unpack. After what seemed like FOREVER she let me out to sniff trees and pee, then we went into the big building.

They gave me a nice yellow bandana to wear. I liked it until a lab named Chelsea told me it meant I was a bad dog.* I showed her bad dog. I tried to bite her. Mommy was appalled. She said the yellow bandana means I don't like German Shepherds, not that I don't like EVERYONE. Mommy gave me my dinner, but I refused to eat it. I ate Mommy's bread from her dinner instead. Then we took a walk in the woods. Mommy kept telling me to poop, but nope. There are no curbs and no lawns, how does she expect me to poop here? There was a lake, but she wouldn't let me swim.

When we went back to our room there was a poodle in it. He had a yellow bandana too. We decided we are the cool dogs. Mommy tried to get me to go into the dog crate she rented for the week. NO WAY!! Finally she figured out she could attach a rope to the bed and I could sleep with her, and stay in my space only. Good thing, otherwise we would be sleeping in the car.

*NOTE: Chelsea and her Mommy wrote me on August 19 to tell me that Chelsea DID NOT tell me the yellow bandana meant I was a bad dog. What she said was, "You're bad, Dog!" because black dogs look so good in yellow. So, much to my embarrassment, I must admit it seems the fight was all caused by a silly misunderstanding.

My Monthly Diary for May, 2011

2011-05-31T21:04:00.002-05:00

This month we had Mother's Day and I celebrated by waking Mommy up a whole bunch of times in the middle of the night. I'm sure she was very happy. Then Mommy had her birthday and we took a hike. I posted about that already, so if you missed it, read on down past this entry.

The big thing that happened this month was that Mommy and I went up to Grandma and Grandpa's house in Wisconsin. Everyone was there except for Mommy's youngest brother's partner. Too bad he couldn't come. My golden retriever cousin was there too, but he isn't allowed to come onto my property and I don't go onto his. Last time he came onto my property I tried to eat him which really shocked my Portie cousin Missy's daddy who had brought him over. He'd never seen me go all Cujo before and he didn't really believe I would. He does now!

Anyway, Missy came over on the first day and we played some runaround on the hill and follow each other and sniff games and Mommy and Missy's daddy commented on how we hadn't gotten to play in a long time because we were both getting old and it seemed like whenever we were together one or the other of us was under the weather.

Well, they spoke too soon because at 6:30 a.m. on the second day I was going downstairs and my hind end suddenly got all tangled up in itself and I wound up falling down 8 steps! I landed at the bottom of the stairs with all my legs in different directions. I managed to get back up, but my right rear leg hurt and I didn't really want to put weight on it. Mommy took me for a short walk to pee and poop and stretch things out, but I still hurt. She gave me a 1/2 a doggy oxy and then when her youngest brother woke up and came downstairs she borrowed his phone to call the vet (her phone doesn't get reception at the house). She was hoping there was a chiropractor in town, but there wasn't so she got me a regular vet appointment and off we went. The vet was very nice. He said I didn't have a concussion (Mommy knew that) and that I didn't seem to have broken anything (Mommy was pretty sure of that too). Mommy was afraid I had popped my right hip (which is my bad one) and when the vet went to check it I was all tense and then I was calm so we kinda think I did pop it a little and he put it back in place by doing the rotation thing regular vets do. My regular vet had done that once which is how we ended up with a referral to my chiropractor! The vet said I hadn't popped my hip though and then he did that toe test thing again that started the argument between my chiropractor and my regular vet about whether or not I had degenerative myelopathy.

He asked Mommy if my vet had talked to me about the lack of sensation that I had in my feet and Mommy told him about the myelopathy fight. He told Mommy he was an orthopedic specialist and asked, "Do you want a third opinion?" Mommy said sure and he said that he was sure it was NOT degenerative myelopathy because if it was I would at the very least not be able to wag my tail by now and I am a very good tail wagger. What he thought was happening to me was that I was developing arthritis in my back where I broke it a couple years ago. The arthritis is pressing on the feeder nerves that are leaving my spinal cord which is causing the numbness in my feet. It may also be compressing my spinal cord. He said that the reason I fell down the stairs was that I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing and, since I don't quite feel my feet right, if I don't pay full attention to doing something, like walking down the stairs, my feet kind of just do what they want to and down I go. I have to admit that was true. I was so excited about being at the lake that I went down those stairs way too fast without a thought in my head except "Whoo hoo! I'm at the lake!"

Anyway, he told Mommy to give me more of my pain meds and my muscle relaxers and said he would normally give me an anti-inflammatory, but I can't have them because of my bleeding ulcers, so it ended up being a not so exciting trip to the lake since I was on pain meds and muscle relaxers for two days which meant I was loopy. I did get to wade a little and I took some short walks and a very short hike with Mommy. I also saw a deer and, on the last day Mommy and I went porcupine hunting which was a lot of fun. Mommy had been woken up by a strange noise the night before and she knew it was the porcupine that has been eating the house. Sure enough she went outside and caught him in the act. He didn't care a hoot about Mommy and even when she yelled at him and threw a rock at him all he did was raise is quills and stroll away.

So, I got to go into the woods and follow five different trails the next morning trying to find the porcupine. I found a big pile of porcupine poop, but we couldn't see a porcupine up in that tree and I found a great hole under a fallen tree with scratches around the dirt, which COULD have meant there was a porcupine in it, but we couldn't see inside. One trail led to the neighbor's outbuilding, which Mommy thought had porcupine potential too. The best trail I found ended up at a tree where I scared a chipmunk. I sat under that tree and looked up and barked occasionally and Mommy got all excited thinking I had found the porcupine. When she saw it was a chipmunk she said I was following the wrong rodent. Mommy decided that all five trails wound up crossing in this one general area so she went to the hardware store and bought a salt lick and put it where the trails crossed. She is hoping that Mr. Porcupine decides that the salt lick tastes better than the house. She then made a removable fence to block the part of the house that the porcupine was eating so that Grandma and Grandpa could put it up at night. Hopefully Mr. Porcupine gets the message and leaves the house alone, because if he doesn't, a hunter will have to be called in to shoot him, which nobody really wants.

Oh, if you are going to Wisconsin this summer be sure you have your tick meds on. Mommy picked up 16 ticks over 4 days and I got 10. Every time we stepped in brush that was higher than Mommy's ankles one of us would come out with at least a tick or two. It is going to be a bad tick summer.

Happy Birthday Mommy!

2011-05-24T16:41:00.007-05:00

It was Mommy's birthday the other day and to celebrate she took the day off and I took her for a hike at the state park. We had intended to do an all day hike, but it was cold and raining in the morning so we didn't get to go, but it turned to cool and misty by afternoon and we left then. We did 8 miles and it was lots of fun, even if I did get slow and grumpy for the last three. Because the weather wasn't very good there weren't very many people on the trails and we got to see a lot of animals that are normally scared off by the loud hikers. Mommy spotted an indigo bunting, which Mommy thinks is one of the prettiest birds out there. Here is a picture of one Mommy found on the web. Maybe he is related to the one we saw!

We also saw hawks and swans and all kinds of ducks, not just mallards, but wood ducks and harlequin ducks and even a ruddy duck who must have overslept and missed his migration bus. Best of all the sandhill cranes were out and were being extra territorial so they were yodeling like crazy. When I was at the peak of my tired grumpiness a kitty-dog ran across our path! Well that woke me up and I picked up my pace for the end of the hike. Mommy calls kitty-dogs "foxes". Shows what she knows. I wore my camera, but I have to admit that I didn't get any really good shots, so we aren't going to force them on y'all.

The funniest thing happened at the end of the hike. Mommy and I had just turned the last corner and could see the access trail ahead of us when we spotted two teenage boys with fishing poles over their shoulders and their pants down to their knees. They were doing that "I'm too cool for this" slouching walk when suddenly they stopped dead in their tracks and stared with really big eyes at the clearing by the access trail. Mommy and I couldn't see what they were staring at, but, since it was dusk, Mommy was concerned it might be coyotes so she made me stop while we listened for clues. Then we heard a sandhill crane yodel and Mommy said, "Oh it's just cranes. Let's go." so we started forward again. Well, when that bird yodeled one of the boys went running back toward the parking lot waving his arms over his head and yelling, "Look at da woodpeckers yo! Look at da woodpeckers yo!" Three more boys came hustling up as fast as they could with their pants down to their knees and the five boys all stood there staring at the cranes and arguing about what they were. We could hear the first boy insisting they were woodpeckers and another boy saying he thought they were "storks or cranes or geese or something" and the other three trying to decide who to believe. One was leaning toward goose and the other two were heading towards woodpecker. Finally the first boy ended his argument with, "Ain't you never seen da cartoons?!" Mommy laughed at that but she COULD see where he was coming from. I mean check out the similarities:

When we got up to the boys one of them turned to Mommy and said, "Lady, you know what kind of birds those are?" Mommy told them they were sandhill cranes and the "storks or cranes or geese" boy yelled, "Thank you!"

Mommy bought Chinese food on the way home and we had a nice snuggly evening. I was tired for two days afterward.

My Monthly Diary for April, 2011

2011-05-03T16:34:00.012-05:00

April was an exciting month.

First off, while Mommy and I were on one of our regular walks

(Auntie Naomi, turn away!)

I saw a SNAKE!! It was right by the sidewalk and was all squiggly and I poked it with my nose and it squiggled some more so I poked it again and it squiggled awhile longer and then it knotted itself up into a little snake ball with its head under its coils and wouldn't play anymore. I looked at Mommy and tried to get her to make it play again, but she said no, the snake was finished playing for the day and we needed to let him get back to work.

(You can start reading again Auntie Naomi.)

A couple days later on my evening walk I found a nest of bunnies. I always play fair and don't try to grab the bunnies until they move and they were staying really still so we were in a standoff. Mommy couldn't see what I was staring at and she kept trying to make me move on, but I didn't want to. Finally the bunnies couldn't take the staring contest anymore and they all bolted off in different directions. When Mommy saw it was bunnies she was kinda mad, but I didn't get any because of my leash. I've checked the bunny spot every night, but Mommy says the mommy bunny moved the nest since a big bad wolf tried to eat the babies. What wolf?

The next day when Mommy and I were coming home from walking to the library to return some stuff we bumped into my favorite neighbor boy!! I was so excited because he had been sent to obedience school in the late fall and we weren't supposed to see him again until at least summer, but he had hurt his leg jumping over a fence and was going to need surgery. Mommy says you are supposed to respect fences and not try to jump over them and now I see why! I haven't seen him since so I think he is being kept crated so he doesn't do more damage to his leg. While we were talking to him Mommy's phone rang (this is very strange because Mommy only carries her phone on hikes just in case of emergency and not on regular walks). Mommy said we needed to head home because AUNTIE NAOMI and UNCLE FRED were coming over. We got home and a few minutes later there they were!! That is very very exciting because Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred are some of my most favorite humans. I was very happy to see them even if Auntie Naomi didn't bring me a present. Mommy says I'm a greedy gus and don't need presents every time I see Auntie Naomi. They didn't stay long, because they and Mommy were going out to lunch before Mommy had to go earn dog food money, but they came back to see me again after lunch so that was good.

I got to go to the chiropractor this month too. My back just didn't heal up right after I fell off the bed last month so Mommy took me in for an adjustment. I was very tense when she started working on my back, but when she did a spot right above my hips I gave a big sigh and melted into Mommy's arms it felt so good to have things set right. I also had a bad spot in my mid back and my head was off too. The chiropractor told Mommy it may have looked like I fell straight off the bed, but I sure hadn't fallen straight!

At the end of the month Mommy and I woke up and there were two bunny birds in my front yard!! They were under the bird feeder eating the birdseed. I barked at them, but they ignored me. Here is a picture of them:

Mommy has been getting her veggie garden in and I've been helping. I like to make sure that the ground is good and soft and the planting lines are straight:

My friend Gracie has a new brother named Sherlock. He came up and sniffed noses with me at the fence for a good long time. He is a 10 year old toy poodle. Gracie is a schipperke.

Finally this weekend Mommy and I took a hike and I saw all kinds of great things. I saw two of the things that Auntie Naomi doesn't want to hear about, some deer, some geese (they ignored everyone who passed them until I came along and then they started honking "wolf! wolf! wolf! wolf!" so I barked at them and got in trouble) and some dogs too. I barked at some of the big dogs, ignored some of the big ones, and said hi nicely to all the small ones. I wore my camera and here are some of the shots I took.

A lot of people ride bikes on this trail:

I like walking on the boardwalks. You can see all sorts of birds there:

There is a goose nesting out there:

Mommy took a picture of it too. They like to nest on muskrat mounds because they are very warm:

One of the things Auntie Naomi doesn't like to hear about. Can you see it?:

There are deer out there:

Mommy took a picture of them too:

Mommy needed a potty break. I always go in the outhouses with her on trails:

Back on the trail:

Mommy's new car has a sunroof which is nice when you are hot after the hike:

My Monthly Diary for March, 2011

2011-04-05T16:38:00.005-05:00

Well, Mommy says she knows it is spring because all of the signs are there. The crocuses have come up, the robins have returned and I start each morning by throwing up. Yup, we don't know why, but it wouldn't be a spring morning if I didn't wake Mommy up each morning with the delightful sound of me walking through as many rooms as possible spitting up bile. I've had quite a few doses of Carafate and Pepcid, but it doesn't help. I still throw up. If I don't puke first thing in the morning then I refuse to eat breakfast until I can go outside and eat grass until I throw up. We go through a lot of paper towels in the morning.

As if my morning puke wasn't hard enough on my stomach and throat I decided to be very clever this month. Mommy made a roast beef tenderloin for dinner one Sunday and I wanted some, but Mommy said no because I have developed a total intolerance to beef protein. I couldn't believe she wouldn't give me a bite or even let me lick a plate, so I waited until she was taking a shower that night and I got into the garbage. I was very careful about it and didn't tip the can over or scatter the contents, but I DID get all of the plastic wrap that the tenderloin was in. Boy did it taste good! Mommy came into the kitchen after her shower and saw that the cabinet was partly open and she said, "Merlin! Did you get in the garbage?" I looked very innocent from my kitchen bed, and since she didn't see any scattered garbage, she figured she had come out just in time to stop me from getting anything. Silly her. So, she had a little trouble understanding why I developed a bad tummy ache the next day and didn't want any breakfast and hardly any dinner and I didn't eat all my Mommy-Goes-Away treats. The tummy ache continued for three days and then SURPRISE!! I pooped out about 2 feet of plastic wrap all in one piece! My tummy felt much better after that, but the next day I pooped in the house while Mommy was out because my intestines were aggravated for some reason. After that all was normal again.

Because it is spring Mommy and I are seeing a lot of our walk friends that we don't see in the winter because they walk or we don't walk by their house because the roads are dangerous in winter. The twins and their neighbors are out again and I take Mommy by their house at least once a week. When I get to their house if they aren't out I slow down to a crawl and stretch my zipline as far as I can towards their living room window and walk by staring into their house. Most times this gets their attention and they come out to pet me. One evening I took Mommy on a walk that led her past two of my favorite dog friends, but they weren't out, then I went to the twins' house and they saw me, but they didn't come out and I was very sad, so I insisted on walking up another neighbor's driveway to see if they were in their backyard, but they weren't and I got very very sad. I was dragging behind Mommy with my head and tail down oh so very depressed when Mommy saw that our neighbor across the street was outside in his backyard. So she called across the street to him, "Would you come out and pet Merlin? He has been trying to find someone to talk to all evening, but nobody is home." He was nice and he came out and pet me and it cheered me right up.

On another walk a woman called out to us, "Hey! That's Merlin the smiling dog!" from about four houses away and I insisted on going up for petting. She was very happy to see me and told Mommy that she had missed me this winter, but she didn't walk when it was icy. Mommy and I pretended like we knew who she was, but really we were both rather clueless, we suspect she was someone we met once or twice on our morning walks, but hey, petting is petting and I'm not turning it away.

Another sign of spring? The Tastee-Freez and Dog n Suds are open!!! I haven't gotten to go to the Dog n Suds for french fries yet, but I did get to go have a pup cup at the Tastee-Freez. Now that I know they have reopened I try to take Mommy by them at least once a week in hopes she will get me a treat.

One not fun thing happened this month. I was sleeping on Mommy's bed and I rolled over and I fell off the bed! I hit the hardwood floor WHAM!! right on my back with my feet straight up in the air. Mommy gave me sympathy but she was also laughing on and off while doing it, which wasn't nice. I ended up on doggy oxy for a few days because of that fall. That is no way to wake yourself up, let me tell you.

Hope you all have a great spring, get to visit your local Tastee-Freez or Dog n Suds or other treat place, and don't fall off the bed.

My Monthly Diary for February

2011-03-08T16:50:00.003-06:00

I debated about doing a February entry. Not much happened other than the big snowfall on Groundhog Day, which I already told you about in my SnOMG post. February is hard on Mommy and me because of all the weather shifts. My back and joints hurt with all the now it is warm, now it is cold, now it is snowing, now it is raining. I end up taking a lot of doggy oxie and getting sleepy and drunk and stupid. I do get to only take a 1/2 of one now, so that means that I am more slow than sleepy and not quite so drunk stupid. Mommy says if I weren't such an active and smart dog she might not notice the change, but for me, walking rather than trotting and not spotting squirrels right away and stuff make it really obvious that I am not myself when I'm on my doggy oxie. Also, the weather shifts give Mommy things called migraines, which means that she doesn't like when I smack her with squeaky toys. So we usually end up spending a lot of February in bed watching old movies and tv shows. We did get to take one hike along the river and I did a couple of eight mile morning walks which were fun.

I also told Mommy I'd like to start painting again. I haven't wanted to paint for about a year, because I have to go into the basement to do it and the stairs are hard to manage, but I followed Mommy downstairs one day, went to my "studio" and stared at Mommy while I wagged and wagged my tail. Unfortunately Mommy was only running downstairs to get something before going off on one of those Mommy things she does without me, so I couldn't paint, and then Mommy had to help me get back up the stairs. She says though that now that the weather is getting nicer she will move my studio up to the three season porch and we can maybe paint on one of the warmer days. Then come summer we will move it out to the backyard. So, hopefully I'll be able to post some new paintings soon.

SnOMG

2011-02-05T14:02:00.007-06:00

We had a BIG snow here. It snowed from Monday night to Wednesday afternoon without stopping. On Tuesday, Mommy was supposed to go into work, but she called to tell them she wasn't going to, just as they were trying to call her to say they were closing early. We went back to bed and watched t.v. and snuggled. The winds were really big and loud too for most of Tuesday into Wednesday and our windows rattled. I had to pee when the storm was going on, but I just ran out into the backyard and peed on the outside of the porch wall. We got snow INSIDE the porch so I don't see why I couldn't pee inside the porch, but Mommy said outside for that. I didn't poop for 36 hours though.

That was Wednesday afternoon when it stopped snowing and Mommy got the driveway cleared so we could walk into town. I was not happy that someone had put great big snow mountains up in my way as well as made snow canyons and snow walls and snow pit traps. When we got to my squirrel tree it was blocked by a 6 foot mountain of snow that the plows had pushed up! I walked around the mountain and whined until I found a 3 foot tall area that I could climb over and get to the tree. The squirrels were fine. They stayed in for the storm too. I insisted on going to the feed store, but they were closed. Mommy said I was a goof to think they'd be open.

Mommy thought she'd have to go to work on Thursday, but they said the town where work is hadn't cleared the snow yet so they were staying closed. I took Mommy for a nice long walk in celebration. First I checked on the squirrels, then I saw the feed store guys and got my cookie and then I wanted to go to Central Park. Mommy said that Central Park was going to be too covered in snow to walk in, but I insisted. Mommy has been shaking her head trying to understand why I can remember every place I ever found road kill, and can decide that all golden retrievers are bad dogs because one golden retriever ran up to me and bit me once, but I can't figure out that if the snow is deep and drifty in the backyard it is going to be big and drifty everywhere. Anyway, she let me go to Central Park and she was right, the snow was very deep and not walkable. I tried though. Someone had broken a trail part way into the park and I followed that and then I tried to make my own, but it is hard when the snow is up to your shoulder and higher in most places. Finally I got us over a five foot snow mountain and when we went down the other side I landed in snow up to my belly and Mommy ended up in snow up to her WAIST!! It was funny watching Mommy swimming out of the snow. When she finally freed herself I agreed that we needed to try to get back to a plowed street so I let her lead and we worked our way back to easier walking.

Today I insisted on going to the lake. I thought I might walk across it like we do in the winter on nice days. Mommy shook her head and said, "You are going to be disappointed again." but she let me lead her there. Sure enough after I climbed over the six foot snow mountain blocking the secret beach the snow on the lake was deep and drifty and I couldn't walk through it so we turned around and walked home. At least today most people have cleared their sidewalks so we didn't have to keep backtracking or walking in the street as much as on Wednesday and Thursday. In case you were wondering our official total snowfall for the storm was 25 inches. Here are some photos of our storm.:

The snow inside our porch

close up

snow by the garage on Wednesday, and it was still snowing

Me looking where I WON'T go in the backyard.
I can't actually see over the drift in front of me.
Mommy tromped a path to the chair for me today, but I still won't go there.

Me looking where I WILL go in the backyard

Me as far as I will go

My Monthly Diary for December 2010

2011-01-25T16:42:00.002-06:00

Yes, I forgot to do a December blog post. So hop in your Not-So-Wayback Machine and let's go!

Let's see, I think the reason I didn't do a blog entry was that I didn't do a whole lot. Christmas happened. Mommy and I went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas Eve instead of them coming to our house. Mommy and Mommy's youngest brother suggested it as a new tradition. Grandma was not so sure about it, but she agreed. Mommy brought all the fixings for Christmas Eve dinner and we got there in the late morning. Going into the house I tripped on the front stoop and fell down. Mommy fixed Christmas Eve dinner and played a dice game and dominoes with her youngest brother and we took a couple of walks. After one of the walks I came in the house and fell down. Then Neighbor Mary came over to eat with us. I was happy to see her and when I was turning the corner into the kitchen I fell down. Mommy was starting to worry about me because of all the falling, but I seemed fine otherwise. We had a nice relaxing dinner and Mommy and her brother said they thought it was much better than everyone coming up to our house because it is a long drive and they have to leave early because of church. Because Grandma and Grandpa live close to their church they didn't have to run off right after dinner which was nice. Eventually everyone but Mommy and me went to church (I'm not allowed and Mommy's church is taking walks with me). We went to bed which was a bit of a problem because it was a twin bed and Mommy seemed to think she should get more than a small sliver of it. Eventually we worked it out and fell asleep. We got woken up when the church goers got back around 1 a.m. and then around 3 a.m. I kicked Mommy totally out of the bed and she gave up and slept on top of the other twin bed which didn't have a pillow so I certainly wouldn't sleep there.

Christmas Day I got to open one of my presents early. It was a 2 foot long antler! I got to open it early so I could enjoy it before Mommy's second brother and his family, including my Portie cousin Missy, came over. I got a stuffed reindeer, a stuffed lobster, a great big giant biscuit, salmon treats, and a box of giant dog milk bones. Mommy and I gave Missy a great big giant biscuit and a small blue monkey. We gave all the grown ups photos taken by ME!! Missy's Mommy got a picture of Missy's legs, Missy's Daddy got a picture of his wife and girls, Mommy's youngest brother got a photo of Mommy and my shadows on a hike and Grandma and Grandpa got a six photo frame with pictures I took at their place in Wisconsin, including a close up of Mommy when we were on a boat ride. Everyone liked the photos. After presents Grandpa's college roommate and his wife came over for dinner. I was nice to him again and when I was leaning on his wife I fell over! I spent most of the evening staring at my feet because they felt like bugs were crawling on them too. After dinner we went home and slept in our own bed.

A couple days later Mommy took me to see the chiropractor because of me falling down and the chiropractor thought I might have Degenerative Myelopathy so she told Mommy to take me to my regular vet sooner rather than later for more tests. You can read about that in my previous blog post. When we got home from the chiropractor there was a message from the car insurance people that her old car was officially totaled, they would send her some money, and they were going to take away her rental car in a week so she went to the new car place and actually ended up coming home with a new car that night! It looks a lot like the old car, but is red and not squished. Mommy kept my blanket from the old car even though it is blue because it has doggies peeing on red fire hydrants on it, but she bought me new red pillow cases to replace my blue ones.

Mommy thought we'd take a New Year's Day hike, but it was very very cold, below zero cold, so we didn't. It got nice and warm the next weekend though so I got to go for an 8 mile afternoon walk. I slept all the next day. We've had some more below zero days and I've had to wear Mommy's sweatshirt on our walks and Mommy looks silly in layers and layers of clothes, then a few days later we have a 30 degree day and Mommy and I get to take long walks again and she ends up unzipping her coat and taking off her gloves by the end of our hikes. Winter is weird here.

Happy Adoption Day to Me!

2011-01-18T16:46:00.002-06:00

Yup. Today is my adoption day. You'd think Mommy would do something special for me, like take the day off work and take me hiking, or give me an extra special breakfast, something. Well, not for me. I woke up this morning at 6 a.m. and promptly threw up. So, Mommy got out of bed and mixed up some Carafate for me and then we went back to bed and cuddled for 1/2 hour while the Carafate dissolved. After the 1/2 hour Mommy squirted the Carafate down my throat and I spit about 1/2 of it back on her and the bed. An hour later I got to have Pepcid and breakfast and walk to see the guys at the feed store, who at least gave me a treat, and then Mommy took me to the VET!!! That's right, my adoption day and I go to the VET for my annual checkup and shots as well as some extra special tests because my chiropractor was concerned that I might have Degenerative Myelopathy.

See, at Christmas I kept falling down. My back end would just go out from under me without warning. I was also moany groany and Mommy kept catching me staring at my feet like there were spiders crawling on them. She figured I had a pinched nerve in my back and took me to the Chiropractor. The chiropractor didn't find much wrong with my back so she did a test where she made me stand with my toes turned under. I guess I was supposed to put my foot flat right away, but I didn't. The chiropractor does weird things to my feet and legs all the time and I let her because I know it will make me feel better, so when she turned my toes under I just stood there waiting for the next part of the treatment. I guess that is considered a big failure and something to worry about. Anyway, even though I failed the physical tests really bad at the chiropractor's I passed with flying colors at the vet so I didn't have to have a nasty biopsy type test as well this morning.

So I have a fever today because of my shots and no special treats because of my throwing up this morning. Mommy says if I don't throw up tomorrow she will make it a better day for me and we will celebrate then. So Happy Adoption Day to Me! I've been with Mommy for 10 years which Mommy says is a miracle if you consider what my first day/weeks/months/years were like with Mommy and all the injuries I gave her, the gallons of pee and poop she had to clean up in my room, and the door frames, hand rails, clothes, books, stuffed animals, cooking utensils etc. that I destroyed.

Happy New Year!

2010-12-31T18:32:00.007-06:00

Happy New Year everyone! Mommy kept track of how far she and I walked this year and it was 1004.15 miles. That is an all-time record for us, and it brought our imaginary walk to Alaska to completion. We made it to Anchorage and even had some miles left to start our journey home. We have decided to take the scenic route and are heading to Fairbanks before heading back south.

View Imaginary Walk Around America in a larger map

We won't be doing a real New Year's Day hike this year because it is COOOOOOLD. Only about 15 degrees and gale force winds. Mommy and I walked into town this morning and were both frozen when we got home. I lay with my back pressed up against the baseboard heater until I warmed up. Mommy says she's still chilled.

Happy Howlidays! My Monthly Blog for November

2010-12-22T13:43:00.008-06:00

First off, some folks were asking to see my very un-PC Halloween costume, so here it is:

Now, let's see. This month I went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Thanksgiving. Grandpa's college roommate and his wife were coming so I made sure I wore my best tie.

Grandpa's college roommate is in the early stages of Alzheimer's and he sometimes loses track of what he was saying or he can't find the right word, then he becomes frustrated. I noticed when he would get frustrated and would go up to him and lean on him when it happened. He would pet me and we would both be happier. I was a very good boy and only tried a couple times to steal the hors d'ouvres. After Grandpa cut a second serving of turkey I stayed in the kitchen to make sure everything was okay in there. Grandpa had left a whole turkey leg RIGHT BY THE EDGE OF THE COUNTER and I was just about to help him move it some place safer when Mommy came in and said, "Merrrrrliiiiin". She seemed to think I was planning to eat it or something. After dinner when Mommy and Grandma and the roommate's wife were putting away the leftovers I decided to help by taking care of the leftover gravy. Grandma had put it into a big butter tub and left it on the kitchen table so I carefully picked it up by the edge and was sneaking, um carefully carrying it out to the family room when Grandma spotted me and yelled, "Drop that!" I was so startled I dropped it, but it landed on its bottom and only splashed a little bit of gravy and Mommy ran over and picked up the container before I could pick it back up. All in all I thing Grandma and Grandpa were very impressed by what a good dog I was.

This month it got very cold very early. Mommy got one of her old sweatshirts for me to wear on our morning walks. On one walk we noticed that there was an odd smell in town. Then Mommy noticed that there were stripes on the street and she realized they were spraying some kind of deicer on the road. We stopped in to City Hall to ask them what it was made of to see if it was safe for my bare feet (I hate booties), but they didn't know, so they asked a public works guy to call Mommy and tell her. He did and it ends up it was made of sugar beet juice with the sugar removed, salt brine and liquid calcium chloride, so it is safe as things like that are.

Finally this month Mommy had a very scary evening. She was running an errand on her work dinner break and when she went to turn left at a T intersection a young woman in an SUV ran the red light and hit Mommy's car without trying to brake or swerve. She told the police officer that she had dropped something on the floor of her SUV and had bent over to pick it up (while driving about 45 mph in a 30 mph zone) and when she sat up she was hitting Mommy's car. Luckily Mommy has strong survival reflexes and had spotted that the car in the other left turn lane to her left had hit his brakes suddenly so without even wondering why he had done it she hit hers and swerved to the right. That meant that the SUV took out her Prius right in front of the front tires instead of t-boning her. If she had been t-boned I don't think she'd have come home to me and I'd probably be moving to Mommy's youngest brother's house to live. I would have been very very sad. Mommy's leg, shoulder, chest, back and neck were hurt, but not bad enough that she had to go to the hospital, and she is feeling almost normal now, a bit achy and tired, but she thinks we should be able to do our New Year's Day hike. Here is what Mommy's car looked like when she went to get her stuff out of it the next day:

Anyway, we have a lot to celebrate this Christmas and New Year if you ask me. Happy Howlidays everyone!

My Monthly Diary for October

2010-11-23T16:33:00.003-06:00

Well, this month we did the whole Halloween thing. I dressed up like an un-PC Indian by wearing one of Mommy's older brother's Indian Guides headdress and plastic bear claw necklace. People liked my outfit and I didn't cause anyone to cry or run away like I did last year. I only helped open the door for the first half of trick-or-treating and then I decided I was done. This was fine with Mommy and she let me sleep on the couch. Then around the last hour I wanted to go out so Mommy let me out and I got upset when trick-or-treaters came to our house and didn't come to the back gate to say hi to me no matter how much I yelled at them to come see me. We didn't get as many people this year as last year and most came in the first half of the night so most of them got to see my costume.

We had that time change thing this month too, but I was a good boy and didn't get upset and throw up in the house. I have also stopped waking Mommy up at 5:30 to tell her I'm hungry. I just wake her up at 4:30 or so to tell her to move over so I can have the warm spot in the bed. I like the cold weather, but I also like the warm spot on the bed. Mommy says it isn't nice to do that, but I'm old so I get my way.

Mommy made me wing lights this month. You can see and read about them in my previous two blogs if you haven't already. I need the lights because it is so dark when we take our evening walk. One evening Mommy forgot to put the lights on me and her and we took our walk and Mommy didn't see a bad spot on the sidewalk when we were doing our power-walk end of our walk and she fell down hard. She slid along the sidewalk, scraped off the palms of both her gloves, got a skinned left knee with a HUGE bruise that covered the whole joint and a smaller bruise on her right knee. When she stopped sliding she rolled over onto the parkway and lay there for a minute or so. I helped by standing over her and staring in her face with my nose right up to hers. She told me I was a very helpful dog after she got up and we didn't do any more power-walk for the rest of the way home. I've been helping the knees heal by licking them whenever she is in the bathroom.

I got sore this month too because Mommy was using the leaf blower. I think the leaf blower is very exciting and I have to run around the yard full blast about a dozen times when she first turns it on. Mommy says I'm getting too old to do those crazy sprints and that is why my legs and back have been aching for the past week or so. What does she expect me to do? Ignore it?

I got to go to Grandma and Grandpa's house this month. Mommy was going to something called an opera with Grandma and it was a long one so I stayed with Grandpa to keep him company. I got so excited when I found Grandma upstairs that I stood at the top of the stairs and barked at Mommy. Mommy agreed it was exciting, but said I didn't need to yell at her.

I made Mommy laugh this month too when we took a short car ride to run errands. I decided to ride on the passenger's side of back seat instead of the driver's side for some reason and when Mommy turned to see how I was doing at a stop she noticed that I was sitting like a human. I was sitting on my butt, with my legs straight out in front of me, bent at the knees with my feet in the foot well and I was kinda leaning against the door with my right arm on the arm rest. She said she really wished she had her camera with her. If she'd upgrade her phone she wouldn't have these problems, but she doesn't listen to me about these things.

I met some new dogs this month too. They are little spotty dogs called Cavalier King Charles spaniels. They are the same color as my former girlfriend Kachina was and much smaller than me so I liked them right away. The boy is called Max and the girl is Jen. We see them on our morning walks and we make our Mommies stop so we can talk to each other for a while. They aren't the running around kind, but they are good sniffers.

Speaking of Kachina, I found out that Kachina's former Mommy sent her boy back to the breeder too. Mommy says that isn't true. He actually went to a boarding school and will probably be back in May. We were wondering why we never saw him on any of our walks this fall. We aren't very fond of sending your critters off to have other people train them up, but Mommy thinks this will probably be good for him. We hope he likes it at the school.

Finally today Mommy and I heard sandhill cranes this morning and when we looked up there were about 100 cranes flying south over our house! Then about 15 minutes later another 100 flew over and then about another 1/2 hour later another 100!! We have NEVER seen that many sandhill cranes at one time. I guess they all decided it was time to go to Texas for their winter vacation.

Have a great Thanksgiving everyone and don't eat any turkey bones. They aren't good for you, but eating them does mean that you get to eat a 1/2 loaf of Wonder Bread afterward, so it is extra tempting to do so.

Headlights! The Next Generation

2010-11-15T19:51:00.005-06:00

Mommy saw these lights at the Container Store and she bought them for me.

She thought they were nice because they light up two ways, have spring clips and can swivel in all sorts of directions. So, they have taken the place of my original headlights. The original headlights had the disadvantage of being easy for me to turn off because they were pop lights, and, because they were held on with Velcro, rub off. These lights aren't as bright and I don't cast shadows when I'm wearing them, but they still make me visible. Mommy says when I'm wearing these new lights I look like a techno-angel so they are definitely wing lights not headlights. Here is me wearing them:

Me from the front

Me from the side

Me from the back

Me running

Mommy is going to put my old lights on elastic so she can wear them like armbands and keep herself nice and lit up safe too.

Headlights!

2010-11-01T19:47:00.006-05:00

Mommy worries about me when I walk with her at night. I had a red collar that I wore, but I have large ruff and it was often obscured. Besides that, we lost it about a month ago. Now that even my evening walks are after dark Mommy decided I needed some lights. She couldn't find a good lighted collar for me so she made me some headlights (or wing lights) out of a couple of drawer lights and Velcro. Here I am wearing them!

Me from the front

Me from the side

Me running

Me drinking out of the birdbath

My Monthly Diary for September

2010-10-26T16:38:00.005-05:00

I was pretty active this month. Mommy and I did a few hikes and I took her on a couple of crazy long morning walks (see my previous entry about one of them). Mommy started taking something called Tai Chi again and I don't like it. I don't like anything that changes my routine. She plugged the nasty beepy thing back in the wall again too, which I didn't like so I got all nervous and whiny for a whole night. It didn't even beep, but just knowing that it was plugged into the wall and COULD beep is worrying enough.

I almost caught some squirrels this month too, which impressed Mommy and some strangers who saw one of my near misses. It's a good thing they weren't there for the day I tried to catch a squirrel at the squirrel park. I was walking with Mommy and I spotted a squirrel. I went after him and he ran up a tree right in front of me. I tried to brake, but I was standing on a whole bunch of acorns and they all were rolling under my feet! My feet slid around like a cartoon character running on ball bearings and I finally fell over and slid into a drainage ditch. I was very sore that night, but I didn't need any meds and I felt fine the next day. Those squirrels are evil.

Weird Kitty who Mommy says is an opossum has come back to visit us at night. He likes to see what Mommy has put in the compost heap and I like to go out and chase him up the trees. Mommy says he isn't the original Weird Kitty because he is smaller and whiter than Original Weird Kitty, but he is just as fun to chase and bark at.

I met the new neighbor dog. She is a HE!! His name is Cocoa and we thought he was a girl because he pees like a girl! He is a grown up boy dog, but he doesn't know how to lift his leg. Very sad that. He came to the fence to talk to me and I got all excited and barked at him and he decided he wanted to go back in the house. A couple days later he came back to the fence to talk to me again and this time I didn't bark at him right away so we got to talk a little bit, but then I got excited again and barked and he went in. Mommy says that my barking is scaring him and I need to stay a little calmer so he can get brave enough to play run along the fence with me.

I also went to the vet this month. I needed my rabies shot. Mommy told the vet how I was slowing down and not wanting to walk long distances anymore and she was worried that my back or joints might be hurting me more than they used to. The vet checked me out and said that I didn't seem to have anything major going on, but that I had lost some muscle in my hind legs. She told Mommy no more babying me. She said that Mommy should take me for 8 mile hikes even if I was getting grumpy at 4 miles. She said I should just stop and take breaks every mile or so if I want to. So Mommy has started doing that with me. On our last walk I got grumpy around mile 4 1/2 but we did 8 miles anyway. I was tired for the rest of that day, but not the day after, so Mommy says it is working.

I made some new friends this month. Mommy and I were walking home from the lake and we passed a house where some people were standing in the driveway talking. One of them said, "Oh look! It's the dog that I told you I saw the other day." I know when people say "dog" they mean me so I went up to him to say hello. He thought that was funny and he pet me and I smiled and he really liked that. The others pet me too so they could see me smile and we had a good long petting session. Finally Mommy said I had to go and we left. The next week when we were walking back from the lake we passed the same house and I slowed down so they could see I was there. One of them did and she came out to pet me. Her friends who had pet me the other day saw she was out petting me and came over to pet me too! Then some kids came by and pet me as well. Now when we walk by that house I make sure to slow down and look for people who want to pet me.

It is good I have some new petters because the girls who come out to pet me at night live on a block that is too dark for Mommy and me to safely walk down at night so we don't get to see them much anymore. This weekend Mommy and I took our evening walk earlier than normal so I made sure that we walked down the road where the girls live. When we got to their house they were not out. I stopped in their driveway and refused to move. Mommy said they were busy and weren't going to come out to pet me. She tried to get me to move, but I refused. She pulled on my leash so I sat down. She told me to stop being silly, the girls were not out and they weren't coming out and I needed to start walking. I lay down in the driveway and refused to move. Mommy pulled on my leash, but I still refused to get up and walk. We argued for about 10 minutes and then the girls' father came out of the backyard where he was raking leaves and started laughing at me. He went to the house and called inside, "Your friend is here. You need to come out and say hi." The girls said, "What friend?" and the dad said, "Merlin" and so the girls and their mom came out to pet me. After a good petting session Mommy said we needed to go and I agreed to leave. As we were walking away I made sure to give Mommy a very smug look. For some reason she thinks I am spoiled.

Oh! I almost forgot! Mommy FINALLY figured out that I say, "Yes". She had noticed a couple years ago that if she asked me if I wanted to go see the guys at the feed store I would lick the right side of my mouth. She thought that was funny because I was anticipating getting a treat and licking. Then one day she asked me if I wanted a treat and I licked the side of my mouth. Again she thought it was anticipating a treat. But this month she said, "Do you want to go for a car ride?" and I licked the side of my mouth. Mommy said, "Wait a minute! Do you want to go for a car ride?" and I licked. Mommy said, "Do you want to take a hike?" and I licked. She said, "Do you want to take a bath?" and I didn't lick. She said, "Do you want to take a car ride?" Lick. "Do you want a bath?" no lick. Mommy said, "Does licking mean yes?" and I licked and Mommy nearly fainted. She now asks me yes and no questions and I will answer yes with a lick. The feed store guys today said, "Do you want a treat?" and I licked and Mommy said, "He just said yes." She may be a little slow, but she finally caught on!

My Crazy-Long Morning Walk

2010-10-10T13:31:00.004-05:00

Mommy needed to return a DVD to the library this morning so she decided we would walk there. Since she figured we'd only do a 5 or 6 mile walk she didn't wear any shoes. We went to the library and then through the park and then I decided that I wanted to go see where a new bike trail I had noticed last week went. Since it was a nice morning Mommy said okay to following the bike trail for awhile. We took it north to a park I'd never been to before. It was rather boring being only a baseball field surrounded by houses, so I decided to backtrack to where a different new bike path broke off. We followed that path and found ourselves at some nice lakes full of geese surrounded by some big McMansions. Mommy kinda knew where we were even though the trail twisted around a lot so we kept going straight. Eventually we came out to the busy road that is by one of my favorite forest preserves. We found there was a new bike trail there too so we followed it towards the forest preserve. It was starting to get rather hot at that point and Mommy had no water for me. We had gone about 4 miles at that point and my tongue was hanging out, so when Mommy saw a Walgreens up ahead she said, "Let's see if they'll let us in." She stood in the door and asked if we could come in and get some water for me and a soda for her. The manager said okay so we walked in in our bare feet and got some water and a soda and Mommy bought me a mug to drink out of. Here is my new mug:

We went to a shady bench and I drank my water. A person who was in the store felt sorry for me and gave Mommy a couple more bottles of water, which was very nice, but unnecessary because Mommy knew that if the trail continued the way it was going we'd be at my forest preserve in about 1 mile and there was a drinking fountain there. The lady refused to take the water back so I drank another 1/2 bottle and then we followed the path which DID go to the forest preserve. I finished off the water there and Mommy refilled one of the bottles at the drinking fountain and talked to some older ladies who said I looked tired. We had done about 4 1/2 miles by then and Mommy said I was and we were not at all where she had planned to be. They asked if we knew how to get home and Mommy told them we did. We followed a bike trail we knew that headed towards home, but breaks off and goes through another development that Mommy didn't know so we just cut across the grass because I was getting really tired by then. When we came to a nice shady spot Mommy and I lay on the grass in the shade by the side of the road and rested for a little bit. Then we continued on our way. Eventually we got to a section of bike trails that I recognized so I started to lead the way home again. We took that trail to the creek path and then the creek path to the main road to the Dog n Suds!!! Mommy said I could have some cheese fries so we stopped and she ordered cheese fries and a bowl of water. We shared the cheese fries and I drank the water and finished off the water she had gotten from the drinking fountain at the park. I tired to get the car hop girl to give me more fries, but even though she thought I was very cute, she didn't come out of the building to bring me anything. Then we continued to town. I wanted to go get a Pup Cup at the Tastee Freeze but Mommy said she was out of money. So we walked through town and I tried to get her to stop at all the restaurants to see if they'd give me anything, but she said no to that too. We did walk to the lake and I took a short swim and then we walked the final 1/4 mile home. It added up to about 9 miles and 4 hours of morning walk and we found all sorts of nice new places! Mommy says we can do it again, but she needs to bring water and a bowl for me if we are going to do it.

My Monthly Diary for August

2010-09-21T16:40:00.002-05:00

This month Mommy and I went up to Wisconsin for vacation. We were supposed to go the last week of August, but there was a misunderstanding with Grandma and Grandpa so Mommy had to change our vacation the the week before the last week of August. It ended up that we got the better week though because we had great weather and the next week it got cold and rained. I had a great time. I chased squirrels and chipmunks and fish and frogs. I took a couple of hikes and I swam for my ducky. I also got to go for peddleboat rides which is one of my favorite things to do. I did fall up the stairs one day and had to be on pain killers and muscle relaxers for a night and then a few days later I fell down a hill and went back on the meds for two nights and one day. The falling down the hill part was Mommy's fault. It was mid day and I was napping in the boathouse while Mommy was reading in the shade of the boat house. She went for a swim and she spotted a nice colorful big rock. Every summer she puts a new pretty rock on my predecessor Boo's grave so she got that rock and climbed up the hill to his grave. I woke up and realized I didn't know where Mommy was so I sniffed around and discovered she had gone up the hill. I climbed up the hill, but when I got to the top she wasn't there. I couldn't figure out where I was or where Mommy was (some trees had fallen down and Mommy had to walk in circles to find Boo's grave which made tracking hard). Mommy had gone down the less steep side of the hill instead of the very steep way she had gone up and when she got back down to the boathouse she was worried that I wasn't there. She whistled for me and I did my worry whine-bark so she whistled again and I was so excited to discover that she was down at the boathouse again that RAN down the steep side of the hill. I got about 1/2 way down when I caught my front foot on a root and I stumbled down the rest of the way. I was very sad and sore and had to do nothing for the whole next day. It was very windy and choppy that day so it wasn't so bad to not get to swim and ride in the boat. Mommy told me that if it wasn't windy the next day she would take me for a peddleboat ride first thing after our morning walk the next day. The next day it was WINDIER than the day before but after we took our walk I ran straight down to the boat and wagged and wagged. Mommy said, "I said if it WASN'T windy." but I refused to listen and Mommy gave in and took me for a 2 hour ride. It took us 1 1/2 hours for Mommy to peddle us across the lake and then 1/2 an hour for us to float back with just the waves and wind propelling us and Mommy not peddling at all! It was lots of fun and I slept for three days when we got home.

Also this month Mommy and I took some hikes in the forest preserves by our house. She noticed that I hike at about half the speed I did two years ago, so we have to plan our hiking times much more carefully so we are sure to be home before dark. It is still fun though.

We got new renter neighbors this month. The trash that were living next to us for the past few years got kicked out in December and it took the owners SIX MONTHS to make the house habitable again. They had to buy all new appliances and carpets and stuff as well. The new people seem nice enough and the good thing is that they have a girl cocker spaniel! I haven't met her yet, but she has looked out at me through the window and I have seen her from my porch when she has been in her yard. The last time I saw her it was about 9 at night and I ran to Mommy and barked at her trying to get her to let me go say hi. She said no we would wait and meet her during the day. I decided that I needed to be really impressive for her so on my next walk I rolled in a big pile of fox poop. It was wonderful! I was covered in orange poop from above my right eye to the middle of my back and I smelled soooo good. I knew the cocker spaniel would be impressed, but when we got home Mommy tied me to the fence and gave me a dreaded BATH!! I ended up smelling like cherries! It was awful! How could she do such a thing to me. The new doggy would think I was some kind of wimp. Luckily for me we have not spotted her since then so I have had time to get a more normal dog smell on me again, but I sure wish I could have met her when I smelled like fox poop.

Finally this month I suddenly had trouble standing up a couple Sundays ago and I couldn't squat to poop and I didn't want to walk far. Mommy called the chiropractor and got me an appointment for the next Saturday. I was a sore boy for a week, but after the chiropractic adjustment I felt so much better that I was jumping on the bed and being silly by bedtime. The vet said I had somehow gotten my hips all crooked. I don't know how I did it, but it sure felt good when it was undone.

My Monthly Diary for July

2010-09-07T16:55:00.003-05:00

I just noticed that I didn't update my blog for July. I must have been busy. I can't remember with what tho... hmmm...

Ooh. I remember some stuff. I CAUGHT A BIRD!!! I was in the backyard with Mommy and I spotted a bright yellow bird sitting on the ground eating grass seeds. I snuck up on him and he hopped up into the air and I caught him! I was very excited and so was Mommy, but she was mad excited. She said the birdie was something called a goldfinch and that I wasn't to catch them. Mommy! I have been trying to catch a birdie my entire life and when I finally catch one, IN THE AIR NO LESS, you get mad at me!? Where are your priorities? Anyway, Mommy made me drop the birdie and it sat on the ground looking shocked. Mommy made me go inside for 1/2 hour and when we came back out the birdie was gone. Shame on Mommy.

Shame on Mommy too for forgetting to buy me dog food and making me eat oatmeal for one dinner and breakfast. Does she not know that her most important job is making sure that I am well stocked with food and treats? It is almost as bad as forgetting to buy me shredded cheese to put on my food too, which she did as well. I got Parmesan instead, which was okay, but not as good as the Mexican Four Cheese Mix I like best.

Anyway, to make sure that Mommy learned her place when we slept on the porch the Parmesan cheese night because it was so hot I went out first and slept on the bedroll and refused to move so she ended up sleeping on my travel bed. She seemed awful grumpy the next morning.

Oh yeah! In July I also spotted a really neat hole in the ground on one of our walks. I wondered what had made the really neat hole in the ground and I figured that I should check it out. So I stuck my nose in the hole and took a big sniff and found out that it was made by yellow jackets!! They all flew out of the hole and attacked me!! They bit me on the nose and ears and butt and feet. When Mommy and I got home I had to take a Benadryl because I was swelling up at the bites. Benadryl makes me sleepy so I slept all day.

I can't think of much else that happened in July, but I promise my august update will be more interesting because Mommy and I went on a trip in August.

My Monthly Diary for June

2010-07-20T16:40:00.002-05:00

This month has been an odd one. First off, it has been really, really hot here. Mommy and I don't have air conditioning so it gets really, really hot in the house. Normally we would spend time out in the backyard under the trees, but the mosquitoes are so bad this year we can't be out for more than a couple seconds before we are swarmed. Mommy uses deep woods bug spray on herself, but it doesn't help her at all. These skeeters also come for your eyes and fly up your nose and in your ears. They are very very bad bugs. So we are spending time on our porch with the fan on. Mommy does go out and do yard work, but I stay on the porch unless I have to go potty or Mommy is taking me swimming. On one of our walks a stranger pulled up in a truck and asked Mommy if she wanted some boxes of cookies for me. Mommy said, "No thanks." and suggested he bring them to the local shelter. She then told me that you should never take cookies from strangers in trucks.

I gave Mommy a big scare this month. Mommy came home from work one night and I was very sore. My back hurt A LOT I whined and paced and drooled. Mommy gave me a pain pill but I still whined and paced until midnight. Then I slept for two hours and woke Mommy up to tell her I still hurt. She gave me another pain pill and I slept for two more hours and then I woke Mommy up. I didn't want her to touch me, but I wanted her to help me. When the vet's office opened Mommy called her and told her what I was doing. The vet said it sounded like my back and that I should go to the chiropractor, but she would give me some muscle relaxers if I couldn't get an appointment right away. I couldn't so Mommy went and got me the pills. They helped a bit, but not a whole lot. We got to the chiropractor and she said she couldn't find anything really wrong with my back so she got worried that I had a tumor on my spleen. I guess they can grow really quickly and if it starts bleeding it could cause me to act like I was acting. She told me to go back to my regular vet and get x-rayed ASAP. My regular vet saw me right away and took me into the back room for blood tests and an x-ray. I got really scared when they put me on the x-ray table, but my vet pet me and asked me to lie down, and when I realized that all they wanted me to do was lie still on my side I decided that wasn't so bad and I cooperated. Well, after all that the x-rays came back fine. No tumors. When the blood tests came back they were fine too. So we were back to it only being my back. I was on a no walking, no swimming, no climbing, no running routine for a week and high doses of pain killers and muscle relaxers, but after about a week I felt fine again. The vet thinks that because I broke my back last year, I now have a bad back and I threw it out. She said she knows how that is because she once threw her back out reaching for a cup of coffee.

Even though my back still hurt a bit we did get to go to see the fireworks. We went to our usual spot with the usual old timers, but then right before the fireworks started a whole bunch of new people showed up and crowded around us. It ends up that the neighboring communities weren't doing fireworks this year so they decided to come see ours, and when they saw us all set up in the feed store parking lot they figured it was a good spot.

Mommy acted weird this month too. It was another really hot day after my back was better and Mommy took me swimming. Then we came home and she took a shower, made a ponytail out of her wet, uncombed hair and put on her really hot day clothes (oversize wife beater and boxer shorts). You can imagine how she looks in this outfit. Luckily when she puts those clothes on I know we are not going out anymore. So I curled up on my kitchen bed while Mommy washed dishes. There was this CRACK! noise and Mommy started saying bad words. Then she grabbed some paper towels and went into the bathroom. After she fiddled around in there she went and got her go outside clothes and changed holding the paper towel, which now smelled really yummy. Then she opened up the garage and I thought we'd go for a car ride because, after all, she hadn't combed her hair out so where could she be going? So I ran out onto the porch, but she got mad and said I needed to come in NOW!! I did because she was using her "or else" voice. She didn't come back until after midnight and she had a yummy smelling hunk of cloth wrapped around her thumb. I wanted to take it off and chew it, but she told me no. She said she got 5 stitches in her thumb. I remember getting stitches when I got fixed. They itched and I had to wear a cone to keep from chewing on them. The people vet didn't give Mommy a cone, but I think they should have because on the second night Mommy took all her bandages off in the middle of the night while she was asleep and she made her stitches bleed. Back to the people vet she went, but they still didn't give her a cone. She has left the stitches alone since then and they should come out on Saturday if she continues to not chew on them.

Finally this month, Mommy and I went to Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred's house in Wisconsin for a three day trip. We had a good time even though it rained on day two, and Mommy couldn't get her hand wet and I got an ear infection. Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred drove Mommy and me around to see some sights when it was raining and they took me to a special beach which was all sand and nicely sloped. Everyone thought I'd have a good time swimming and Mommy was prepared to let me do so with her keeping her hand dry, but because of my ear infection I was grumpy and didn't want to swim. Everyone seemed rather disappointed with me, but when you have an ear infection, swimming doesn't look fun. The next day, after Mommy cleaned out my ear, I felt much better so Mommy took me to the rocky beach for me to swim before we left to go home. Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred came with and they watched from the road while Mommy and I slogged through 30 feet of thick mud and cattails to get to the water. I ran around on the rocks and looked for fish and had a great time. The humans seemed bemused.

My Monthly Diary for May

2010-06-14T20:37:00.009-05:00

This was an exciting month so it is going to be a long update. First of all Mommy and I went up to Wisconsin to Grandma and Grandpa's house. I was worried at first because Mommy didn't follow the normal trip rules and packed days in advance, then she went out for the evening and I thought she had left and forgotten me. My ulcer got a bit upset by that and I had to be on Carafate for a bit. Then Missy's oldest human sister came to our house and she rode up to Wisconsin with us, which was strange, so I wasn't so sure where we were going. When we stopped for gas Mommy went in to use the bathroom and she expected me to take a piddle walk with Missy's sister, but I was having none of that! I watched for Mommy to come back instead.

I got a new Merlin Cam and I got to take it to Wisconsin. Here are some of my photos

Here is Mommy going into the kitchen:

Mommy's oldest brother washing windows. I got in trouble and got sent to my room. I don't remember what I did that got me in trouble, but it was boring watching window washing.

ALIENS!! Actually it is my human cousin and his friend, my human not-really cousin:

This is my cousin Missy. She is a Portuguese water dog:

Here's Grandpa and Missy in Grandpa's boat I can't wait until they get to the dock so I can jump in and get a ride. I'm not sure how Missy got to go for a ride when I didn't. I like Grandpa's boat because I'm allowed in it. I don't like Mommy's oldest brother's boat because only Missy is allowed in it. No fair!

Missy and I played run around one day and I was running so fast that when I tried to turn on the hill by the lake my hind legs spun out and went over the edge. Down the hill I went backwards, which was not fun. I came back up and decided that the run around game was over. When we got home I slept for two days and then I told Mommy I needed to see the chiropractor. She took me the next day. We had to wait a long time because there was a dog with a bad owie in the next room. The walls of the rooms don't go all the way up to the ceiling so you can hear everything that is going on next door. His daddy sang to him the whole time we were waiting, but the other dog ended up being fine (he had allergies and had chewed a hole in his leg and tail). I usually get mad if I hear the chiropractor talking in the next room, but this time I was good, maybe it was the singing. Anyway when it was my turn the doctor said my back was really messed up. She said everything was going in a different direction. My appointment took twice as long as it usually does because she had to fix so much. I felt much better after she put everything back and I wanted to play ball the next day, but Mommy said no because I needed to rest up after such a big treatment.

We noticed after we got back home that the dogs next door seem to have adopted an additional human. I think they must have thought that getting another male for the problem male human that lives there would give him something to do and make him behave better, but that hasn't been the case. Now the two of them are always making noise in the garage (which is by our bedroom) at all hours and I sometimes have to bark at them to be quiet. At least they got an older human who is about the age of the humans that are already there and didn't go and buy a human puppy.

Anyway, back to me. Mommy and I went to Mommy's coworker's annual picnic which I love because so many people come tell me what a wonderful dog I am and I get to go on a hike afterward, but this year it was better than ever because Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred were there! I was very excited to see them and get pet. Auntie Naomi didn't bring me a present though because she wasn't happy about my small critter catching that I did last month. Sigh. Someone else brought a big puppy to the picnic and we scared each other without even talking to each other. When we looked at each other we would both just shake and shake. Mommy took me for my hike when she noticed that I was wagging my tail in a friendly way, but had on my angry ears. She didn't want the puppy to think that my tail meant I was friendly. We had a good hike, but when we got back to the picnic Auntie Naomi and Uncle Fred had left. I was sad.

Last week Mommy took me to the Tastee Freeze for a pup cup and then we went to the library to return some stuff and to see something called "a pipe and drum corps" that was playing outside the library. I'm not sure what a pipe and drum corps is supposed to be, but it sure was exciting. I liked the drums. They sounded like fireworks and the guys playing them had sticks in their hands and one guy's sticks looked like they had small white tennis balls on the ends of them. When the drums started playing I perked up and watched them intently. I was hoping that maybe they'd throw those sticks or the tennis ball parts at least, but they didn't. Then the pipes started to play. The pipers had sticks in their mouths and were holding a bag under their arms and more sticks were attached to the bag and when they squished the bags it sounded like they had CATS in those bags and the cats weren't happy about being squished. I got very excited and jumped up and down and barked and Mommy held my mouth closed and said, "You are not the music critic." but it was so exciting and I really wanted to get those yowling cats. Mommy made us move farther away from the pipers, but I still barked when they played so Mommy moved us so I couldn't see the pipers, but I listened for 1/2 a song and then started barking again so Mommy got mad and said we had to go home and when we got home I didn't get a bone. Mommy said I was darn lucky we went to Tastee Freeze first or I certainly would NOT have gotten a Pup Cup because I was so bad at the concert.

Last night Mommy took me back to the library and said if I was good for the concert that night I'd get french fries, but it ended up that silly Mommy had the wrong day and there was no concert so we went home and I didn't get any french fries, but I did get a big milk bone instead of a small one for my after walk treat. After Mommy did some boring stuff around the house we settled down to read in the bedroom. The male neighbors were making noises in their garage again and then lightning started and thunder too and I wasn't happy. I told Mommy to make it stop, but she didn't. Then the neighbors started making whooping noises and all the sirens that we usually hear on our Tuesday morning walk started to go off. Mommy got up and said we were going to read on the basement couch. I grabbed Pyramid and followed her downstairs. We could see the lightning through the basement windows and could hear the thunder and the wind and the neighbors whooping. I paced around and refused to settle and then Grandma called to see if Mommy knew that something called a tornado was coming our way. Mommy said yes and told her the sirens had gone off and we were in the basement. While Mommy was talking to Grandma I went into the storage closet under the stairs to hide, but there was too much stuff in it and I couldn't get comfy. I then tried to go back upstairs, but Mommy wouldn't let me until the sirens all went off again. There was still some lightning, but no more rain or thunder when we left the basement so I Mommy and I went to bed. We checked our yard this morning and everything was fine so Mommy said the tornado didn't actually hit us or too nearby. They say it might be big storms again tonight, but I sure hope there are no more tornadoes.

My Monthly Diary for April

2010-05-25T16:40:00.003-05:00

I'm going to warn Auntie Naomi right now that she is NOT going to be pleased with me this month. So, maybe Uncle Fred should preview this one.

My tummy is feeling much better thanks to the Forco powder so I am feeling much livelier and am back to being perky and alert on my walks. So, on one walk this month Mommy and I were walking under some maple trees when WHAM!! I almost got hit on the head by a baby squirrel! He had fallen out of the tree and missed landing on me by inches! Before Mommy's slow brain could register what had almost hit me I had that baby squirrel in my mouth. I was trying to get it into a good shaking hold when Mommy finally came to and grabbed my collar and yelled, "Drop it! Spit!" The baby squirrel was a lot more squirmy than a big squirrel so I was having trouble holding it and Mommy shaking my collar wasn't helping. Then the squirrel started squealing and squirming even more and I lost my grip on him and he fell down. Then he got up and wobbled over to the tree trunk and climbed up. But he only climbed up about 4 feet and then he stopped and froze. I looked at Mommy and said, "Oh come on! He's just sitting there! Let me go over to the tree and pull him off." But Mommy said no I had to leave him be and let him climb back up to the nest. We didn't see him the next day even though I stopped and sniffed all around the tree so we figure he was fine.

Then the next week on our walk we passed by some bushes and I dove in and came out with a squealing baby rabbit in my mouth. Again Mommy the spoilsport yelled at me to "Drop it! Spit!" and started shaking my collar. I dropped the bunny and he hopped off to some different bushes and hid. On our walk home I insisted on going to the bunny bushes and checking for him, but I didn't find him. The next day however I walked Mommy to those bushes and I spotted that bunny again. Unfortunately Mommy spotted him too and she didn't let me catch him. He hopped to a different set of bushes and then looked at me and hopped on across the street to another set of bushes. I barked and barked and barked at him. I checked the bushes over and over again after that, but I didn't find the bunny. Mommy says if he has any brains he has moved on to saver property.

I've also taken some hikes with Mommy this month. We went on some short hikes and then we took an 8 mile hike. I had wanted to turn back to the car after 3 miles that day, but Mommy said she was sick of short hikes and wanted to go farther. I managed the whole 8 miles and wasn't too sore afterward so maybe I can do longer hikes than I thought. This is good because Mommy bought me a new Merlin Cam. I haven't gotten to use it yet, but I'm looking forward to the weather being more amicable for hiking.

The weather has been very weird. I'm not sure why we have skipped over spring and gone straight to summer but last Monday the temperatures were around 60 degrees then by Saturday it was about 73 degrees. Mommy and I took a long walk and ran a bunch of errands and on the way home we stopped at the Dog n Suds and I got to have some french fries and a bowl of water. The girls were very quick serving me this time so I didn't have to bark at them to hurry up.

By early the next morning it was 85 degrees and it came close to 90 that day. Mommy got out my shedding brush and gave me a long brushing. I don't usually let her brush me for more than 5 minutes, but it felt so good to get my old winter undercoat off that I sat still for a good 15 minutes and Mommy got four poodles worth of hair off me. Then she went and planted tomatoes and I slept on the concrete floor of the garage. Half way through the planting Mommy went in the house and got in the shower fully dressed, which was weird if you ask me, and then she came back out with a bucket of cold water and threw it on me. I couldn't believe she did that to me! I ran a couple of laps around the backyard and then went back to sleep in the garage.

It still has not cooled down. It was at least 90 yesterday and didn't cool down much after dark. It was too hot in our house to sleep last night so Mommy and I moved out to the porch. We slept there until about 1 a.m. when I heard cats fighting next door. I barked and barked at them and woke Mommy up. Mommy decided it was cool enough in the house for us to go back to the bedroom so we did. At 5 a.m. I decided it was morning enough so I woke up Mommy and told her I wanted to have breakfast. She got up and made me my kibble and Forco powder and yogurt. Did I mention I have decided I don't like Forco powder after all and now will only eat it if it is mixed in yogurt? Anyway, Mommy made me my breakfast and I looked at it and decided that I wasn't all that hungry after all and went back to bed. Mommy said I was a jerk. She wasn't so mad at me that I didn't get to go to the lake this morning for a swim and it was a GREAT morning to go to the lake. The carp were spawning! I love when the carp spawn. They swim up close to the bank and splash the water so I can find them really easily. I ran around where they were spawning and tried to grab them, but I couldn't catch any, and then at one point I dove under a fence and fell down the bank and into the water. I climbed back up, but I couldn't figure out how to get back out under the fence. Finally Mommy was able to help me out, but my back end was really sore on the walk home. I hope we go back to spring soon, but maybe without the thunderstorms.

Oh, Don't panic! Happy Towel Day!

Ewwwww! Part 3

2010-04-28T13:23:00.004-05:00

Mommy and I got our coupon! It is for one package of any Kraft processed cheese not just the KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food. There is also no size limit on the package, but there is a price limit. Mommy is going to price all the various packages of KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food she can find. Hopefully we can get a lot of KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food and stay under the price limit. Mmmmmmm KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food.

My Monthly for March

2010-04-20T16:38:00.003-05:00

This month didn't start off too well. My tummy problems continued and I started pooping in the house about every 4 days. I'd be fine for 4 or 5 days and then I'd feel sick and poop in the house. Then I'd feel find for 4 or 5 days again then poop. Mommy noticed that I was starting to lose weight too. You could see my hips and spine when you looked at me. So, she called the vet and told her what was happening and the vet said that she thought my good bacteria and yeast in my gut was all out of whack because of A. the ulcer and all the antibiotics I had had to take for it, B. The emotional stress of going to the vet for my checkup, and C. The physical stress of having had my shots at that checkup. She told Mommy to buy me some Forco powder (actually called Forco Dietary Supplement) and give it to me as the package instructed. Mommy bought it and when she opened it up she was kind of surprised by it. She says it looks and smells like what you'd end up with in the final sweeping of a barn.

The first time she gave it to me I sniffed it and refused to eat it or any of the food. She had to put yogurt in my food to get me to eat it. Then the next time she gave it to me I ate all the kibbles around the powder and then bumped the bowl to make more of the powder fall off the kibbles and then ate them. Mommy had to mix yogurt with the powder to get me to eat it. The third time she gave it to me I decided I LIKED the way that barns tasted and I gobbled everything up. The powder has worked too. I only pooped in the house once in the past three weeks (keep reading to find out why) and I'm even off Pepcid now. I do still have tummy aches sometimes and the vet said I now I get to eat oatmeal and yogurt instead of rice and yogurt when that happens so I'm happy about that. I like oatmeal unlike rice which is NEVER yummy no matter how many times Mommy calls it "yummy rice". Everyone keep your paws crossed that the good effects of the Forco powder continues.

I felt so good after a couple days on the powder that I decided to get into the kitchen garbage while Mommy was taking a shower. In the time it took her to shower I got to eat about a 1/2 bag of garbage. I got two spoiled potatoes, two egg shells, some fat off a steak, some paper towels used to wipe up a grease spill, and some plastic wrap. Mommy came in just as I was trying to unwrap the green roast she found at the back of the freezer. I was surprised a few days later when I pooped out paper towels and plastic wrap, but it was better than the runs I got the next day. Mommy says I am my own worst enemy.

Also this month I got to go on some hikes with Mommy, I love hiking even if it makes my back sore. I got to sniff and sniff stuff and roll in stuff and bark at stuff. I was so tired when I got home after one hike that I forgot that I was thunderphobic when the first thunderstorm of the season hit. I looked up to make sure that Mommy was still in the room, but then I went back to sleep. The second storm of the season I DID remember to be thunderphobic and pester Mommy though. Mommy says she needs to take me on 8 mile hikes before each thunderstorm from now own. We saw a coyote on one of our hikes too. Mommy yelled at him to git and he did though.

I met a new dog this month. His name was Frankie and we played runaround for awhile. My back hurt afterward, but it was worth it. The weird thing though was that when I met him again a couple days later HE BIT ME!! I don't understand that at all. My feelings were really hurt. We haven't seen him since so I don't know if he likes me or not. I also met a little tiny dog named Sugar who wanted to play runaround, but her people didn't want her to play with a dog who's head was bigger than her whole self. I did get to sniff her though.

I got to go to Tastee Freeze this month and get a PUP CUP too! It was WONDERFUL. Mommy said it was way too big and I did have a little bit of a tummy ache afterward, but I think it was worth it. Mommy says next month she will tell them that even though I am a big dog I need a Yorkie sized Pup Cup. Mean Mommy.

Mommy did a lot of work in the garden this month and I helped. When she weeded I sat on her lap and when she tried to dig I stood or lay down right where she was digging. I brought her balls so that she could take a break every once in a while and throw them for me. I also lay right in the spot where she was trying to rake. Finally, I dug a nice hole in the veggie garden and planted a tennis ball. I can't wait to see what comes up. I thought maybe it would be a tennis ball tree or a tennis ball bush, but my friend Emily tells me that it will be a tennis ball plant because tennis balls grow underground like potatoes.

Finally I got revenge on the little terrorist, um terrier, that comes out and tries to bite me sometimes on my walk. We were passing his house and he threw himself at the door and barked at me, trying to get the door to open. I looked at him and then I saw that he had left his tennis ball out in the yard. So, I walked up to the ball and picked it up with just my front teeth so he could see I had the ball. I stood in front of him for awhile with the ball in my mouth and when he started getting really mad I strolled very slowly away, carrying his ball. He really went nuts at that and his owner came to the door to yell at him. When he stopped barking I dropped the ball because I didn't really want it. (After all, I'm going to have a ton this fall when the tennis ball plant produces balls). The owner apologized to Mommy for all the barking and Mommy, between laughing, told the owner that I had egged the bad dog on then she called me a brat.

Ewwwww Pt. 2

2010-04-19T16:58:00.002-05:00

We got the following e-mail today from Kraft:

"Thank you for visiting www.kraftcheese.com and for letting us know that your KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food were misshapen and had dark crusty edges and spots.

I'm sorry for your experience. The problem you described sounds like there was a possible mechanical failure at our facility. I am sending you a reimbursement coupon via first class mail, which you should receive within 7-10 business days.

We value the quality of the products that leave our facility. We give careful attention to each step of our manufacturing process. Samples from each production run are evaluated before we ship them, in an effort to prevent any unsatisfactory products from entering distribution.

Mistakes can sometimes occur on our production lines. We try to prevent this by stationing inspectors at various points along the production lines, and their duties include watching for malfunctions. Also, our quality control staff makes regular rounds throughout the production area during the day in order to ensure that production equipment is functioning properly.

I hope this information is helpful, and again, I apologize for this experience. Thank you for your loyalty and we hope that your next experience is a good one."

Will let everyone know when/if we get our coupon. My favorite part of the letter is that their American cheese is actually called "KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food"

"Mommy can I have a grilled KRAFT Singles Pasteurized Process Cheese Food sandwich?"

Ewwwww!

2010-04-18T14:28:00.003-05:00

Mommy buys Kraft American Cheese Singles because she sometimes likes to snack on them and they are handy to have around in case she needs to give me a pill. We got to about 6 slices from the bottom of our most recent 24 pack and found these three slices (below them is a normal slice):

Mommy sent Kraft an e-mail saying "EWWWWWW!" but in a more literate manner. She wanted to attach the photo, but they had no way for her to do so. We will let you know if anything comes of it.

My Monthly Diary for February

2010-03-23T16:47:00.005-05:00

This month has not been a very good one. First off, after we came back from Wisconsin I started to have some tummy trouble and had to go back on Carafate. Then that cleared up and I was feeling okay until I had to go to the vet for my annual checkup. I got very upset at the vet, which is odd. I don't really like going to the checkup vet, but I don't usually get really upset, but I was shaking in the waiting room and kept wanting to leave when we got into our examination room. The vet came in and gave me my shots and checked me out and said I looked really good for my age and the fact that I have had some tummy troubles and the broken back and all and then she let me go, but she told Mommy that I needed to come back in two weeks for a second part of my Lyme shot. This is new, but it is necessary because my predecessor, Boo, got Lyme even when he had been vaccinated for it all his life. The second half of the Lyme shot protects against the variant that Boo had gotten. When we got home I moped and got a bit of a fever, which often happens when I have my distemper shot. (Mommy says that is my own fault because every time she thinks I can avoid getting the distemper shot I go and do something like fight with Walter, catch a feral cat or a squirrel, or, like this year, all three.) So Mommy let me mope.

The next morning I woke up, jumped out of bed and threw up. Back on Carafate I went. Things would get straightened up and then after I was off Carafate for about a week I'd start throwing up again. Then I started pooping in the house while Mommy was out. Mommy was getting upset about that, but since I was pooping in only one room she put papers down while we tried to get things straightened out. I also started waking her up at 10:30 p.m. every night having panic attacks. After a couple weeks (and after I pooped and peed in the house) Mommy decided to take me to the chiropractor to see if maybe I was having back pain. I like the chiropractor vet and was happy to go there. She said my back wasn't too bad, but did a little bit of adjustment to my hip area and I went home to sleep. I didn't get to sleep though because when we got home Mommy discovered that both the bathtub and kitchen sink were backed up and when she called the plumber they said they could come right away. They did which was nice, but what wasn't nice was that the pipes were all corroded and they couldn't open one up to clean it out and had to cut a whole section off and replace it and the kitchen drain fell apart in the guy's hand while he was taking it apart! Mommy was watching him do it so she knows he didn't do anything. Anyway, I didn't get any sleep because I kept having to help the plumbers. But I did get to finally sleep when they left and I slept all the rest of the day and through the night and I felt much better and I stopped pooping and peeing in the house.

When I went in for my second Lyme shot Mommy made arrangements for me to not have to go in the back room with the vet techs in hopes that I wouldn't get so upset I'd set my tummy off again, but even though I waited in the car until they were ready for me and then went into the out door and got the shot and went right back to the car the next day I threw up first thing in the morning again. Since then my tummy hasn't been totally right and I feel good for a few days and then I have tummy troubles again for a few days, then I feel good again, then troubles. Mommy is at a total loss for what is wrong with me but she does say that eating every dead thing I find on our walks can't be helping. I don't see why that would be, and I'm not telling her what I think, and I am still making sure to wake her up at 11:30 at night for post time change panic attacks. Mommy keeps saying the word "Prozac" around me. Last night I woke Mommy up at 10:00, 11:30, 3:00, 4:30 and 7:00 and today is another bad tummy day after having had three days of good tummy. So, anyway, I need all you dogs and cats and humans and whatever else out there who read my blog to think good thoughts for me so that my tummy can feel better and I won't need to see the checkup vet to get whatever this Prozac stuff is.

Things haven't been all bad this month though. I got to go on some hikes and very long walks and play ball and stuff. Also, Auntie Naomi came into town and even though I didn't get to see her she brought me a stuffed animal! I was very happy to have it and danced around the house with it. BUT there has been some talk on the internet that I am spoiled because after the snow melted this month Mommy went out and picked up all my stuffed animals that had been lost in the snow all winter and put them on the line to dry. There were sixty of them hanging out there and Mommy thought it looked funny so she took a picture of it and posted it on TwitPic.

Some people seemed to think that being able to lose sixty toys and not really miss them meant that I am spoiled. I don't think I am. So Mommy and I got all my toys out and Mommy counted and I only own 98 stuffies and an unknown number of balls and bones. Here they are:

So, as you can see, I am NOT spoiled and I DO need those toys from Auntie Naomi each time she comes into town.

Flashback to Year 3

2010-03-11T13:12:00.017-06:00

February 25, 2003

This was a rather boring month. Mommy and I did most of the usual stuff. We visited our former neighbor at his new place, we went hiking in the forest preserves, and we went to the dogpark. I am getting better about pointy-eared dogs and square-headed dogs, but I still get aggressive-defensive if a dog runs up to me when I am playing with someone else. I don't really think you can blame me though because that is what happened when the mean shepherd and rottie attacked me.

We also babysat Grandma and Grandpa's birdie while they were on vacation, but we didn't do a very good job of it because poor Tiger died. He came to us sick, but Mommy still feels like she should have been able to do better. I felt guilty about letting Tiger die while Mommy was at work and I greeted her that evening all upset and apologizing with my head and tail down. Mommy knew right away something bad had happened. When Grandpa and Grandma came to our house to get Tiger's cage and stuff I was VERY happy to see them. I was so excited that I screamed and screamed when Grandpa walked in the door.

I learned a new trick. When I am in a "down" position and Mommy says "Head down" I put my head down on or between my paws. Mommy says it looks really cute. The things I do to humor her.

The main thing that happened this month is that I taught Mommy a new trick. It all started when I was outside having fun in the backyard. A squirrel came by so I ran after it and barked at it and barked at it and barked at it. Mommy opened the door and made me come inside. Then, a few days later, I was outside and I saw one of the feral cats. I barked at it and Mommy came and opened the door and made me come inside. A few days after that I was waiting quietly by the back door for Mommy to come let me in. She was doing something else I guess, and she didn't come right away. Then I saw one of those cats again. So I barked at it. Mommy came and opened the door and told me to come in. That is when I realized I could train Mommy to come let me in whenever I wanted her to. The next day I was waiting for Mommy to let me in, but she didn't come right away. So I let out one loud "BARK!!" and Mommy came and let me in. I tried it again the next day, and it worked, and the day after too. Now Mommy is fully trained to let me back into the house when I sit by the back door and bark.

March 25, 2003

The big news of this month is that I injured Mommy. See, we were walking and I kind of pulled her down a hill and she got hurt. It couldn't have been that bad because she wasn't licking anything, but she says that I did the following damage:

1. twisted her left ankle
2. pulled a muscle in her left calf
3. wrenched her right knee
4. pulled a muscle in her right thigh
5. bruised her hip
6. THIS IS THE BIG ONE!!! cracked two (maybe three) ribs
7. wrenched her right elbow
8. wrenched her right shoulder
9. pulled a muscle in her neck

It has been a couple weeks since I did this and Mommy feels much better now. She says the only things that still hurt are her knee (no surprise she has bad knees anyway) and her ribs, but her ribs don't hurt when she breathes anymore. They only seem to hurt when I tug really hard on the leash.

I wrote to the BadDogs about this the day after it happened. Click here to read the story, but come back to my webpage afterwards!

On a brighter note, Mommy and I have been working on my dog phobia and things have gotten better. I don't get as upset when I am playing with another dog and a dog or two come to see me. I can also talk nicely to most pointy-eared dogs now too. I still hate German shepherds though. (Sorry to all the nice German shepherds that might be reading this!) Mommy and I were in a forest preserve parking lot heading towards a trail this month and a bad dog owner let his German shepherd out of his truck without a leash. The owner was getting his bike off his truck and ignored Mommy when she yelled, "Would you please hold your shepherd, my dog has issues with them." and the shepherd came up to me with his head down, ears forward and fur up. I have to admit I lost it. I started jumping around growling and snapping and basically making a fool of myself. Mommy kept putting herself between me and the other dog and had her hand on my back and was telling me that the doggie wouldn't get me, but I couldn't hear her. I was too scared. The other owner FINALLY came and after some time caught his dog. Mommy said, "Sorry, but I asked you to hold your dog." and we went for our walk. Some people who had seen my fit talked to Mommy later on the trail. Mommy explained about my shepherd problem and one lady let her chow talk to me and I was very nice. The lady said it was hard to believe I was the same dog. When we finished our walk there was a ranger truck parked in the lot. The ranger wasn't there, but Mommy thinks the bad owner probably reported me as vicious and the ranger was on the trail looking for me. Either that or somebody else reported the bad owner for not having his dog on a leash.

April 22, 2003

This has not been a good month.
It started off normal enough. We took our walks, I played with my friend Teddy, we played ball, I got in trouble a little. You know, the usual stuff. Then came THE ACCIDENT.

I'm still not sure what happened. One minute I was chasing my soccer ball in the backyard and the next I was sitting down with a lot of pain in my hind quarters. I could hardly walk. Moving caused me to scream "YIPE!!!" Mommy needed to go to work, but she couldn't because I wouldn't come in the house. I didn't want to do anything that would cause me to hurt! Finally, Mommy remembered that she had some leftover deli ham in the fridge and I decided I would move one painful step at a time as long as I got some ham in between steps. I yiped for each step too.

Mommy called the vet, but they couldn't see me right away but they told Mommy they would call if someone canceled. Someone did and we went to the vet. I yiped getting into the car. I yiped getting out of the car. I didn't want to climb the step into the vet's office, but once I was in there I tried to jump on the counter to get my milkbone. YIPE!!! While we waited for the vet I whined and shook. Mommy kept telling me it would be okay. When the vet came in it was a man vet, not my normal female vet. I didn't really want anyone touching me and I cried some more. The vet said he needed to muzzle me, just in case, and Mommy said okay because she didn't want me to accidentally hurt the vet, but once the muzzle was on all I could think about was getting it off so I wouldn't lie down and let the vet look at my legs and back.

The vet took me into the back room and had an assistant help. I YIPED when they would reach for my legs, but not yipe when they moved them, or sometimes I'd yipe when one was moved, but not when they moved it the same way a second time. Then I decided I'd had enough and I sprayed my anal glands at them. THAT MADE THEM STOP TOUCHING ME!!

When the vet brought me back to Mommy he said he couldn't tell what was wrong without x-raying me and he didn't want to have to knock me out to do so if it was only a torn muscle. So, we had to work on the assumption that it was a torn ACL. That meant no walks, no playing, no nothing for TWO WEEKS so that things could heal up. They gave me some pain killers which made me feel better, but then they made me throw up so I couldn't take them any more. Mommy said that was for the best though because I kept trying to do things that were bad for me. Lucky for me, after two VERY BORING WEEKS, I felt better so I didn't have to have x-rays or ACL surgery.

But things aren't normal yet! I still can't play with my friend Teddy. I can't play ball. I can't take long walks. I'm not supposed to run. I can't jump on the bed (Mommy moved the mattress to the floor of the livingroom so that I can still sleep with her).

I can't sit on my window seat. I can't counter surf. I can't do ANYTHING FUN! Mommy and I can now walk into town and she says we should be back up to our 5 mile morning walk in another 2 weeks or so, but I am going CRAZY. I want to RUN. I want to JUMP. I want to PLAY. NO FAIR!!!

May 20, 2003

Things have gotten better this month. My leg feels MUCH better. So Mommy has been taking me to my favorite trails again. At first we only walked for about 4 miles, but now we are up to about nine. I also get to play ball in the backyard and I got to have my friend Teddy over too. I was feeling SO MUCH better that I was getting bored with only playing ball for a little while and not doing our full 12 - 18 mile walks on the weekend so I decided to show Mommy how good I felt. Therefore, I jumped up on Mommy and cut her lip open. She wasn't very happy about it, but she did say, "If you are feeling that good I guess we don't need to sleep on the floor of the livingroom anymore." So she put the bed back together and got the house back to healthy dog state.

I got to have my bench by the window back and that was when I noticed that the neighbors across the street got a new German shepherd. I was not happy about this, let me tell you, and I actually bristled and growled a bit when I first saw him. Mommy has pointed out that he is in his own fenced yard and he isn't going to come in the house and get me, but I still don't like him much. It doesn't help that the neighbors have started taking him for walks. Don't they know that Maggie, the little white dog down the street, Scruffy, who lives a few blocks away, my buddy Teddy, and I are the ONLY DOGS allowed to walked down our block? Anyway, Mommy went to meet the new dog and told his people about my shepherd problem so they are being nice and not walking him on our side of the street and we don't walk on their side.

Finally, it sure is nice to sleep up on the bed again, but the first morning I forgot where I was and I rolled off the bed! Mommy tried to catch me but she wasn't fast enough and I landed on my head. Mommy said it was a good thing I landed on a part of me that didn't matter, and nothing that would get hurt. HUMPH!

June 24, 2003

This has been a busy month. First Mommy and I went to Wisconsin to help Grandma and Grandpa get their house ready for summer. I know this is hard to believe, but I was a GOOD DOG the entire time I was up there. Grandma even commented that I was "civilized!" I only ran off once (to check out the neighbor's laundry which was flapping and teasing me) but I came back when Mommy called, eventually, and she didn't have to come into the woods to look for me, so it was considered "good" not "bad." I only got hooked up to my long leash once and that was because Mommy and Grandpa were moving a big wooden swing and they didn't want my help for some reason. Anyway, being good at the lake is VERY tiring!! When you are bad you get tied up and so you nap a lot and glare at Mommy and stuff, but if you are good you get to chase chipmunks and squirrels and fish and you get to run in the woods (come back when Mommy calls and you get a Pupperoni!!) and you get to roll in poop and dig holes and swim and follow smells and all sorts of other things. Boy is it tiring!

The first day we got there Mommy threw my duckie in the lake for me to fetch and I got it 9 times and would have gone more times, but Mommy stopped me because the water was too cold. The second day I chased the duckie 6 times. The third day I chased the duckie twice. The fourth day I chased it once, and I got Grandma to let me in the house so I could take a two hour nap. On the last day I told Mommy she could go get her own damn duckie! I slept for the whole car ride home and was still asleep when Mommy got home from work that night and I slept the whole night and the next day too. Being good is very hard on the system.

When we got home I wanted to tell my friend, Teddy, about my trip, but I discovered that he had moved! He went to someplace called "Florida" and Mommy says it is too far away for him to come for our playdates. Mommy had been warning me that he was moving, but I didn't realize that meant no more playdates. I have been very sad on Sundays (playdate day).

ME AND TEDDY:

Mommy is trying to get the neighbors to let me play with Ernie (a new lab puppy) but they don't seem to be very eager to do it.

Also this month Mommy and I did almost our full trail hike. We did 10 miles. It was warmer than we thought it was going to be so I got very thirsty at the half-way point. Mommy broke the rules and took me into the "no dogs" park to get me water. Nobody yelled at us though which is a good thing or Mommy probably would have bitten them. When we got to the eight mile point I realize that we were leaving the shaded area and going into the Long Area of Sun. I sat down in the shade and refused to move. It was Father's Day so Mommy took out the emergency cell phone she caries on our hikes and called Grandpa to say, "Happy Father's Day." and chat with him while I cooled off. Some people who had seen us earlier in the day stopped to see if we were okay. Mommy said we were fine and after chatting for a while with Grandpa, we finished our walk. When we got home I had three ticks and Mommy had two. Mommy says no more sitting on the ground in the woods for us!

Finally, Mommy taught me a new trick. See, whenever Mommy goes into the bathroom I barge in to see what she is doing. Mommy can't seem to remember to make sure the door latches when she shuts it, and I refuse to not barge in, so Mommy taught me to shut the door. So now when she is in the bathroom and I barge in she says, "Merlin, shut the door!" and I turn around and hit it with my paw until the door is closed. Mommy thinks it is a very useful trick.

July 30, 2003

Well, I'm late updating this month, but you will see why at the end.

This month we went to our town's 4th of July celebration to watch the fireworks. I love fireworks. We got there about one hour early so that Mommy could buy some dinner and we could picnic. Imagine our surprise to find that the park was already PACKED with people. Our spot that we always sit in was taken by a golden retriever and his family too! Mommy and I went to get something to eat and discovered that almost all the vendors were out of food. We were lucky that the guys selling burgers still had some and the kids selling pop still had some too. I sat in line and waited very nicely. People complemented me on what a good boy I was. One man even stepped on the tip of my tail and I didn't do anything but look back at him reproachfully. His wife hit him though and told him to get off my tail! It was funny.

We went back to the fireworks area and finally found a spot where we could spread out our blanket. Then we sat down to eat. After we shared the burger (I got half) some little girls came up and asked if they could pet me. Mommy said okay and they pet me for about a half hour. Mommy had planned to read her book, but she didn't get to because she had to watch the little girls. Then some other kids came up to pet me too. Then someone joined the group next to us and they brought along a little peke. I wanted to play with him but Mommy said no. Finally it was time for fireworks to start. I was all ready and so was Mommy and then some brats in front of us threw one of those popper firecrackers at the peke and hit him in the side. The peke wasn't hurt but he was scared and I got really mad and wanted to go give those bad boys a piece of my mind and maybe some of my teeth, but Mommy said no. Unfortunately it took me the first 10 minutes of the fireworks to settle down so I missed quite a bit of the show.

After the show Mommy tried to get us out of the park while staying out of the crowd, but we ended up getting shoved into the middle of a massive jam at the exit. I stayed really close to Mommy and my glow collar was on, but people were still stepping on me. I was handling it okay, but Mommy was getting madder and madder because people weren't even saying "sorry" when they stepped on me or shoved Mommy. (Mommy is quite short and being in the middle of a large crowd can be really bad for her). We were almost out of the park when a kid reached out and started to pet me. Mommy said, "You should always ask before you pet a strange dog." The kid's father said, "It's okay we have a golden retriever."
Mommy said, "This is not your golden retriever."
The man said, "You wouldn't bring a vicious dog to the park."
Mommy said, "No I wouldn't, but this is a very stressful situation for him. Even the best tempered dog can lose it when someone comes up behind him in a crowd and touches him."
The man said, "My son likes dogs he wouldn't do anything bad to him."
Mommy said, "My dog is trained how to behave in public, and I would hope that people would train their children too, so that everyone can be safe."
Then the man called Mommy a female dog.
We got out of the park at that point, which is good because I think Mommy might have bitten him if we hadn't.

Things were boring for most of the rest of the month until right before I should have updated my page. That was when Mommy started packing bags. We were going on a VACATION!! I thought we were going to go to Wisconsin, but we didn't. We went to DOG SCOUT CAMP in Michigan!! It was very exciting, and I only got in one BIG fight and I learned a lot and so did Mommy. We just got back on Saturday and that is why this update is late. Check back in a week or two because I am making a special CAMP DIARY which will have pictures and everything.

September 3, 2003

I'm late again this month, but that is because Mommy and I went to Wisconsin. I'll tell you about that trip next month.

The big thing that happened this month is that I went to Dog Scout Camp. I did so much there that I made a special daily camp diary. [I'll put it up as my next flashbacks]

After we got back from camp I slept and slept and ate and ate. Then Mommy and I got back to our normal routine. Until the NEW NEIGHBORS showed up. We got new neighbors next door and they have a golden retriever. His name is Berkley, but we thought his name was Barkley because that is what the neighbors' daughter calls him. Barkley is a good name for him because he BARKS AND BARKS AND BARKS at me. I really want to be friends with him, but when I go up to the fence to say hi he BARKS at me. Then I get scared and I make Cujo faces at him and bark back. Then, because I want to be friends, I stop Cujoing at him and I wag my tail and try to be friends again. Mommy says I look like an idiot doing that and calls me away before I can Cujo at him, but sometimes I switch so fast she doesn't realize it is coming. Berkley's mommy is a little afraid of me because I look so evil when I go off at him. She thinks I might bite her, but Mommy says she really doubts that would happen. So, as it is right now when we are both out in the back yard we are either barking at each other or ignoring each other.

Mommy says she thinks we could be good fence friends because we have similar interests. I like chasing cats and squirrels and so does he. I like running along the fence with other dogs and so does he (but he likes to bark while doing it and I like to run quietly). I like to chase basketballs in the backyard and so does he. He likes his ball so much that if he sees me chasing mine he runs to his mommy and tries to make her jump over the fence to get my ball. I think he thinks it is his. So, hopefully, he will learn to stop barking so much, but just in case he doesn't, Mommy is working with me on learning that he isn't really being mean when he barks. He barks at me and I get treats for not reacting.

Other than fighting with Berkley, I didn't do a whole lot. Mommy and I are taking hikes on the trails by our house and I am carrying my backpack. I look really cool in it and people sometimes stop to talk to Mommy about it and they tell me I look good wearing it. Sometimes they ask about Dog Scouts and Mommy tells them about camp. Mommy fancied my pack up a bit with some buckles and by sewing my Dog Scout patches, my CGC patch and the trail badge we earned last year for hiking 7 trails in 3 months. (We actually did that in about one month because the required trails are only 3 miles at the longest.) So now I look REALLY COOL when I wear it.

September 23, 2003

Well, as promised I'll tell you about my trip to Wisconsin. Mommy and I went up there at the end of August. When we got there Grandma and Grandpa weren't there, but they came the next day. Boy was I excited!! I love it when I get to see Grandma and Grandpa. They didn't stay the whole time though and I was very sad for a couple of days after they left. I was VERY good at the lake and I got to be off leash for the first few days. I only went to visit the neighbors once and I came back right after I said hi.

After we had been there a few days I woke Mommy up around 7 a.m. (see I let her sleep in when we are on vacation) and she let me outside by myself. I was very good and did what I was supposed to do and then came inside. About a half hour later I looked out the window and what did I see in OUR BACKYARD but a GERMAN SHEPHERD!! I jumped on the window and barked and even Mommy got mad because the shepherd was wandering around without any humans. The shepherd looked at our house and ran off into the woods. Mommy went outside and tracked the shepherd to another neighbor's house and then lost the trail when the shepherd stepped onto the neighbors driveway. She went back to Grandma and Grandpa's house and called the neighbor to see if it was her shepherd. It wasn't, but she said it belonged to the neighbors next to her. Mommy went back to their house and, sure enough, there was the shepherd in their house. She knocked on their door and the shepherd's daddy came out. Mommy told him that the shepherd was in our yard and how I HATE shepherds because they have attacked me in the past and she really didn't want me to start a dogfight that she would have to finish. The owner then asked her how she knew that it was THEIR shepherd. Mommy explained about tracking it. Then he said, "When did you see the dog?" and Mommy said, "About a half hour ago." At that point the man admitted that it COULD be his shepherd since he lets her out to run around BY HERSELF in the woods for a FEW HOURS EACH MORNING!!, but she NEVER goes farther than a couple properties over. Why would she go onto OUR property? Mommy said, "She probably smelled MY DOG and came to investigate." (she did not add, "Duh! you big moron!" and "How do you know where she is when she is OUT OF YOUR SIGHT for a FEW HOURS each morning?!" which I think showed a lot of self control.) So then she said she would keep ME ON A DRAGLINE on our property if he would keep their dog on their property. He said he would, but I am sure it was their dog I saw in our front yard a few mornings later. That is why I barked and barked and barked at 5 a.m.

So, even though I was a very good boy I had to wear my leash for the rest of the time I was at the lake. Just because some other dog has a BAD OWNER.

I still had fun at the lake though. I swam and swam and swam. I ran in the woods. I chased chipmunks and squirrels and fish and frogs. I found the cool retrieving toy that my cousin, Missy, hid in the woods. I rolled in all sorts of stuff. I went to visit a friend of Mommy's (I tried to sit on his couch which HE said was okay, but which MOMMY said wasn't.). And Mommy and I went for a long hike. I wore my backpack for it and got lots of compliments along the trail.

I slept for the entire ride home. We took Grandma's new canary, Willie, home with us because we were going to babysit him for a couple of weeks. Willie loved the car ride and especially liked looking out the sunroof. Grandma's car doesn't have a sunroof. Mommy says it was good I slept because that way we didn't have to stop and make her worry about Willie being locked in the car alone while we took our walk.

Since we've been home, and Willie has gone back to Grandma's house, things have gone back to normal. Mommy and I are still hiking. I am up to 32 1/2 miles carrying my pack. When I get to 50 miles I get to be a Pack Dog, and I can sign my name Merlin, CGC, DSA, PD. Mommy says it is strange having a dog with more letters after his name than she has (she doesn't have any letters after her name). Maybe she should go for her CGC, or would that be a HGC?

October 21, 2003

This month we didn't do a whole lot. It was a stay at home month. No vacations, no trips, no nothing. We did go for lots and lots of hikes in the forest preserves. Mommy and I were working on this special county program where you pick up a booklet with about 12 trails listed. You hike seven trails before the end of November and you get a little metal badge to put on a walking stick. Any trail over 2 miles counts as two trails (Mommy says any trail UNDER 2 miles should count as 1/2 a trail, but then I guess other people don't walk as much as we do). Since we can finish our 7 trails in no time Mommy and I do all the trails that allow dogs on them. This year we did 9 trails and I got my badge last week. It is bigger than last year's and is three colors instead of two. It looks really good on my pack (we don't have a walking stick). We used our county hikes for my Packdog title too and this weekend I passed the fifty mile mark. Mommy sent in my log so soon I should be able to put that PD after my name. Mommy says we are going to take a backpack break for a little bit. We'll still hike, but I won't have to wear my pack each time, and then we will start working on 100 miles so that I can be PDX (Packdog Excellent).

Also this month Mommy and I went to visit our old neighbor in the nursing home. When we walked in the door the receptionist said, "Merlin!!" and insisted on petting me (no complaints here). I tried to get her to take my headcollar off, but she wouldn't. Then when we were walking down the hall a nurse said, "This must be Merlin. I HAVE to meet him!" and she pet me too! It was great. I love it when people recognize me. It turns out that our neighbor called out and told everyone we were coming to visit and they all wanted to say hi because he had told them so much about me! Mommy said it was a good thing she brought me, she had actually considered going for a visit WITHOUT me that day, but decided at the last minute that it wasn't too hot to leave me in the car when she stopped at the library for tapes for our neighbor. When we were leaving it was right before lunch and all the residents were gathering outside the dining area so I did all my tricks for them. Mommy says that if I would EVER calm down she would check into making me a therapy dog. I know I would love that job.

Finally, after last month's diary I got an anonymous question from some human asking me why it was okay for me to visit the neighbors at Grandma and Grandpa's house, but it wasn't okay for the German Shepherd to visit me. I know it had to be a human asking that question because any dog would know the answer to that one. It wasn't okay because it was A GERMAN SHEPHERD that visited me. I would have thought it was great if it was a pomeranian visiting me but A GERMAN SHEPHERD was on MY LAND!! Mommy says actually she would have been just as mad if a pomeranian had come to visit without its human and would have hunted down its human just the same. See, the minute I leave our property Mommy knows it, and she comes after me. Mommy always seems to notice whenever I wander out of sight up there and whistles for me right away, but the GERMAN SHEPHERD's daddy didn't know, or care, where his dog was for HOURS EVERY DAY and that is a BAD daddy.

November 25, 2003

This month Mommy did that strange thing where she walks around the house and plays with all the clocks and then she doesn't get up on time the next morning, or feed me on time, or get home from work on time. This year I was VERY VERY good and I didn't pee, poop or throw up in the house at all! I was still nervous when she was late getting home, but I just got Pyramid and cuddled with him on the bed until Mommy came home.

We also did that thing where Mommy makes me dress up funny and then kids in costume come to the door and Mommy gives them treats and I inspect all the bags. Then after Mommy closes the door I get a treat too! This year Mommy made me dress up as an angel. From the way my halo flopped around she said I was a fallen angel. For a little while Mommy dressed up as the Grim Reaper and she told me that that made me the Angel of Death.

After about 2 hours of answering the door I got tired of it (and I'd had enough treats) so I went into the bedroom and refused to come out again. Besides, all the kids I like had already come and oohed and ahhed over me.

And finally this month I discovered that the big long piece of furniture in the livingroom called, "my down couch!" was very very comfortable. See, Mommy was lying on it watching tv and I wanted to get pet, so I put my chin on her tummy and she pet me. After a little bit my neck started to get stiff, so I sat up and put one foot on Mommy and she kept petting me. Then my other front foot started to cramp so I put that foot on Mommy. Mommy said, "You are really pushing it big guy." but I just smiled at her. Then I thought it would be nice if she rubbed between my shoulder blades so I turned around and put my chest on Mommy. She said, "Only this once." and she scratched me. After a bit she fell asleep. That was when my hind legs started to go numb. I wanted to take some weight off them, but, being the considerate dog I am, I didn't want to wake up Mommy by jumping down. So, instead I carefully climbed up onto Mommy. You should have seen how surprised she was when she woke up! Anyway she told me to get down and I did. Mommy thought that was that, but what she didn't know was that I decided that if I could be on the couch when Mommy was sleeping on it, why couldn't I sleep on it when she was at work? I slept on it for an entire week. Once Mommy found my ball on the couch when she got home and told me I should be more careful where I throw it. She didn't realize that I had taken it up there to play with while on that comfy couch!

My undoing was that Saturday. Mommy was cleaning the house and I was bored. I slept on the bed for awhile, but I decided after a bit that the couch would be better. So, while Mommy was cleaning the kitchen I got up on the couch. You should have heard her yell when she came into the livingroom and found me there! I tried to look surprised, "hey! how'd I get up HERE??" but she didn't buy it. So I sat on my livingroom dog bed with a big sigh and waited for her to do something more interesting. She didn't. After she finished cleaning the house she started to pay bills. I decided she was too busy to notice so I left my dog bed and quietly started to climb up on the couch. Again she yelled at me. And now there are evil mouse traps on the couch when Mommy is not sitting on it. HUMPH!

December 23, 2003

This month Mommy and I went up to Grandma and Grandpa's place in Wisconsin for Thanksgiving. I had fun, but not as much fun as in the summer. It was deer hunting season so I wasn't allowed outside without Mommy on the other end of my leash. I also wore my Dog Scout bandana the whole time because it is so bright and shiny red. Mommy pinned a red bandana to her coat sleeve too. Since Mommy had to go outside with me and it was kinda cold, we didn't go out a whole lot. I waited by the window for chipmunks, but none came. Mommy said they were asleep for the winter. To add some excitement to this dull vacation I did things like try to take Grandma's slippers whenever possible. I also carried everyone's shoes around and at one point I tipped over an end table.

When we got home it was mostly boring. We took some walks, but not as many as I'd like, and lately Mommy has been very busy shopping and stuff for Christmas, so I have been very neglected. Mommy took me to PetSmart to have my picture taken for Santa. I wasn't very good for Santa, but then, he wasn't very good for me. Even Mommy got a little mad at him because she was trying to explain to him that SHE would tell me to sit and pose (she wanted me to sit sideways and put my paw on his knee) but he just took my leash by my collar and JERKED it to try to make me sit! Well, THAT doesn't work! So I got upset and refused to sit for him or Mommy and I just wanted to go home because Santa was being mean to me, but finally Mommy got me calmed down enough to get one okay picture taken. Mommy says you can tell that both Santa and I are rather pissed off. We made it into a Christmas card anyway. Click on the link at the end of my diary to see it.

Also this month I though Mommy had finally realized that it was not fair that she got to go potty in the house but I didn't, because she brought in A TREE! Then she put all these toys on the tree and I thought, "Oh! It isn't a potty tree, it is a new dog toy!" I love chewing pine branches and putting toys on the ends of them makes it even better, but then Mommy ruined everything by hanging MOUSETRAPS on the tree too! How could she do such a thing? I think it is awful and she did it all just to torture me. I hope Santa doesn't bring her anything but coal for playing such a dirty trick. I also know that there is a yummy treat for me hiding in the coat closet, but Mommy won't open the door for me. I sure hope Chirstmas comes soon. I'm not sure how much longer I can continue to not pee on or eat the tree, and there must be some way to open that closet door. Happy Howlidays!

January 20, 2004

Well, this was a busy month. First there was Christmas. We had Mommy's oldest brother and his family, Grandma, Grandpa and Mommy's youngest brother over for dinner. I was a good host and circulated among the guests. I did so by circling the room over and over for the entire hors d'oeuvres period. I also showed them that Mommy had nuts they could eat by taking nuts one at a time and cracking them open and eating them. For some reason the guests didn't want nuts. Then I finished off the hors d'oeuvres just like Boo had done back before he got sick. I was very sad when the guests went home that night.

The next day was Christmas day. I got all sorts of good gifts and then Mommy packed the other presents up and we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house. It was very exciting to be there with everyone (Mommy's brothers and all were staying there) and it got even better when Mommy's middle brother joined the group and brought my waterdog cousin Missy. Missy and I chased each other all over the house and then Grandpa seemed to forget there were dogs in the house and he stood with the front door open and Missy ran out first and I ran after her and we ran around the outside of the house and into the nieghbors yard and Mommy chased us and Mommy's middle brother chased us and we dodged them and wrestled and it was great until Missy finally got caught by Mommy's middle brother. He picked her up and brought her inside. Then I let Mommy catch me and bring me in too so that Missy and I could continue our chase game. We chased each other around the diningroom table and through the livingroom. Then we went in the basement and chased some more. After all that running I had to pee, but Mommy wasn't downstairs and nobody who was knew that I had to pee so I just peed on one of the basement posts. Mommy's middle brother caught me and tried to stop me by pulling on my collar, but once I'm peeing there is no stopping me so Mommy got to clean up a puddle that was about 5 feet long. I got a half hour time out in Grandma and Grandpa's bathroom. After that I was a good boy the rest of the night and I only played chase with Missy and didn't pee inside anymore. I was very tired that night!

Shortly after Christmas it was New Years Eve. Mommy had the day off so we went for a hike. I carried my backpack and when we got to my favorite trail Mommy let me choose which way we walked. I chose south (I usually choose north) and we hiked and hiked and hiked then we took a break and turned around and hiked back, but I didn't want to stop there and Mommy let me hike a trail we'd never done before. It ended up being a BIG loop that connected with the trail we had been on. By the time we got back to the car we had hiked a total of 13 1/2 miles. Mommy noticed that night that my backpack had rubbed a blister under my arm and she felt bad that she had let me carry the pack for so many miles. We spent most of New Years Day just hanging out around the house recovering!

The weather hasn't been so good for hiking after New Years Eve so Mommy says we are going to start really working on painting. She has made me my paint paw and set up an art space in the basement. We have already started working on new tricks and gone back to work on some of the old ones I never really got. She says it is important that I tire out my brain if I can't tire out my body. I wonder why that is? Do you think it has something to do with the fact that I have been teasing her constantly over the last week or so?

Finally it was my adoption anniversary yesterday. Three whole years with Mommy. Is she a sucker or what?! Mommy gave me a Kong filled with chicken in the morning and then lots of people food and a Jumbone and a real bone at night. I gobbled down the chicken, the people food and the Jumbone and I hid the real bone under the covers of the bed up by Mommy's pillow. Mommy was very surprised when she found it at bed time and she put it in the fridge. She said I can have it back tonight, but it will go back in the fridge if she finds it in her bed again.

My Monthly Blog for February

2010-02-23T16:44:00.002-06:00

This has not been a very fun month.

You know it is not going to be a fun month when you start it off by going to the vet for your annual checkup and shots. I was very nervous in the waiting area and then the vet tech took me away to poke me and make me bleed which wasn't nice. I came running back to Mommy in the waiting area and wanted to go home right then, but she said no. Then we went in the examining room. Usually I am impatient in the examining room waiting for my vet to come say hi, but ever since I had to spend all those days at the emergency vet I don't like the the examining room so I sat as close to Mommy as I could and I shook and shook an shook and whined. Then my vet came in and poke me and listened to my heart and stuff and said that all things considered I looked very good. Then she gave me my shots and told Mommy I had to come back in three weeks for ANOTHER SHOT!! Mommy and I were both surprised, but they have changed the Lyme shot so I had to come back. After I got the shots I ran to the door and shook and whined. The vet asked how my tummy had been and Mommy said, "Fine, but I suspect it isn't going to be after today." and she was right. Two days later I woke up feeling awful and I jumped out of bed and threw up in the hall, the living room and the kitchen. Mommy let me and out then put me on Carafate again, WHICH I HATE, but which I have to admit makes my tummy feel a lot better. After three days on Carafate I was back to my old self.

Then about a week later we had a great big snowstorm. Mommy took the day off and I got to go on a lot of snow walks with her. When we started our first walk there was about 3 inches of snow on the ground and by the time we got home there was over 6 inches! The next time we went out there was about 11 inches of snow. And by the time I went out before bed there was 14 inches of snow. This was shocking because the snow actually touched my belly when I walked in it! A couple days after the big storm I was trying to catch a squirrel who was on top of the fence and I pulled a muscle in my left hind leg trying to run through the high snow. It hurt a lot and Mommy said "no more long walks for you until that is healed" but I did get to walk to the feed store guys and get a freeze dried chicken treat from them (much to Mommy's horror). Then by Sunday I was driving her crazy so she broke down and took me for a 1.1 mile hike. I had a lot of fun, but by the time we were done my leg was hurting again. That night I felt really bad and had to have a pain pill. Well the next day between the upset from the injury and the chicken treat my tummy wasn't feeling good. It didn't stop me from eating Mommy's toast that morning, but while Mommy was out I pooped in the plant room. Back on Carafate I went.

After four days I felt better again and I got to be off the meds. Then that weekend the smoke detector's battery died and it went "BEEP!" around 6 p.m. Well beeps scare me A LOT (I have had panic attacks because smoke detectors have beeped on TV) and I was on Mommy's lap panting and shaking and whining all night. The smoke detector didn't beep again that night, and I was feeling happy enough to grab a bite of Mommy's pork curry at dinner when she got up to answer the phone, but the next night, right before bedtime it beeped again. Mommy put me outside so she could change the battery and I hid behind the yard shed while she was doing it. She discovered the replacement battery she had was old and so she had to just leave it batteryless until she could get a new one. I came back in reluctantly when Mommy called me and I looked up at the terrible beeping thing when I went into and out of the bedroom, but it stayed quiet for the rest of the night. Anyway, between the curry and the fear of beeps I pooped in the house again while Mommy was out the next day. So I'm back on Carafate AGAIN!!

Mommy realized that my second Lyme shot was today and she knew that if she let the vet tech take me into the back room to give me the shot my tummy would be really really bad so she called the vet and arranged for them to give me the shot in the back hallway with Mommy there. It didn't stop me from shaking and shaking and whining and running to the door as fast as I could when they were done though. So Mommy and I figure I will be on Carafate for about a week this time. Mommy says if I keep being so neurotic she is going to have to get me a prescription for Valium. I'm not sure if she is kidding or not.

P.S. Today is International Dog Biscuit Appreciation Day and because of my tummy I can't have any. That does not seem fair.

Flashback to Year 2

2010-02-07T15:11:00.005-06:00

February 19, 2002

This month wasn't a great one. It started off okay. Mommy bought abook of dog tricks and made a list of tricks she is going to teach me to do. We also went to the dog park two more weeks in a row and then, the day after the second visit, I got sick. I started drooling at about 11 am and kept drooling all day long. Mommy checked my teeth, and my throat. She didn't see anything wrong and couldn't figure out what was going on so she called the emergency vet (it was a Sunday). They said that maybe I ate something that tasted bad and Mommy should give me lots of water and stuff. Mommy did, but it didn't help. She even gave me some extra treats and some chicken broth, but I kept drooling. By 9 at night I was still drooling and now I was all curled up and whimpering or bothering Mommy for things that I didn't want. I'd ask to go out, but then refuse to go out when she opened the door. I asked to be pet, but moved away when she touched me. Finally, I just started whining and poking her so she took me to the emergency vet.

I'd never been to this vet before and I was very excited to see that they had a counter with a girl behind it. Maybe she hands out treats, you never know, so I jumped up on the counter and drooled on everything on her desk. She agreed that I was drooling way too much and so Mommy and I went into a back room. The girl listened to my heart and said it was going rather fast and I seemed anxious to her too. Then she said, "Let's take his temperature." and she tried to stick this thing up my butt. Well, NO THANK YOU!! I jumped out of the way and ran into a corner. Mommy got me out and held on to me and the girl tried again. NOPE! I got away. They called in an aide and she tried to hold me down. NO WAY!! I got my front paws on her head and jumped over her back. The girl said, "Well, let me get the vet." and she went into a back room. The vet came out and she listened to my heart and said it was a little fast, probably because I was anxious. Then she checked my tummy and glands and teeth and throat and ears. She said that they all looked fine. Then she said, "Well lets see if I can take his temperature." She picked up that stick thing and I ran and put my back end by the door. Then she called in the first girl. When I saw her I ran to the corner and sat down. They didn't seem to get the message that I wasn't going to have something stuck up my butt. The girl tried to pin me to the wall and I started screaming and then I tried to bite the vet. Mommy was shocked. The vet decided I didn't need my temperature taken. She told Mommy that she didn't know what was wrong. That it seemed like I might have eaten something like chocolate or a medication of some kind, but Mommy keeps her medicines in a cabinet that I can't get into and there was no chocolate in the house. The vet said that the only thing she could do was to tell Mommy to check on me every 2 or 3 hours during the night to make sure that I didn't get worse. Then Mommy paid $78 and we went home. I felt a little better the next day and about 5 days later I felt fine.

The day after I felt fine, Mommy started to feel sick. The next day she woke up and found that she had drooled all over her pillow in the middle of the night. She had a runny nose and fever and stuff. She was sick for about a week. That was kind of fun because she stayed home with me, but it was also kind of boring because she just wanted to sleep and stuff and I wanted to play. She got kind of grumpy when I would jump on her tummy and wake her up to see if she wanted to play get the underwear and
stuff. She said she let me sleep when I didn't feel good and I should let her sleep now. Nope. Anyway, when she started feeling better she said I owe her $78 in cookies because I had caught a cold and had acted like I was dying. I couldn't help it. I didn't feel well, and I tend to be a worry wart. How was I to know I WASN'T dying?

March 19, 2002

Well, I have to admit, I haven't been very good this month. After Mommy got sick last month and stayed home all that time I got kind of spoiled. When Mommy went back to work, I decided to pee or poop in the house again. I made sure to pee or poop at least twice a week. Mommy made an appointment with the vet for me to make sure there was nothing wrong with me. The vet said I was fine, and she and Mommy agreed I had probably developed separation anxiety. The vet suggested that Mommy put me on drugs to make it easier for me to think when I get anxious, but Mommy didn't want to do that right away. Instead Mommy decided to study me a bit. The vet gave her some pamphlets about separation anxiety and we went home (after I got my kennel cough snort--I'm going to take a CGC prep course in May so I should have lots to tell then!--and lyme shot).

Mommy read the pamphlets and realized that I no longer had any of the separation anxiety symptoms except for the peeing and pooping part. So she set up a tape recorder to see what I did after she left. When she came home and listened to the tape my secret was out! I ate my treats, played with my toys, slept and peed and pooped in the house. I NEVER whined or paced. Then Mommy borrowed a video camera from Grandma and Grandpa so she could see what I was doing, just in case she missed
something. Now she has a nice tape of me eating my treats, playing with my toys, napping and pooping right in front of the camera. Mommy plans to call the vet in a few days and tell her that I DON'T have separation anxiety and to see what she suggests. I don't like this camera stuff.

April 23, 2002

The Housebreaking War Continues

Don't tell Mommy, but I think she may be winning. After she discovered that I didn't have separation anxiety she called the vet and talked to her. The vet agreed that what Mommy described was not separation anxiety, but was rather some kind of "magical thinking." See, I wanted to be outside and my logic went like this:

1. I want to be outside.
2. If I pee or poop in the house, Mommy gets mad and she puts me outside until she cools off.
3. Therefore, if I pee or poop in the house, I will get to go outside.

It worked too, although I expected to get to go out right away after I went potty in the house (You can see it on the video tape. I see something outside. I try to open the door. I won't open. I poop. I go back to the door and see if it will open now). But, see, when Mommy came home I got to go outside for hours. It was great. The vet said I was the "ultimate button pusher" and then when Mommy asked her what she should do the vet said, "I have NO idea. Isn't it terrible when your dog is smarter than both you and your vet?"

So Mommy decided to go back to basic housebreaking 101, but to up the rewards and punishments. So, if I am good, and I poop outside, I get a treat. If I'm good while Mommy is gone I get to go for a VERY LONG after work walk and have some sit out in the backyard time too. Sometimes I get a carrot too. Sometimes I even get to go to the dogpark! If I am bad, and poop or pee inside, I get locked in my room and I only get 3 short 5 minute outside times and NO Mommy time. The first week of this training I pooped inside. I spent 1/2 the night alone in my room. A few days later I peed in the house. I got locked in my room until bedtime. Then, the day before Easter I peed in the house because I was too lazy to walk to the back door with Mommy. I got locked in my room for the entire night and didn't even get to come out at bedtime! I was VERY upset. I barked and cried, but Mommy said nobody out stubborns
her. I was only saved from a whole night alone in the dark by Mommy getting a phone call at 2 a.m. from some drunk. She said that as long as she was awake she'd let me out, but I didn't get to sleep on the bed with her. I haven't peed or pooped in the house since. So, as I said, it looks like Mommy may be winning, but don't tell her. I want to keep her on her toes.

May 21, 2002

Well, Mommy won the housebreaking wars. I haven't peed or pooped in the house for a month. Personally, I think Mommy cheated. See, at the end of April I decided I wanted to poop in the house, so, when Mommy and I went for our walk, I considered pooping, but then I held it in so I would be able to poop after Mommy left. Mommy got really mad and she pulled my crate out of storage. I was VERY SHOCKED to see it out. Mommy set it up in the basement and made me get in it. Now, when I was little I liked to poop in my crate and then sleep in the poop, but now that I am big I realized that this would not be much fun. So I had to hold it ALL DAY. When Mommy came home and saw that I hadn't pooped in my crate she was VERY happy and she took me to the dogpark. That is when I realized that I like it better when Mommy is happy, so I haven't peed or pooped in the house since.

The other big thing this month is that Mommy and I have started our CGC prep course. I love going to class. The night of the first class, when we got two turns away from the school, I started yelling at Mommy to hurry up and get there. Mommy was surprised because it had been over a year since we had been in a class there, but I knew where we were going and that the ladies with the good treats would be there. I was so happy to see everyone at the school that I tried to jump onto the counter when Mommy was checking us in. The lady with the best treats said, "Ah, Merlin...I
remember Merlin."

I'm not sure what the purpose of this class is because we are learning all sorts of silly things. Like I am supposed to SIT! when the lady with the treats comes to say hi. (I am not supposed to jump on her and lick her face and try to take the treats out of her pocket) I am supposed to SIT! while Mommy talks to another person with a dog (But the dog and I are not supposed to talk. ) I am supposed to SIT! while the trainer guy brushes me and looks in my ears and holds my feet. (But Mommy brushes me while I stand because I am so tall it is easier that way) I am supposed to SIT!
while the trainer guy holds my leash and Mommy hides for 3 minutes. (Do they really think that I don't know that Mommy hasn't really gone anywhere?) I am supposed to SIT! and WAIT! while Mommy walks across the room and then I am supposed to COME! and SIT! (I am not supposed to COME! and slam into Mommy's legs.) I am supposed to HEEL! while Mommy and I walk among all the other people and their dogs. (But again, us dogs
are not allowed to talk to each other) The best part of this class though is that we get to do something called "jumps" every other week. I LOVE JUMPS! They are such fun, but the trainer guy laughs at me because I jump straight up in the air with all four legs at the same time and somehow make it over the jump. He says dogs are supposed to jump FRONT FEET then BACK FEET not all four feet at the same time. Oh well.

June 25, 2002

This was a month of achievements. First off, Mommy and I went to Wisconsin and I DID NOT pee in the house. I also quit playing with my doggie cousins when my doggie cousins wanted to quit. Then, Mommy gave me the basement again and I have not peed or pooped down there and I also have not slaughtered any stuffed animals. And finally, just to show Mommy how little she is in control, I PASSED MY CGC TEST!!!

Mommy was SO SHOCKED. See, for classes 4, 5, 6 and 7 I decided that I had had enough of this class business and I goofed off EVERY TIME. In class 4 I knocked over some equipment and tried to hump my girlfriend Rita. Then in class 5 I decided that I was tired of sitting on command and went on strike. Mommy would say, "SIT!" and I would stare off into space and act like I never heard her. Class 6 was mostly spent lying on my back and chewing the leash. For class 7 I was SO ROTTEN goody-goody Sassy the rottweiler's mom told Mommy not to worry if I did everything wrong at the test because, "even those of us who have been showing for years come home occasionally with a NQ." (not qualified).

We practiced sit-stays at the dog park in the training area with all the distractions around me. We practiced saying hi to all the neighbors and having me sit during it, and the weekend before the test Mommy and I went to and art fair and walked it for an hour to practice walking in crowds. After we were done Mommy said, "I still don't think you will get your CGC but I am very proud of you because you did the fair SO WELL."

We went into the test and Mommy said, "If you pass three of the tests I will be happy. If you pass half of them I will be astounded. If you pass them all I will buy you a cheeseburger." Well, how could I turn that down? I was supposed to be number 4 to be tested, but the tester called 5 instead because she had seen who 4 was and wanted to do 5 first because she thought HE had a chance of passing. So Mommy and I got to watch goody-goody Sassy FAIL!!! HA!!! Sassy jumped all over the tester for Acceptance of Stranger and for Walking in Crowds. Her mommy didn't even bother taking the rest of the tests and left. When I finally got called MOMMY BLEW IT! We did Acceptance of Stranger first and she held my leash in the wrong hand because she forgot she needed to shake hands and when she switched the leash I stood up. The tester said she got two tries (which was lucky for Mommy) and on the second try it all went well. I needed a second try for Appearence and Grooming because I licked the tester when she was looking at my paws. I didn't stand up, I just licked her. I needed a second try at Out for a Walk because they told me to turn left, but the refreshment table was about 2 feet in front of me at the time so I figured forward was a better direction. I also needed a second try for Acceptance of Another Dog because they matched me up with a dog who wasn't in our class (he had just come for the test) and he was DOG AGRESSIVE. The other dog glared and rumbled at me and I stood up and moved away from him. The tester said, "As much as I hate to say it, do that again." We did it again and this time Mommy stood as far from the other dog as possible and I did fine. All the other tests I passed on my FIRST TRY. Our trainer was so surprised that after the first six tests were done he came over and checked to see if I was REALLY me and not some ringer that Mommy brought in for the test.

When the testing was over, and we had our certificate, I jumped on our trainer's lap. By the way, I got my cheeseburger.

July 23, 2002

Well, I guess that good dog thing actually stuck. I've been a good boy this month. Mommy has given me run of the house for as long as three hours while she's been gone and I haven't gotten into ANY trouble. She also has let me have run of the house while she is asleep and I have been mostly good. I only ate one pair of underwear about a week ago. Mommy is beginning to wonder if I am sick I've been such a good boy. Maybe it is the heat around here. It has been SO VERY HOT that I really don't want to do much. Sometimes I don't even want to eat. After having lived with Boo, Mommy has trouble with the idea that a dog could just choose not to eat even if he is feeling okay. She says if I keep this good dog stuff up I will probably have run of the house all the time by fall and she will get to have a dining room again.

Other than being hot and good, only one exciting thing happened this month. Mommy has been really busy, so no trips or stuff. Therefore, I've gotten to go to the dogpark a lot. The other day when I was there we stayed until closing. Then just as Mommy was trying to leave I saw a chihuahua and I ran up to say hello. The chi got scared and ran. I LOVE playing chase so I chased. The chi got so scared he RAN UNDER THE GATE of the dog park and out into the parking lot. Mommy jumped the fence and tried to get him, but he was very shy. Other people were yelling for his owner to come, but she was REALLY slow to react. By the time she got to the parking lot Kitty (the chi) was heading for the road. Kitty ended up running down a very busy road at sunset with his owner chasing him. I was worried that Mommy was going to leave without me so I was trying to find a way out of the park when Mommy came back in, but rather than pay attention to me, she ended up riding herd on the woman's other chi (who was trying to run under the gate too) and the woman's four greyhounds who were running along the fence trying to find a good place to jump over. The lady finally got Kitty and everyone was very happy to see him, and Mommy said she was very sorry I had chased him under the gate in the first place, but other people said it wasn't Mommy's fault. Mommy still said it was my fault though and I was a bad doggie to scare Kitty so bad.

Oh! I almost forgot! Mommy took me to see the fireworks on the 4th of July. It was lots of fun. We sat on a blanket and some people came and sat by us. Their kids didn't have their CGCs because they were VERY poorly behaved. Some even teased me until Mommy said, "If he pops that Scooby Doo toy, I am not buying you a new one." and "I do not want him to eat what is in that glowstick so stop waving it in his face." Then their parents kind of controlled them. On the other side of us there were some nice people who couldn't believe that Mommy had taken A DOG to the fireworks. They were afraid I would be scared. I wasn't. I LOVE FIREWORKS. I like to watch them, but I don't like the ones that just flash and make a big boom. When those would go off I would glare at Mommy because I know it was her fault the boring fireworks were being displayed. I like the nice colorful ones. I watched about 1/2 the show and then I fell asleep. After the first few fireworks went off the nice people next to me said, "Wow! He REALLY DOES watch the fireworks. I've never seen a dog who watches them before."

August 20, 2002

This month Mommy and I went to Grandma and Grandpa's place in Wisconsin. Boy was it fun! I got to swim and roll in things and chase chipmunks and squirrels and ducks and stuff. One day I was in the house and a chipmunk came right up to the glass doors that are on one side of the house. I got so excited I started barking and pounding on the glass. Mommy opened the back door and tried to get me to come to her to go outside and chase the chipmunk, but my brain kind of turns off when I see the little ratty things and I wouldn't let it out of my sight. It ran along the glass and I chased it. All of a sudden I realized that the chipmunk could keep going beyond the house, but I was going to run into the wall! I tried to stop, but I spun out (Mommy says I am the only dog she has ever seen who literally spins out) and I slammed sideways into the stereo speaker. I was very lucky that it was so close to the wall because it didn't tip over and even the little china loons and glass duck lamp didn't fall off.

Another day Mommy was swimming and I was swimming with her when I heard a car. I like cars up there because interesting people come in cars. I left the water and ran through the woods to the neighbor's house. It was their car. They were leaving so I chased them. They kept honking at me so I didn't hear Mommy yelling and whistling for me as she ran through the woods in her bare feet and swimsuit (if I keep saying that maybe Mommy will believe it eventually). After I had chased the car a down the road a bit I decided to come back to Mommy. Mommy looked silly running up the neighbor's driveway in her swimsuit with her bare feet covered with leaf litter and stuff. Mommy grabbed me and SPANKED me. Bad Mommy. She said she was sorry later, but we were still mad at each other for most of the rest of that day.

The next morning I got Mommy up about 6:30 and told her I had to go out. What I really had to do was chase the deer I had seen from our bedroom window. I chased them until they pooped and then I stopped to roll in the poop. Mommy came chasing after me through the woods again. This time she was barefoot and in her bathrobe. When she caught me I rubbed deer poop off on her robe. Boy was she mad! After that she made me stay on my leash for most of the rest of the vacation, but sometimes I would be so good that she would let me off and then I would chase after cars I heard or ducks I saw or deer or chipmunks or squirrels...

It was a FUN vacation. When we got home I slept for one whole day and then I moped for the second day. The third day Mommy took me to the dogpark and I remembered that being home could be fun too, so I stopped moping.

September 24, 2002

I discovered this month that there are FISH in the lake by our house. Why didn't anyone tell me about this before??!! I have NEVER discovered anything so fun, except maybe squirrels and the dogpark! Now, every chance I get I try to convince Mommy to take me to the lake. There are BIG fish, which I don't see very often, middle sized fish and little fish that Mommy says are called minnows. I like the little fish the best. They swim in big packs and are SO MUCH FUN TO CHASE.

At first I would just run maddly through the water hoping to catch a fish, but now I am more careful. I stand really still in the shallows. I don't move anything (except my tail which seems to have a mind of its own) and I watch for the fish. When I spot them then I LEAP at them. Mommy says I am never going to catch them if I keep leading with my feet, but I'm not sure about that. Even if I don't catch them it is still fun to jump at them because when you jump into the middle of a bunch of minnows they all swim in different directions and then you can run maddly through the water after them. Sometime I try to bite them, but they are always deeper than I expect and all I seem to get is ears full of water. But I figure practice makes perfect and so I plan to practice until I catch myself a fish.

Mommy took me to the lake the other day to chase the fish and said that I could stay there until I got tired of the game. An hour and a half later she took it back and made me go home. She didn't realize that I never get tired of chasing fish, but she got tired of pacing back and forth on the beach. She says that maybe next time she will take my 100 foot training leash and a chair and a book so that I can fish all morning if I want. I hope she does. I want to CATCH some of those minnows!

October 22, 2002

This month Mommy and I went back up to Wisconsin. Everyone was supposed to go up to help clean up from the summer, but her brothers all went up early and did all the work. Since Mommy couldn't get off on the new weekend and already had the other weekend off, we went up and had fun. One of the things we did was went into town and saw this very strange custom where the townspeople cook roastbeefs in front of their stores and then they dress themselves and their beefs up and parade through town. (Check my page in the future for photos. Mommy is such a slow photo taker it will be a while before they are out of the camera) Mommy wondered what I would do with all the meat around me, but I was very good and didn't try to take any of it. If I hadn't been wearing my headcollar it might have been a different story.

The BIG NEWS of the month though is that I have gotten COMPLETE RUN OF THE HOUSE and I have been VERY GOOD. I've been so good in fact that Mommy spent last weekend cleaning up my room and stuff and putting away all the babygates and my cage. I was downstairs with Mommy when she pulled the cage out from by the boiler and boy was I shocked. I smiled at her and ran upstairs because I thought she was going to try to put me in it. I HATE that cage. I don't care what they say about dogs liking cages because they are a spot of their own and all that. My spot is on Mommy's bed thank you very much! Mommy kept calling me and saying, "Look! I'm putting it in the box! I'm putting the box in the storage closet!" but I didn't really believe her. I still haven't gone back down into the basement, just in case. Mommy says the next big job is repairing the door frames that I ate before I became a GOOD DOG.

Finally this month my dogpark visits have had to change from evenings to weekends because it gets dark too soon. I miss going at night and Mommy isn't very happy about some of the bad dog things I have been learning from the weekend dogs. She says they seem to be a lower class of dog than we are used to. They tend to guard their toys and food and water and they fight a lot. I even got into some fights myself. One dog attacked me because his Mommy gave me a treat, and then the other day I took offense when a pit bull puppy jumped on me and I snapped at him and he snapped back and the next thing you know we were kind of scuffling and Mommy and the pit bull's owner had to separate us. Then while Mommy was holding me I actually snapped at two other doggies. Mommy says she knows I was over tired and over excited, but it was no excuse and I had to go home and now Mommy says no more dog park for at least one week. Obedience instead. **SIGH**

November 19, 2002

Well, this month Mommy did that weird thing where she walks around the house and fiddles with all the clocks and then she starts coming home from work an HOUR LATE each night. This year, however, I DID NOT pee or poop or throw up even once! Mommy says I am turning into such a grown up dog.

This month also that Halloween thing came again. Mommy made me wear devil horns to answer the door. I didn't mind because I get treats if I do it right, and I did it right almost every time. Everyone liked me except one little boy who was dressed as a puppy and who was AFRAID OF DOGS! Why was he dressed like a puppy then? Mommy thinks maybe they were trying to work him through his dog phobia or else he wanted to dress as something REALLY scary! I greeted almost everyone perfectly and I didn't try to stick my head into anyone's candy bag and take their candy either. The only kid that I attacked was one who was wearing a stuffed animal on her head, so could you really blame me? (Read my Bad Dog story for the whole tale)

Finally, Mommy let me go back to the dogpark, but only on weekday mornings. I was good for the whole month until THIS MORNING when I decided to fight with a German shepherd for absolutely no reason. Mommy couldn't catch me. (I am fast and strong and slippery so there is no stopping me unless you manage to grab both my tail and a leg at the same time and that is hard to do when you have to do it in the middle of a dog fight!) The German shepherd had to be dragged out of the park with me going after him the whole time before I calmed down. BOY WAS MOMMY MAD!! She actually hollered at me and said all sorts of bad words and swatted me AND did a muzzle squeeze and head shake (she's NEVER done that before! I was shocked let me tell you.) in front of all the other dog owners! She really lost her temper. I don't know why she gets so mad. I am only having fun. I wag my tail the whole time I am fighting and I never actually BITE the other dog I just make all the noise and snap my teeth. The other dog never actually bites me either because I am too fast. Mommy says it may be a game for me, but it isn't for the other dog or the owners and I am not going back to the dogpark until probably NEXT YEAR because I have to REALLY work on my manners. So still more obedience and Mommy says "NO MORE SPOILING because you are the OMEGA DOG not the alpha!!" Something tells me I may have gone too far today.

December 23, 2002

This was a busy month. First off, Mommy kept her word and I didn't get to go to the dog park AT ALL this month. Mean Mommy. I have been getting wilder and wilder just to show her how badly I need to RUN, but it hasn't helped. Mommy was also keeping her word about lots of obedience work until I found a way out of it this month. I ate something toxic and had an allergic reaction to it. The whole left side of my head swelled up and my left eye swelled closed. Mommy took me to the emergency vet who said it looked like I'd been bitten by something and said, "Save your money. Go buy Benadryl and give him that rather than get him a shot of the same stuff." So Mommy did and the swelling went down. The vet had said if I looked okay the next day Mommy shouldn't do anything. I looked fine, so she didn't, but when she got home from work my whole nose was swelled up to twice its size! Mommy said I looked like somebody called ALF. Mommy got me a vet appointment for the next day, but by the time we got there my nose wasn't swollen anymore, but it was all covered in bumps and was itchy. The vet said I had hives and I had to take Benadryl for almost a week! They think I may have eaten a spider or centipede, but I'm not telling what it was. The only lasting effect of the reaction was that the hair fell out around my eye and it hasn't grown back yet. Mommy says she will talk to the vet about it when I go for my checkup in a couple weeks.

While my nose was still itchy, Mommy packed all our stuff up and we went to Grandma and Grandpa's place in Wisconsin for Thanksgiving. I had fun and was very good. I only got in trouble once (read my Bad Dog story ). My doggie cousin Fred came by one day, and I kept giving him what Mommy calls "the devil eyes" because Fred is really big and big dogs make me nervous 'cause of the dog park problems, but we didn't have any arguments and I even tried to get him to play with me a couple times. He's kind of old, so he didn't want to. One other thing I did at Thanksgiving was head-butt my human cousin really hard right under the eye. Everyone (except Mommy who has been head-butted by me before) thought he was going to get a black eye, but he only had a red spot under his eye for a day.

Also, this month Mommy took me to visit our old neighbor. He lives in an assisted care place now so I don't get any treats at the fence anymore. I kept trying to get him to come give me treats and Mommy kept telling me he wasn't there, but since I wouldn't believe her she took me to his new place. He has a GREAT ROOM you can see a dog park from his window!! I kept whining and trying to get Mommy to take me there, but she wouldn't. My neighbor was happy to see me and even though he had told Mommy he didn't want me to come see him, after the visit he said, "I'll have to get some treats." and then he said, "You can bring my friend by whenever you want." so Mommy says we will go back there and MAYBE if I am GOOD we will go to the dog park too. By the way, new neighbors are at the house now. They haven't moved in yet, but they sure are making a lot of noise. Mommy says they are gutting the house and redoing it. We don't know if they are going to move in or if they are going to resell the place when they are done, so Mommy says, "No fence begging!" I haven't listened, but the new people don't seem to understand that they are supposed to give me treats. I hope they move in so I can train them.

Finally this month Mommy took me to see someone named Santa Paws and get my photo taken. We went to the pet store and instead of going right to the toy area we went to a back corner where this guy dressed in red stuffed animal fur was. He has this long white beard and he smelled like lots of other doggies and cats and hamsters and ferrets and all sorts of animals. Mommy had me jump up on the platform he was sitting on. I did it, but when Mommy stepped back I got scared and jumped off. We repeated this a whole bunch of times until the elf who was taking the picture suggested that Mommy hide on the floor behind Santa and hold my leash. When I knew Mommy wasn't leaving I settled down right away and they got a good photo of Santa and me. Mommy made it into our holiday card. Click here to see it. Write to you next year!

January 21, 2003

Well another busy month. This month that Christmas thing happened again. Mommy and I went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas Eve. One of Mommy's brothers was there. I kept licking him all over the face. Grandma and Grandpa had a TREE in the house. I was very good and didn't take any of the ornaments off, and I didn't water the tree, and I didn't lop off any of the branches. I did try to get to the back of the tree where my presents were, but Mommy wouldn't let me. Mommy says maybe next year we can have a tree in our house too! Some other relatives came over for Christmas Eve and I was very good. I didn't get into any trouble, except trying a couple times to eat the hors d'oeuvres. I even showed off my tricks (Click here to see my list of tricks I can do ). Mommy and I slept over that night. I was okay, but I would have prefered a double bed. Mommy takes up too much room in the twin bed.

The next day we opened our presents. I got a REAL bone from the butcher, a squeakie stuffed pacifier and a cow that goes "MOOOO!" when you bite it. I chewed the cow's horns off right away. Grandma thought that was terrible, but Mommy doesn't mind. Then one of Mommy's other brothers and his family came with their dog, Missy. Missy is a Portugese water dog and still a puppy. She wanted to play and she chased me around. I played with her some, but I know that running games are OUTSIDE games so I didn't play as hard as I would have if we were outside. She also jumped up on Grandma's bed and bedroom chairs (which is a no-no and I told her so!) so we ended up having to stay in the kitchen and front hall only. Missy wanted the rolls that were rising on the counter. I wanted the rolls on the counter too, but I saw Mommy had put a mousetrap by them so I told Missy not to touch them. When everyone was in the other room opening presents, Missy jumped up to get the rolls and set the mousetrap off. Mommy heard the SNAP! and came to see who got got. Missy was looking startled and surprised by the mousetrap and I was dancing around the room wagging my tail and LAUGHING at Missy. I told her not to touch the rolls! HA HA HA!!

Missy and I got more presents too after all the people had finished with theirs. I got a giant tennis ball (I've lost it somewhere in our house) and a rawhide bone from Missy. I also got a rubber squeakie dog, some chewy milkbones and a big rubber squeakie bone from my Auntie Naomi (from Mommy's work), and some carob yogurt drops from Santa Paws. I gave Missy a dead-fowl quail. Missy didn't know what it was and dropped it so I stole it and when she tried to get it back I growled at her. So Mommy took it away. Christmas sure is fun.

This month I also went to the vet for shots. It took two people to hold me down so a third person could take blood for my heartworm test. Mommy says I really need to learn to relax at the vet's. The vet says my hair around my eye should grow back with my spring shed and I am a perfect dog, physically.

Mommy let me go back to the dog park this month. YAY!! I have been good, but I have to drag my leash around so Mommy can catch me and we go somewhere high or fenced when we see German shepherds and I get treatstreatstreatstreats for looking at them and not getting bristly. I did snap at a dog who tried to join a chase game I was having with another dog, so Mommy took me home and said we have to work on "dogs coming up behind me" (that is how the shepherd came at me and made me paranoid), but Mommy thinks I am improving. She says she'll take me to the park by my neighbor's new place next time to see if a different location helps.

I got to stay with Grandma and Grandpa a second time this month because Mommy went to a wedding and didn't want to worry about me having to go out and stuff. I hardly worried this time. I only threw up a little after Mommy left and I didn't pee or poop in the house at all. In fact, when Mommy came to get me I was sleeping on the bed we had slept in on Christmas Eve. Mommy was very proud of me.

And, last but not least, I celebrated my second aniversary with Mommy on January 19th. Mommy bought me another bone (from the grocery store) but when she unwrapped it it was spoiled. It was so disgusting that when I sniffed a drop of blood that had fallen on the floor it made ME gag, and I play with road kill! Mommy took it back to the store and told them to check their freezer. So, I got a bully stick instead and that night Mommy bought me a double cheese burger and fries. MMMM.

Happy New Year!

My Monthly Diary for January (Start of Year 10)

2010-01-26T16:38:00.004-06:00

The end of December/beginning of January is always a big time for me. First there is Christmas. Mommy brings a tree in the house that you are NOT supposed to pee on and then she puts presents under the tree that you are NOT supposed to open even though you can smell that they are for you and yummy. This year was no exception. I KNEW there was a new antler for me and a bag of walnuts under the tree and I really wanted them, but I was good and didn't take them, except once when Mommy was on the phone and even then I didn't open the present, I just carried it off to my bed. Finally after waiting forever Christmas came. Grandma, Grandpa and Mommy's youngest brother came to our house for dinner and Mommy was very careful so I didn't get any people food. She said she didn't want me to blow up and end up at the emergency vet again. Mommy and I slept in the next day and then I got to open all my presents EXCEPT THE ANTLER AND THE WALNUTS!! Mommy told me I could open them at Grandma and Grandpa's house. We got in the car and drove to their house and when we got there I jumped out of the car and discovered that I was very stiff. I walked towards the house in a C shape. Mommy said if I were an old man I'd have been bent double and walking sideways. Mommy took me for a short walk down the block and I loosened up again. It seems that the deep snow we'd been walking in the past few days tired me out more than I knew. Mommy and her youngest brother hung around a bit and then Missy and her family came! I wanted to play, but Missy has become a bit of an old grump (even though she is younger than I am). We got to open our presents when the humans were opening theirs. I was very excited to have the new antler and settled down to chew it. Mommy gave Missy one too and she chewed on hers a bit, but then saw how much I was enjoying mine and she decided mine was better. We spent the whole rest of the time with her waiting for me to put down my antler and turn my back so she could rush in and grab it and run away. Then I'd take hers and chew it until Mommy got mine back and we'd start over again. Missy can be goofy at times.

After Christmas Mommy and I went up to the family house in Wisconsin. Grandma and Grandpa went up too and Missy and her family went up and stayed with Mommy's oldest brother and his family at their house. I don't like Walter, Mommy's oldest brother's dog, so we have always had an agreement that I don't go to Walter's house in Wisconsin and he doesn't come to the family house when I am there, but Missy's dad wasn't very bright and on his first night there, after Mommy and I had gone to bed, he came over with the kids and Missy AND WALTER! I heard them downstairs and ran down to say hi and was really pissed off that Walter had come. I ran up to Walter and stood over him all stiff and said, "What are you a wimp? Come on. Just try something." Walter hunkered down as low as he could and whispered, "Please don't kill me. Please don't kill me." and Missy ran off to the far corner of the kitchen and pretended to be invisible (she does that very well). Mommy sensed bad doggedness and came downstairs calling, "Is Walter here?!" and Grandma said, "Yes they are getting along great! Merlin is wagging his tail." Mommy tore down the stairs and saw what was happening and said quietly, "Everyone step away from the dogs. Do not look at them. Do not talk to them." The humans all thought she was nuts, but Mommy could hear what I was saying and yes, my tail was wagging, but it was curled into a very tight spiral and was wagging in quick jerky movements, which is never good. Missy saw Mommy was there and RAN to the back door. Mommy let her out and managed to get me away from Walter long enough for Walter to get outside too. I then ran to the window and whined my, "Come back I just want to play" whine and the humans, except Mommy, believed me and insisted that Walter get to come back in. Another few very tense moments ensued, but Walter eventually got to go home uneaten. Mommy told Missy's daddy that Missy could come back the next day, but Walter needed to stay home.

The next day everyone came over and I ran out to play with Missy and then realized that WALTER HAD COME BACK AGAIN!! I ran downstairs to tell him to stay away from my house, but he came upstairs anyway and tried to get me to play. I looked at him and ran up like I wanted to play and then, without warning, I jumped him and tried to eat him. Missy's daddy tried to get Walter away by pulling on his leash, but the leash broke. Mommy was at us by that time and she pulled me off Walter by the scruff of the neck and base of the tail and forced me into the house and up to my room for a time out. I knew I was in trouble, but frankly, Missy's daddy was in more trouble as far as Mommy was concerned. Walter and Missy decided to go home with Missy's mom and everyone, including me, went sledding. Grandma said I shouldn't have gotten to go sledding because I'd attacked Walter, but Mommy pointed out that sledding and Walter have nothing to do with each other in my mind and leaving me home would do no good. It was a good thing she didn't leave me home because while we were gone Walter and his daddy came back over to the house. Mommy wonders how so many humans can be so dog stupid and then go around telling her she is the stupid one. Anyway after that Walter stayed home, so maybe they did learn, and Mommy and I decided to leave that vacation earlier than planned and have some quiet time at home instead. We had a good time taking walks and sleeping in and just having a "staycation".

Also this month we had some nice weather and Mommy and I took a long hike which was fun. We were out for three hours, but only got 3 1/2 miles because I had to sniff EVERYTHING we passed since it had been a long time since we had been able to get out onto the trails. I also almost caught another squirrel this month. He was on top of the stockade fence and I jumped up after him, but he jumped down the other side. Mommy was shocked to see me hanging for a brief moment by my armpits on the top of the fence (it is 6 feet tall) and she said I was lucky the boxer wasn't out on the other side or we'd have had a problem, since he can jump high enough that she can see his whole face over the fence.

Finally I celebrated my Adoption Day this month and am now starting my 10th year with Mommy! You can read my adoption story in the previous blog.

Happy Adoption Day to Me!!

2010-01-19T16:49:00.009-06:00

Today is my Adoption Day. I've been with Mommy for nine years now. That isn't bad considering how I started in life. For those of you who tuned in late, I'll tell you about how Mommy and I found each other.

You see, back in the summer of 2000 Mommy's old dog Boo finally lost his battle with mouth cancer and somewhere in Wisconsin I was born. About five weeks later Mommy sent in applications to Labrador retriever rescue groups and around the same time somebody threw me over the fence of a rural Wisconsin kill pound in the middle of the night. Mommy said on her applications that she couldn't take a dog until February because she had a family reunion to attend and she had to buy all new furniture and repair her floors and walls. That was because mouth cancer causes a lot of bleeding and Boo had been allowed to have full run of the house while he was sick and he bled on EVERYTHING.

L.E.A.R.N. contacted Mommy and wanted to do a home visit a couple days before the floor guys were coming to refinish all the hardwood floors in the house. Every piece of furniture that could be salvaged was either in the basement or stuffed floor to ceiling in the kitchen. Mommy took the interview lady through the blood splattered living room and down to the basement where they sat on the slightly less blood splatted couch and talked. Mommy thinks that volunteer was very brave.

Mommy thought they would think she was nuts and not give her a dog, but, while they may have thought she was nuts they knew they could find a dog that was just as crazy as her, and that was ME! I've never been quite normal, but that is due to the fact that I grew up in what must have been the worst of the worst pounds. Hoses scared me, brooms scared me, barking dogs scared me. I didn't get any good human contact because I was destined to die after I'd been there for four months, but luckily for me L.E.A.R.N. was contacted right before I was to go to that final vet visit and they pulled me out of the pound.

Mommy was at the family reunion at the time I was rescued. Mommy's vacation lasted longer than my first foster home. I was there for only a few days when my foster mom called the people in charge of fosters and said that I was untrainable and someone needed to come get me THAT DAY or she would take me back to the pound herself. I got picked up a few hours later and was taken to my second foster home. That foster mom was a professional trainer and she checked me out and decided I could be trained, but I was going to need a very special forever home. She turned down one person who thought he might want me because she knew it wasn't the right fit (they wanted a dog who could be trained as a gun dog). The people who arranged the adoptions then went through all their applications and found Mommy's with its great big red SUCKER! stamped on it (this is Mommy's theory of what her application looked like). They called Mommy and said, "We know it is a month early, but we think we have the perfect dog for you! Would you please go look at him?" Mommy looked at the house and decided that she could delay repairing the kitchen an bathroom and said yes.

We met at my second foster home and I was super charming. I brought her all kinds of good things while she was talking to my foster mom, like the kid's toys and shoes and socks and a video tape and a remote control. Mommy fell in love right away and, even though she was a little concerned that I lost all interest in her when we took a "test walk" and she couldn't get me to look at her face no matter how many weird noises she made, she said she wanted me! The foster lady said she thought Mommy was a perfect fit for me too, but we had to wait 48 hours before the deal was set. It was a very long two days for both of us and then it extended into two weeks because my foster mom noticed I had an odd way of walking and wanted my hips x-rayed and Mommy said as long as I was going to be knocked out for that they might as well fix me then so she couldn't take me until I had mostly recovered from that. But finally she came to take me to my forever home.

I let her put my seat belt on without complaint and hopped right in the car without looking back. I knew I was going some place good. When we got on the highway I managed to tangle myself up in my seat belt so badly that I was stuck upside down dangling over the foot well of the car. Mommy had to pull onto the shoulder and untangle me and I helped by licking her face and wiggling the whole time. Then when we got home I went potty in the yard and she let me into the house where I immediately found the toy box and picked up every toy and ran one lap through the house with each one. When I had emptied the toy box I squatted down on the newly refinished living room's hardwood floor and peed about a gallon of pee in two seconds and Mommy saw just how charming I really was.

But despite everything Mommy kept me and so I got to celebrate my Adoption Day today with a new toy, a big bone and promises of chicken nuggets tonight.

Happy Adoption Day to Me!!

Happy New Year

2010-01-01T12:05:00.003-06:00

Happy New Year all! Mommy doesn't celebrate her new year at this time, but we still like to wish you all a happy one. What Mommy does do is calculate how many miles we walked during the previous year. We did 997.15 miles in 2009. This isn't too bad if you consider that I broke a vertebra in June and was on the disabled list until August with no walks longer than 1 mile allowed all that time. For the fun of it Mommy started keeping track in 2007 of how many miles we walked each year and we started an imaginary trip to Alaska and beyond. We are almost there! If there were roads in the Southeastern part of the state we would be there, but we are just past Whitehorse, YT in Canada now. You can see my Google Map of our Imaginary Walk Around America if you want to. Hope 2010 is a good one for you all!

My Monthly Diary for December

2009-12-22T13:42:00.006-06:00

Well a few things happened this month that I posted right away, so you may want to read the previous entries on my blog. For one thing, it was cold and Mommy made me dress funny. Also, Mommy got attacked by a squirrel! I have also decided to post one Flashback year per month until I get all my old Geocities entires stored here (since Geocities closed down and I lost my storage space there). If you weren't with me from the beginning you might want to read the Flashbacks too to learn more about me and my early years. Other than that, lets see...

We got snow finally! I love snow. I love chasing my basketball in the snow especially. I think that is the best fun. You get to chase the basketball and slip and slide and then when you get it it is cold and covered in snow. And then when you bring it to Mommy is is covered in frozen slobber. It is a great game!

Mommy also bought nuts in the shell for Christmas and she put them on the end table by the couch. I love nuts so I kept stealing them and eating them. I ate all the walnuts first and then the hazel nuts, then the almonds. I can't eat the Brazil nuts because their shells are too hard, but whenever Mommy cracked on for herself I made sure I was there to get a piece. She complained that I had eaten almost all the nuts and she had hardly gotten any. I think she should be happy that I saved her from all those calories. Also, if I wasn't supposed to eat them, she should have put them on top of the fridge with the other good stuff I'm not supposed to eat.

Speaking of good stuff I'm not supposed to eat, the Christmas tree torture is back. This year I know there is a big cookie waiting for me under the tree and one for my cousin Missy too. I really really want to eat them, but Mommy says they are no until Christmas morning. Every once in awhile I'll go back to the tree to make sure they are still there, but then Mommy hears and says, "Merlin! Get out of the presents or I'll tell Santa!" and I have to leave them alone again.

Speaking of Santa, Mommy helped out LEARN (the people she got me from) this month by standing at the front of a PetSmart store and convincing people that their dog/cat/ferret wanted its picture taken with Santa. Mommy tried really hard to get someone to have their newly purchased fish's photo taken with Santa, but all the fish people turned her down. She did a good job though because at one point the photo people told her to slow down because the line was too long. LEARN made $300 for a 1/2 day of Santa photos, which is not bad!

Also this month I ran out of my 3V caps which I take to keep my skin unichy and my coat shiny. Drs. Foster and Smith didn't have any in stock so Mommy had to go to the vet to get them. When my vet heard Mommy talking to the receptionist she came out and said to Mommy, "What did he do now?" I think I am getting a bad reputation at the vet's! Mommy explained that I was fine and we just needed the supplements and the vet was happy. Then she warned Mommy to keep an extra close eye on me on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day and NO PEOPLE TREATS! Mean mean vet.

Another thing that happened this month is that Mommy needed to go to Grandma and Grandpa's house after work to celebrate Missy's Mommy's birthday and so the neighbor boy came to our house to let me out and feed me. He likes me a lot so he decided that he would take me home with him after my dinner. I had fun at their house, but I was a bit worried that I had been stolen. I was very happy when he brought me back home late that night and Mommy was there.

Finally the best thing that happened to me this month was (Auntie Naomi, don't get too mad at me) I CAUGHT A SQUIRREL!!!!!

Mommy and I had gone to The Squirrel Tree and I was sniffing for them when a couple of the squirrels got nervous and decided to leave the tree. The first one was a big fat grey squirrel and he ran out and up and I jumped up and just missed him. Then, right on his butt was a big fat black squirrel. I was still up on the tree when he came out of the hole and I made a quick grab and GOT HIM!!! I caught him by his fat butt and fuzzy tail instead of his head and neck so I couldn't shake him dead and he spun around and started scratching and biting at my face and squealing. Mommy started yelling, "OH! OH! OH! Drop it! Drop it!" I did drop it and I quickly stepped on its tail so it couldn't run away. It was still squealing and trying to bite me and I was trying to figure out how to get to its head and neck when Mommy pulled me off the squirrel and it jumped up and ran up the tree. Mean Mommy. I could have shook that squirrel dead eventually!

The Squirrel War Continues

2009-12-16T09:55:00.003-06:00

I went to the Squirrel Tree with Mommy this morning and a squirrel was inside. He decided he wanted to be outside and tried to run out and up the tree like they do, BUT he had eaten waaaay too much and was very fat so when he twisted his body to run diagonally out of the tree his big fat butt got caught in the hole! I thought I finally had my chance and jumped up to try to grab him, but instead of staying stuck he turned himself forward and launched himself out of the tree and straight towards Mommy's face! I don't know if he was thinking he could take shelter on top of her head or if he was planning on biting her in retaliation for her letting me go to the Squirrel Tree each morning, and I won't know because Mommy's boxing training kicked in and she did a great duck and weave maneuver which caused the squirrel to miss her. The squirrel landed with a heavy plop into the snow behind her and ran up the next tree before I could get him. Those squirrels are getting crazier!