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Addy

Rotten Eggs

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Farmer Food Lady would like to teach all y’all city folk a little lesson about the perils of non-urban living.  I mean, besides the fact that right now I really want potato chips, and the nearest store is, like, far… and all my Facebook friends are ignoring my pleas for someone to bring me chips.

Anyhoo.  When one free ranges ducks, one runs the risk of ducks laying their eggs anywhere they damn well please, because ducks are assholes.  And not only are they assholes, they are lazy and/or stupid assholes who either forget where they laid their eggs, or grow tired of sitting on them and abandon them for something better, like a piece of corn.

When one has acres of overgrowth and free ranges ducks, and one ALSO has something called A Terrier, one will periodically be called upon to remove stolen-slash-found eggs from said Terrier’s mouth.  Because one does not know when that egg was laid, and what state of decomposition it might be in.

And so begins my cautionary tale.

You know that eggs rot.  You know that rotten eggs “smell like sulphur” and that gas companies use an additive to make dangerous, odourless gas “smell” like rotten eggs. But I am here to tell you that YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT A ROTTEN EGG SMELLS LIKE, ACTUALLY.  Specifically, you have no idea what a fertilized egg that has been roasting in the sun for days or even weeks smells like.  It smells like you murdered it, rolled it in decaying fish, buried it in manure, basted it with goat urine, ate it and then vomited it back up.  Oh and also you’re a rotting animated corpse that has been roaming the country feasting on human flesh for a millennia.

Eggs that go bad like this smell like nothing on earth that you have ever smelled before or will ever smell again.  The mere hint of the smell will trigger your gag reflex.  A whole egg-full of it will cause you to projectile vomit for like 9 straight days because, as an added bonus, the smell adheres to anything it comes into contact with with the tenacity of super glue.  And sometimes, when they are feeling playful, they will randomly explode.  They’re super cheeky that way.

So today when Winter popped out of the underbrush with a blue egg in his mouth I went into Happy Mommy mode and cooed at him to bring me his Precious for which I would offer cheese or gold or my first born child in exchange.  He brought the egg to my feet and dropped it … and it cracked.  And as I bent down to touch it, the delightful aroma reached my nose at the same time my fingers touched it.

So I screamed.

I scooped it up with the Chuck-It as I fought the urge to vomit and I used the Chuck-It to lob it through the air into the goat pasture where it would be safe from dogs.  As it arced gracefully against the sky, backlit by the afternoon sun, it exploded mid air like a Canada Day firework.  That was three hours ago, and if you go outside right now you can actually air scent its path through the cosmos.  I dropped the Chuck-It in the duck pool and ran for the house with my hand held as far away from me as possible and collapsed on the kitchen sink, gagging, as I scrubbed my hand with dish soap, an SOS pad, bleach – whatever was handy.  And when I rose to dry my bloody papery skin bag of a hand I looked out the window to see Spring and Mini Mama taking turns rolling in the egg stink on the gravel that the crack had left behind.

I hate this dog.

And I hate this dog.

And I especially hate this dog.

All these dogs also hate me, because they all got a bath.  Winter didn’t actually smell bad, I just did it out of spite.

For good measure I’m gonna hate this dog too, because I think he was laughing at me.

I don’t hate this dog though, because she’s my good girl.  Those of you on Facebook know that a week ago she had a vestibular attack and scared me half to death because although I am familiar with vestibular, I am not familiar with it in my own dogs as none of mine has ever had it before.  Not even Gemma, and she was born around the same time as Jesus.  So we’ve had a trying week of falling down and eyes darting back and forth and getting stuck between walls and furniture and no appetite.  But she’s improving day by day – she can get up and down the porch stairs on her own now, though sometimes she misses the door and gets stuck on the porch, and she “plays ball” with the other dogs every day. I’m not taking her hiking anymore, and I do have to trick her into eating by putting food on the floor and telling her to “quick!  Get it!”, and she has a wicked head tilt … but she soldiers on.  Thank doG.

So I’ve had my bad run of threes, right?  Cyrus blocking, Dexter trying to break a puppy, and now Piper?  Gosh it would be such a shame if something happened to Peetie.  Boy would I ever be devastated.  It’d be awful if she drowned.

Or jumped face-first into a fence full of blackberries.

Or some other horrible fate I don’t have a photo illustration of.

Actually the dog who is probably going to drown is Miss Chase The Water Droplets.  Can’t keep Addy out of the pool for anything!

Except when she’s standing on guard with Alfie.

Alfie is boarding with me off and on for the next several months.  He’s 120lbs of the nicest dog you’ve ever met in your life.  He’s super easy going, lets the puppies skitter and climb all over him when he’s in the house, which is like, almost never because he spends 99% of his time out in the yard sleeping amongst the poultry and getting up to do a tour of the property perimeter to let everyone know he’s on duty.  Even TWooie only objected to him for about 20 minutes and then decided he was totally cool.  I luff him!  I kinda wish he never had to go back to his real home.

And speaking of going home … the puppies are now EIGHT WEEKS OLD.  I can’t even believe this and have checked the calendar like 7 times to be sure I didn’t suffer a head injury and lose like a month of my life.  Soon they will be leaving for their new foster homes (in singles, rather than as a group, because while I may be talented at several (okay a couple) things, housebreaking 4 puppies simultaneously is not one of my talents.  I mean let’s face it, I had to give up area rugs because I can’t even get Addy to stop peeing on anything soft on the floor.

This little tan boogityboo was my favourite puppy from day one, but as he has grown up, his lung capacity has exceeded his small stature by an alarming amount and he NEVER F*CKING SHUTS UP.  He’s really loud and bossy, hates being left alone and is convinced that near constant shrieking will entice me to let him out of the xpen.  It’s fairly safe to say that he is no longer my favourite, and has slid way down the list to last place on the charts.

Ginormo Girl remains a third or so bigger than all her siblings, and though she started out as one of the shyest puppies, she has blossomed into this super hilarious little dog who gives me the awesome photo ops ever!  She’s absolutely hilarious and launches herself through the air at me every time she sees me.

Her black and tan brother is easily the most middle of the road puppy in the history of puppies.  He’s so average.  Like super sweet and such, just as the rest of them are, but he stands out in no way at all.  He’s just really darn nice!

But this little darlin’ is my hands down favourite now.  She is beyond sweet and cuddly, and gives me full on whole body wiggles when I call her.  She’s snuggly and hilarious and throws herself on her back, wiggling away, with a little neon sign flashing “LOVE ME PLEASE” over her.  She’s the one that will follow me from room to room, and was the first one to learn to go down the porch stairs on her own.  I love her!

The black and tan ones are very long, longer than they are tall, and pretty tube shaped, so I wonder if they have dachshund or beagle or something in them.  The brindle and white female has really long floppy ears.  The tan guy is smaller and taller than the rest, but his ears look like they might one day stand up.  I can’t even begin to guess who the baby daddy(ies) was!

They’re so small it’s easy to forget that they are the age that many puppies go to their news homes at!  So I am going to miss them a ton, but they’re ready to move on and make the transition to adolescents in their new homes.  Also I will not miss the pooping.  So. Much. Pooping.

But so much cute!

Unfortunately, because of timing and the generous folks who donated to brown puppy’s vet bill, we didn’t get a ton of suggestions for the naming fundraiser, but the ones we did get were pretty cool, so it’s time to vote on them!

  • The fairies from A Midsummer Night Dream –  Peaseblossom (big girl), Cobweb (tiny brown puppy), Moth, and Mustardseed (twins)
  • Names from Murdoch Mysteries (Canadian, albeit eastern Canada): William (or Wills), Julia, Thomas, Jonny, Emily (or variations on those names)

I should have started the contest earlier and posted it in more places, but time just gets away from me these days.  Nevertheless, post your favourites in the comments … or if you have other suggestions, why not post them too and we can do a vote at the end of the week?

Here’s a random photo of Fae guarding an egg.  After this afternoon’s escapades, she can just HAVE THE F*CKING THING.

 

And here’s a composite of four photos of puppies being weighed for deworming, which I posted on Facebook a while back.

I’ve been teaching myself to composite because I want to up what I have to offer in the photo department, and also because it’s fun to make something out of something else.  This is my latest one, which I am SUPER proud of, that I did for a client.  She’s finally seen it, so I ca finally share it!

This is the original, straight out of the camera shot, taken in the evening on the mushroom manure pile in the back field:

And this is what I turned it into through the magic of photoshop!

What do you think??

The Great Turkey War of 2017

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Fae has declared war against the poultry, for some reason, and the yard has become a battlefield.

The chickens fear her tiny high-pitched wrath.

But the turkeys … the turkeys fight back.

Look how angry the turkey is!!

But look how angry Fae Fae is!!

The turkeys aren’t too bright though, and they can’t seem to tell Fae from Addy, because they chase Addy around as well, and Addy is super offended and shocked every time.  Although right now I also want to chase Addy around, because she and Winter tag teamed one of my ducks and killed it yesterday (insert angry face here).

There are some adjustments in progress ’round the farm between the farmy animals.  Like, everyone hates the goats (except me).

This is Harvey

And this is Nibbles

Spring also doesn’t hate the goats; she really wants to be friends with them, but Nibbles keeps headbutting her every time she tries to lick him on the nose.  She keeps trying though!

Winter doesn’t much care about the goats one way or another; he just wants their apples and he only gets snarly when they try to eat the apples that he thinks belong to him.

Piper fears the goats; apparently Harvey and Nibbles are no smarter than turkeys, for they too mix up the dogs … and the other day Piper was shuffling through the yard doing her daily routine of semi-senile yard-circling when Nibbles headbutted her for no reason at all and scared the bejesus out of her.  It took all the rest of the day to convince her to go outside again, and now she goes out and does her business and then hides under the front porch stairs until I come rescue her, even when they are locked up in their own pasture.  Nibbles got a spanking for that one!  Nobody is allowed to be mean to Piper!

TWooie was at first confused by goats, and his teeny little pea brain has finally come to the conclusion that they are dogs, or at least, just as bad as dogs, so he now hates them and he will bite them.  And then he gets headbutted and that makes him even angrier.  It’s a bit of a vicious cycle.

Obviously the goats spend most of their time in the pasture, not only because I heavily supervise their yard time around the dogs (I don’t want goaty vet bills, and I don’t want a dog getting gored by goat horns) but because their job is to eat down the weeds, blackberries and knotweed in the field, and not the pots of strawberries on my porch.  So they only get to come out in the yard every other evening or so for a romp.  They quite enjoy a game of tag with me, and they also enjoy standing on my agility equipment.  I like them, even though they smell kinda bad.

Wootie does not like the goats – much like Piper, he is afraid of them (Nibbles also headbutted Wootie for no reason).  In fact, Wootie thinks he is in hell right now, because of Demon Goats, and Demon Puppies.  He can’t find anywhere safe to go.  The puppies are now SUPER mobile and busy, having just turned 6 weeks old, and they run all over the house at will, which drives Wootie crazy as he has a metaphysical restraining order of about 9 feet against all puppies.

This is his “I hate everything about my life” face.  But it’s also like my newest new favouritest photo.

Dexter likes the puppies, surprisingly, and is very gentle with them.  Although he accidentally ran one over this evening and he felt very very bad immediately.  Usually he is very careful about the placement of his feet around the puppies.

That one is the little tan and black female (#1). And this is her twin brother (#2):

This the first born female (#3) – she is like a third bigger than her siblings:

And this is my favourite puppy, the littlest one with the longest legs and the tiniest ears.  He’s a real pistol (#4)!

On Facebook a while back I suggested a naming contest for the puppies to raise money for the rescue, where people could pay like $5.00 per puppy to suggest a name and then all the suggested names would go up on the blog for everyone to vote one and the names with the most votes would win and that’s what they would be called (but NOT Puppy McPupface!)  Do you guys wanna play?  I think it sounds like fun, and also a fun way to raise donations for the rescue.  I guess Paypal would be the best way to do it … so if you want to play, you can send your name suggestions via paypal (mrsnappyone@yahoo.com) and a $5.00 donation and we can collect names through, say, July 15th and then hold a vote!

Here are more adorable puppy photos to inspire you ;-)

And here’s a photo of Addy chasing the splashes she’s making in the pool, because it’s pretty adorable!

 

And This Is Why I Hate You

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Dexter hates Peetie because she doesn’t give him a moment’s peace.

Addy hates Winter …

… because Winter would rather play with Spring, and Addy can’t keep up.

(btw, this is my new favouritest photo EVER)

Dexter hates Winter and Winter hates Dexter because both of them are ornery and weird.

Peetie hates my client dog Diezel, because on land

and at sea (aka the waterin’ hole), Diezel won’t leave her alone.

(What’s that Peetie?  You find it annoying to be pestered constantly and shadowed around?  BOO FREAKIN’ HOO)

My boarding dog Cao hates Peetie

because Peetie climbs out of the water and shakes all over everydog nearby.

Of course, so does Diezel.  And he spends a LOT of time getting in and out of the water!

Mini Mama hates me

because I insist on bringing her puppies outside every afternoon for a romp.

ZOMG right?  So cute?!?!  They turned 4 weeks old on Saturday.  I started feeding them mush meals, which they find very exciting, and which I find adorable.

They’re so FAT.  I love them!

BTW, in the photo up above, Mini Mama is in the crawl space under my house and staring at me through some weird random little window that exists in the crawl space.  I don’t know why she does this – she seems to really like it under there, with what I assume are a multitude of spiders and other creepy crawlies.  She asks to go out often so she can sit in the crawl space.  The window is like the icing on the cake, so she can sit in there but still watch everything.  She’s an odd little dog.

I don’t usually bring my Big Girl Camera on hikes/walks because I feel like it’s more important to keep an eye on dogs that belong to other people than it is to be framing and setting up shots.  Also, my camera hurts me/my neck/my arm, because it’s HEAVY.  Lugging it around for an hour and a half gives me a wicked head/neck ache and lately my right arm has been going numb.  Some people in one of the photography groups I’m in swear by this nifty gadget and I’m thinking I might need one!

I never bring the camera when I do a forest hike, because I think I’d die trying to climb hills with an extra 9 lbs of camera hanging from around my neck, but today was easy terrain and an easy group of dogs (ie, mostly my dogs!).

Also the scenery is very pretty on this walk, which makes for nice dramatic backdrops for portraits.

(This photos makes me like Peetie!  Even though she is not wearing a collar in it because she rolled in cow poop AGAIN)

I also brought my camera to Regionals, but I didn’t take very many photos because there’s a professional photographer for the event, and I don’t think it’s cool to scoop her business.  However, I also don’t have any spare money, so I was unfortunately also not going to pay her to take a photo of Springles with her ribbon for qualifying for Nationals (did you like that slick segue?)

Yeah, we managed to qualify by the skin of our teeth.  Well, actually we had quite a bit of wiggle room, but it was definitely not a podium-worthy performance, or even an impressive-placement-performance.  As I went in with no expectations except to keep it fun for her and keep her stress-level to a minimum to prevent poopage (because she hates Thunderbird, if you recall, and every year she shits or pisses in the ring there, and ONLY there) it was kinda fun to just run for the hell of it.  But it also meant that I had to not take it very seriously, and I have not found that happy compromise between taking it seriously and stressing out my poor overly sensitive terrier, and having a lark and therefore handling like an idiot.  It was interesting to note just *how easy* it is to stress Spring out though … in our second gamble, which she could have gotten (she is a gambling fool), she bounced every so slightly off my foot when I sent her out to the final obstacle, and I’m not even kidding, that slight bounce of her paw off my sneaker was enough to turn her to the right and cause her to take a different obstacle instead.  Because the closing gamble is timed, and one tends to get a little panicky, and that may have been the first time all weekend I showed her any kind of stress and WOW, what an effect that had.

I love my Springaling very much, and she has come a long way from the dog that used to stress pee and poop in the house if I left her alone for as much as 45 seconds, but she’s still super duper sensitive, and I am super duper a spaz, so we are not destined to be a super duper competitive team.

As Dexter is pretty much stone deaf, and Fae is The Most Emo Dog Ever, I guess I’m going to have to start training Peetie if I want a new agility dog.

Oh, I also took a photo of Fiona and Rogue on the podium in first place blah blah blah, I should just recycle the same text every year since they win EVERY YEAR pretty much.

Here’s a photo of Addy that I find adorable, because she is obviously smiling in it!

And here’s a photo of Miss Piper because she’s started having quite a bit of trouble walking lately, and I’m not sure how many more hikes she has left in her :(

“But I’m an Italian Greyhound!”

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“And I’m deathly allergic to water!”

… unless it’s in the wading pool.  And you had your face in it and then someone cycled by so you had to yodel at them and make water droplets fly everywhere.

Or The Food Lady dumped the water out of the duck pool to refill it with clean water, and the water made mud, and you felt it necessary to put on Mud Boots.

Or The Food Lady put goldfish in the duck pond for the ducks and chickens, and you hopped in there and caught all the goldfish yourself, because you’re just that much of a jerk.

Believe nothing Addy says!  It’s all lies, damnable lies!

(I’m also not boring, never you mind what she says to the contrary!)

Don’t believe Fae either.  I am NOT mean, just because I made her pose on the swing.  And made her look like she has no neck (now you now why I don’t photograph people!).

“Mean.”

It’s SO HOT this weekend, finally!  It’s so hot that we go out to play in like 20 minute increments, and then come back inside where it’s nice and cool.  Otherwise, some dogs are prone to stealing the fetch toy and hiding in the grass with it instead of bringing it back to be thrown again.

Even games of tug-o-war were on the lackluster side today.

(And is it considered anti-social if you play tug with a blackberry plant rather than another dog?  Wootie is asking for a friend.)

I haven’t taken too many photos this week, because my arms and shoulders hurt.  Last weekend I photographed the ASC of BC trial for two days, and then spent basically all my free time before and after my jobs editing them.  It’s a lot of work!  For some reason I got the idea in my head to work out what I make hourly, on average, from event photo sales when I factor in shooting time and editing time, and let’s just say I don’t recommend that particular activity, as it’s very depressing.  Don’t get me wrong; I do a healthy amount of photo sales from events like this, and I enjoy doing it, but it just doesn’t really offer the kind of fiscal reward that people seem to assume it does.  I recently joined a photo group on facebook and there are these CRAZY talented photographers on there (not dog photographers) and when discussions of pricing come up, I find myself kinda wishing I had gotten into wedding photography or baby photography instead.  Also, they are CRAZY talented, did I mention that?  Harumph.  It makes me feel old and sore and broke.

BUT, despite my aching neck and arms, and copious consumption of liver-killing Advil, I had to break out my friend the camera on Friday because HAM.

HAM!!!!!!

Got Ham?  Auntie Fiona’s Got Ham.  Got ham.  Gotham.  Meet Fiona’s new puppy, Gotham!

Holy f*ckballs, is he ever cute!!  Ever see something so adorable that you kinda wanna pick it up and squeeze it until it explodes?  That’s what Gotham does to me, so Fiona says I’m not allowed to touch him until I get myself under control.  (Also, apparently talking to Fiona’s puppy and accidentally calling Fiona “Auntie” instead of “Mommy” means you’re about to steal him and she no longer trusts you.  Some people’s paranoia.)

Gotham is a purpose bred sport mix, designed to be fast, drivey, athletic and win all the Regionals that Fiona’s other dog Rogue has, up until now, won.

That’s because Fiona is mean and selfish, and it’s not fair that she wins all the Regionals.  I mean, we go to Regionals and we almost never win.  Spring is going this year.

“Oh hai, I’m Spring, and Ima poop in your Steeplechase.  Hee hee”

Considering we don’t have class to go to anymore, since the Sadist stopped teaching, I’m not exactly shooting for the moon with her this year as the only agility we do these days is chasing-squirrels agility, and it apparently does not require my input.  At all.

Incidentally, Spring is a dead ringer for Gotham’s mom, which is weird to see in photos.  And Gotham is really frickin’ adorable.  Have I mentioned that?

I am glad we found her a puppy.  She deserves a nice well adjusted dog, now that the Devil has called Tempus home to reign as his side.

BUT I AM JEALOUS AS F*CK.  She has Gotham and I have STUPID PEETIE.

“I heard that.”

Oh noes!  You heard that!  What are going to do, IRRITATE ME TO DEATH??

It’s not fair.  I want a puppy.

You know, I mean, besides the four puppies I currently have.  Because these puppies, while very very cute, and very very fat, are already obstinate little brats.  I TOLD them not to be born on the ASCBC trial weekend, and they did it anyway!  And then I tried to photograph them for you all today, because I keep promising to do that, and they wouldn’t all look at the camera at the same time.  Yeah yeah, their eyes aren’t open yet or anything, but that’s no excuse!  They wouldn’t even all face the camera at the same time!  They’re really, really disagreeable little shits.

Of course, they’re really f*cking cute little shits.

This was the best photo I managed to get and it took like 8 million tries and a full hour of turning puppies around only to have them crawl around in a circle and face the wall again by the time I got to my camera.  And to make matters more frustrating, I got the idea in my head to shoot with my 50mm, because my 70-200mm is so long that by the time I get far enough away from them to get the shot, they’d all wandered off (which is all kinds of amazing for gibbled peanut shaped rodents THAT CAN’T EVEN WALK).

I HATE my 50mm.  I know some photographers love theirs and they do amazing things with it, but I just cannot make friends with it.  And it’s like childbirth – once it’s over, you forget how bad it was.  So about once a year I bust out the 50mm with optimism and rainbows, and end the session with rage and tears.

Also, I was shooting on the floor, because I was afraid to put them on a little stage in case they fell off.  My knees and elbows are still angry at me.

I think I need an assistant the next time I try photographing them, to corral them while I shoot.  I tried to get individual photos of them, but they were too damn squirmy and only this little guy obliged me by slumbering on while I lifted him in the air.  Therefore, he is my now officially my favourite.

Mini Mama is a very good mama, if a tad overprotective.  Yesterday Corey and Ghillie came to visit and Corey held a baby, and Mini politely took it back from her and said “No, not you.  Only The Food Lady.”  And today when I brought the babies in studio, she said I was allowed to photograph them and mess with them all I want, but she was going to Sit Right Here In the Cat Litterbox and keep a close eye on my while I did.  Which I did not photograph, because the cat boxes need cleaning and I don’t want anyone judging me.  My self esteem is already fragile enough thanks to the 50mm, TYVM.

Mini Mama is very devoted to her puplets.  She comes outside about once a day to burn around the acreage at top speed for about 9 minutes, then she wants to go back inside to sit with them again.

Also, all of my dogs are terrified of her because if they poke their noses in the dog room she shoots out of the xpen like a shark and bites them.  And this morning she came into my bedroom and woke me up to let me know she had peed and pooped on the bathroom floor because I was a lazy slugabed who had the nerve to sleep in past 8AM.

I thought it might be kind of fun to having a naming contest for the puppies, and raise some money for the rescue in doing so (I am fostering Mini Mama and her boob parasites for another rescue organization).  Would you guys be into that?  I thought maybe people could pick a name and donate like $5.00 via paypal to put the name in the contest.  Then after a period of time, we could put all the entries to a vote and the 4 most popular names would win.  Would you guys be interested in doing that?  You can’t play if you name one Boaty McBoatface though.

There are two males and two females.  My favourite non-squirmy sable is a male, as is one of the black and tan ones.  The other black and tan one, and the one marked like mama are both females.

Part of me is really looking forward to them becoming something other than giant, colourful maggots and start interacting and being mobile and stuff.  And part of me is afraid of how much work 4 puppies are going to be.

Here’s a photo of Terrence and two of his wives.  People in the neighbourhood know Terrence BY NAME now and they greet him as they pass my yard, BY NAME.  Seriously, my turkey is more popular than me.  That’s actually why I offered to foster the litter of puppies; so I can one-up my turkey ;-)

I have some of his sons and daughters for sale, incidentally.  If you’re in the market for a turkey or two.

Look Ma, No Hands!

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(or at least the doggie versions of hands, which can also be called “feet.”)

I guess it’s been so long since we’ve been to the beach that they were literally walking (running) on air?

Because Miles didn’t touch the ground.

And Addy didn’t touch the ground.

And Hollie Smallz didn’t touch the ground.

And Spring REALLY didn’t touch the ground.

Winter may have touched the ground a little bit, but I think he mostly touched water.  Also, I think this is the nicest photo of Winter I have ever managed to take, because Winter is just not very photogenic.

Miles touched Piper, which could have gone badly for him, but fortunately in her old age Piper’s reaction times are slow ;-)

TWooie, who is just not a fan of the beach (unless he’s catching Things From The Sea), made sure to touch the ground thoroughly.  This is about the deepest water he can handle, poor weirdo.

Unlike his brother, who likes the beach a lot.  Although Wootie’s leg is very sore, so he hasn’t been enjoying much of anything lately.  I can’t remember which cruciate he tore so I don’t know if it’s finally gone or if the other one went.  I still haven’t quite finished unpacking so the vet records are around here somewhere, but not sure where.  Poor old man.  Why are all my dogs getting old?  I wish that wouldn’t keep happening.  Fortunately, his ears remain absolutely fabulous.

It really was a glorious day to spend at the beach – not too hot.  Although Heather complained about it not being hot enough for no-shoes.  I forgot the Chuck-It (I remembered to check if I had a BALL, but not the stupid ball throwing implement, so the ball was useless … which anyone trying to throw a ball with their hand and then putting that sandy hand on their expensive camera equipment will know) so the dogs just had to run around willy nilly for 1.5 hours.  Which they did gleefully.

This is Miles, one of my client dogs.  His mum is super pregnant, so sometimes she FB messages me and says “Come take them away before I murder them!” and I rush to oblige ;-)  Miles has CEA which is a genetic disorder that causes blindness in collie type breeds, because his breeder didn’t do any genetic testing and believes either that CEA is “rare” in border collies (it is when you test for it, and don’t breed carrier to carrier, or anything to affected!)  and/or that his owner “caused” the blindness and/or is “lying” about him having considerably limited vision in order to discredit her.  And is still breeding from the same lines.  This is shameful.  Miles compensates pretty well for his vision loss, and I am always surprised how well he can navigate, even at top speed.  Although he doesn’t always see my legs, and I’m not entirely sure that’s unintentional.

This is Ammo, Miles’ brother.  Ammo is a very nice dog who can see perfectly well (because he comes from a different breeder who tests for things like genetic disorders that commonly affect the breed) but unfortunately for Ammo, his handsomeness does not translate on camera.  In virtually every photo I have taken of him, he appears extremely dorkish.  Sorry Ammo.

This is not unlike another handsome black and white border collie, whose completely embrace of The Derp ruins an otherwise perfectly lovely shot of athletic dogs racing each other into the waves.

Here’s Peetie, in a rare instance where she is not annoying the crap out of me.

Some of you on Facebook have already met Minnie, my very pregnant foster dog!  Minnie is my solution to puppyitis (her radiographs suggest she will give me FOUR puppies to fawn over) and also to feeling like I’m not doing very much in the way of rescue since I no longer work in a shelter and my rescue is no longer busy, ever.  So I offered to foster this little lady for another rescue, because I have the time, and I have the space, and I really like puppies!  She’s been with me almost a week and now thinks her name is “Mini Mama.”  She’s a sweet little thing who is a bit shy, but when she gets comfortable she starts showing some personality.  Today I got her to play biteyface with my hands for the first time, and got her excited about the Bum Pinching game … which was a mistake because then she got all excited and started bouncing around and bit me in the back and in the face before I could stand up (I was sitting on the grass chucking the ball for the big dogs)!  Little imp.  I’m not sure when her puppies are due, but I swear her belly gets bigger by the hour!

She doesn’t share well though.  She doesn’t share food, she would rather not share my lap and she really, really didn’t want to share this empty crab shell that she found and rolled on to forever mark it as Hers.

I’m going to need lots of socializing volunteers when the puppies arrive, so I hope lots of you are up for visiting Casa de Food Lady in coming weeks!  I will work on getting more photos of her too.  Until recently, she has simply glued herself to my heels wherever I walk, but she’s starting to relax and explore the farm now when we are out.

Mini Mama came at a good time, because it feels like EVERYONE except me is getting a puppy!  I keep getting these FB messages from friends who are like “I’m getting a puppy, but don’t tell anyone, it’s a secret still” and it’s a good thing I can’t punch anyone through the computer screen because I am SO JEALOUS.  *I’m* not getting a puppy, I only got Peetie, she sucks donkey balls.

Like, my friend Christine told me a while back that she was getting a puppy, and then sure enough, she shows up at my house on the weekend with this SUPER F*CKING ADORABLE PUPPY.

Gah!!  His name is Pip, and he is a purpose bred border collie X whippet  (I think they’re the new borderjack).  His big brother is Skye, whom you may remember from many years ago when he had The Whole World In His Mouth.  Yes Skye turned out enormous, and yes Pip is still quite teeny (he’s just 12 weeks old) and pair of them are just SO FREAKIN’ AWESOME.

I have coveted other people’s border collie/whippets for a long time now, and Pip only made me want one even more!  Until I introduced him to Addy, and the two of them WERE EXACTLY THE SAME.  The started speaking “sighthound” to one another right away, and got the simultaneous ‘craze’hounds.

And then I remembered that although Addy is one of my most favouritest dogs ever, she is also REALLY REALLY NAUGHTY and she only gets away with it because she’s a whopping 11 lbs.  If she were 40 lbs, there’s a good chance I’d drop kick her into the next solar system.

Still though … so much cute in a whippety looking package.  It’s very hard to resist.

If you like, you can see more photos of Pip and his Combo Session on my photography website, under “client galleries” (and yes, I redesigned the site again.  It’s a compulsion, I can’t help it!)

Here’s a photo of Fae, because I totally omitted her snotty little self from the blog today.

And here’s a photo of Piper, because she’s awesome, and who knows how many beach trips she has left in her anyway?

She found a lady at the beach who had NOT stupidly forgotten her Chuck It, and she decided she liked her better than me and was never coming home.  It took quite a lot of convincing to get her to leave the stranger and head back with the rest of us!  That’s gratitude for you – 14 years of life I give her, and I forget the Chuck It ONE time, and I’m dead to her.  Harumph.

This weekend I am at my annual gig shooting the ASC of BC trial in Tsawwassen.  If you’re of a mind, come out and visit!  If you want me to like you the nanosecond I meet you, come bearing a Frappucino.  Or this Tweedlet.  Either one is cool ;-)

 

WARNING: Guard Dog On Duty

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There she is; the fiercest of FaeFaes to ever nap in the driveway. Beware all ye who enter through Food Lady’s gate!

Especially if you’re a HAWK.  Or a PIGEON.  Or a SPARROW.  If you have wings of any kind, Addy bids you UNwelcome.  This is her ferocious battle-the-birds pose.

I kinda wish she wasn’t so bad ass.  She’s roughly the same size as my ducks, and three of those got eaten by hawks and eagles!

But what can you do.  She’s a junkyard dog, after all.

Today was the first really warm day of the year.  Like t-shirt warm.  I’ve taken a bit of a break from interior house stuff to work on exterior stuff.  Last weekend I spent a day putting up fencing along the orchard to separate the orchard from the yard, and by extension, separate the dogs from the outer perimeter fence and thus from joggers, cyclists, horseback riders and John Q Public, all of whom the dogs have taken to barking at and rushing at.  The following morning Winter forgot I spent all those blistered-hands and backbreaking hours stretching and u-nail hammering and ran full tilt into the fence when he tried to chase a cyclist going up the path.  HA HA HA.  WINNER!

(OTOH, today my landlord’s lovely dog Mia chased a cyclist along that very same path, so I’m relieved to know that my dogs aren’t the only morons in the neighbourhood).

The next day Michelle came to visit and I put her to work, as I usually do (she’s a good sport) and we finished fencing off my North pasture to separate *it* from my yard, so the goats can move in.  And so that the dogs cannot get into the pasture and eat my goats.  Because while I have nothing against the practice of eating goats, Harvey and Nibbles are not on the menu!

We also put landscape cloth up all along the front fence, so the dogs don’t see everything going by and bark at it, and it’s worked very well!  Only Addy is sneaky and pigheaded enough to get flat and peer under the gate for a glimpse of shoes or hooves or wheels, but when she sees them and barks, the other dogs have stopped joining her in her noise-making because they haven’t figured out her peeping tom trick and think she’s just being an idiot (and she is!).  It’s really super cut down on the decibel levels when the dogs are outside.

Naughty though she be, she remains one of my favouritest dogs.

The landscape cloth barrier has not stopped the entire neighbourhood from admiring Terrence though.  The dog room window looks out onto the walnut orchard and almost every evening while I’m preparing dog meals, I see at least one person strolling or cycling by stop to stare at Terrence.  A couple of days ago a neighbour I had not yet met came up to my gate when I was outside with the dogs, and explained that his niece and nephew who were here visiting from Alberta have wanted to meet Terrence for DAYS and were too shy to ask, so he brought them over.  They came on in, admired Terrence, held baby turkeys and just generally figured my yard was a petting zoo, which I find both hilarious and kind of accurate.  (They came back today for round two, and were lucky enough to get to go visit goats with the landlord).  And I guess Terrence’s destiny is to be famous.  Which is pretty impressive when you figure that his original destiny was to become Thanksgiving Dinner.  Instead, he has thus far given me 10 little Terrences to pass on the family line, with more potential little Terrences in the incubator right now!

I ALSO spent quite a bit of time last weekend building a stall in the chicken barn for the goats to sleep in at night, but my landlord said it might be a pain in the ass to convince them to go in the barn at night, and figured he would put a goat house in the pasture for me.  My experience with farm landlords for the last 8 years can be summed up with the sentence: “I have a really good idea and I’m going to get on it never!” So you can imagine my surprise when 20 minutes after suggesting he would do this, he rolled up on his tractor with an old livestock trailer hitched on the back and said “Here’s your goat house!”

And of course, me being me, I made him stop the tractor so I could compose a photo of the dogs in the trailer in the right light before he put it in the goat pasture.

Piper is conspicuously absent from this photo, because in her old age she has developed a phobia of vehicles.  She seems to enjoy hiking with us every day, but does not enjoy getting in the van, nor her time in it.  So when she saw me asking dogs to hop in the trailer, she scuttled away and vanished.  And because she’s going on fifteen, she’s allowed to get away with shit like that; it’s a privilege of old age.

“Can’t sleep; cars’ll eat me!”

My landlord also brought me 4 raised garden beds and put them in my yard so I can grow things!  Things like Dexters, which are already coming up nicely.

Things like food, and NOT like Japanese knotweed which has appeared everywhere, as Gracie so kindly demonstrates:

Gracie and her brother and sister came to stay with me for a week while their mom was away.  I took advantage of them living here to test drive my studio on not-my-dogs.

Gracie is the master of the Aussie head tilt!  I miss that head tilt – Tweed got the gene for it with his Aussie half.  None of my other dogs do it.

She’s also very photogenic!

Her, umm, “portly” siblings are slightly less photogenic, poor things.  They are old, and Gracie’s mom adopted them a couple of months ago, so they came to her really, umm, FAT.  They are losing weight slowly, but they are definitely not trim creatures, so it was a challenge to capture them without showcasing all their extra, err, fur ;-)

This is Cyan

And his sister Millie.

They lucked out with their new home for sure!  There were, I think, 6 of them in total, left in “boarding” at a local rescue and then never collected (and the rescue got stiffed on the bill, of course), by a breeder of border collies.  Le f*cking sigh.

This weekend I get to photograph my friend Christine’s new puppy, a border collie/whippet mix.  I am bouncing up and down excited about that, Peetie-style. (I love this photo.  It almost makes me like Peetie.  Almost.)

She may not be graceful.  Or obedient.  Or smart.  But she is funny.

I have another surprise coming this weekend too, but I’m not going to tell you about it yet.  I will photograph it, and spring it on you unsuspecting-like!

Don’t be suspicious.  DON’T BE LIKE THE WOOTWOO!

Next weekend I am at the ASC of BC annual trial as their official photographer, which I am excited about.  The trial is always fun to photograph, and they always feed me food.  And I’m a fan of food, especially free food.

Because it’s a relatively small trial with mostly the same competitors every year, I figure most of the Elite level people already have a kajillion photos of their dogs playing agility taken by me, so I’m going to concentrate on the Novice and Open rings mostly.  Last year I had entered Spring in Novice and photographed the trial at the same time, which means I didn’t get many Novice level photos as I was running in those classes.  So this year I’ll spend most of my time photographing the up-and-comers, and leave some free time for mini-sessions at the event.  If you’re interested, check out my newly designed website for information and pricing.  Hope to see some of you there!

I am going to leave you with this photo of Dexter, which looks like basically all other photos of Dexter, as he only has one facial expression, apparently.

And also with the word HAM.  Which is ANOTHER surprise I can’t tell you about yet, but should be able to spring on you in a few weeks :)