Wootube!

Dolittle's got nothin' on me

foster puppies

A Real Snow Day

By 5 Comments

It snowed soooo much and soooo hard that it was difficult to take photos because the camera couldn’t find my subjects through the blizzard.

Addy is so over it before it even began.  She wouldn’t come out of the barn.

This is the face of a be-sweatered and be-snooded skinny little dog who hates me for taking her out of sunny Southern California, I’m pretty sure.

I’m not sure the WooTWoo were all that much happier, because they have all the hair and they get all the snowballs.  So they don’t appreciate being made to pose in the snowfall.

And then there’s Silly.

That right there is an “OMGOMGYAY!” face if ever I saw one.

In rather sharp contrast to the “I will kill you in your sleep” face that Spring is currently sporting.

Maybe it’s the sweater.  Which she managed to take off, and which I promptly put back on her again right before I took this photo.

And since I was pissing off dogs, I decided I may as well piss all of them off by making them sit in the doorway of the barn so I could get this photo.  In for a penny, etc.

Addy is conspicuously missing, because she was inside the barn with me and never leaving unless tucked inside my coat.  Silly was off somewhere else being ALL LEGS.

Actually, he was probably across the pasture barking at horses.  He’s a real ass about barking at and fence running with the horses (as well as the neighbour’s super irritating german shepherd on the other side of the pasture).  I’m working on getting him to call off, and that’s coming along, but now he thinks the game is to run at the horses and bark and then get called off and recall for a cookie.  I tried a long line for a while, but he can still outrun me even dragging 20 feet of leash.  He definitely needs some work in the recall department, as he quite an independent streak!

And Mini Mama was off having the zoomies (and losing her coat) because for a little kinda naked dog, she LOVES the snow.  She can get FaeBitch to play with her when it’s snowing outside.  She had a meet and greet with a potential family but they decided she was not the doggo for them.  She has another one coming up, assuming I can ever get out of my driveway again with all this snow.  I wish I could just keep her, I love her very much, in spite of all the goat poop she consumes.

I even managed to get a photo of Piper that I really like a lot.  I may clean it up a little more and have it printed.  This is how I will always remember her best – bulldog legged and wearing a slightly judgmental / slightly confused expression on her face.  She’s still chuggin’ along and of course she loves the snow, so this is her happy place, even if she doesn’t really look like it is.

Anyhoo.  No stories this time, just snowy photos.  But if you want to, you can all think “I hope you get diarrhea” thoughts about WebJoe, because as I type this snuggled up beside my portable heater and shivering under a blanket, he’s in Hawaii posting photos on facebook about how he’s trapped on a sunny beach somewhere.  Snowy Fae thinks he deserves the diarrhea.

Happy Valentine’s Day

By 4 Comments

Okay, so it’s not Valentine’s Day anymore.  Just pretend.  I’m a busy Food Lady and time gets away from me.

For Valentine’s Day this year, we got the gift of snow.  Snow is apparently TWooie’s soul mate, and that’s why he’s so darned happy.

We got quite a lot of snow where I live, so I brought my camera along on our hike, thinking to get some dogs-in-snow photos, but there was hardly any snow where we hiked.  It was oddly warm out, and melting faster than the ground could keep up with (my driveway was basically a swimming pool when got home) so mostly it’s just photos of dogs being mostly wet.

 

Check out The Silly!  He’s growing so fast – he’s almost as tall as Peetie is already!  And starting to look more like a dog and less like a puppy.  Until he does something …well, silly.

Like when he saw his first helicopter (and I don’t mean me!  I’m not a Helicopter Mom, like Auntie Fiona is!)

He’s a pretty great puppy.  He’s goofy and kinda laid back, but he’s got a great work ethic and is a little bit bossy/demanding when he wants something, but he’s learning to curb that a bit.  He also has a weird (kinky??) fondness for shoes, which I love a little less, but he doesn’t eat them, he just stashes them all over the house so that I am forever looking for a shoe’s mate.  The funniest thing is that he *worships* Old Lady Mad Teeth(tm) and falls all over himself bowing to her and licking her when she comes in from one of her (prednisone-induced many) staggering, lost-in-a-fog pees.  She, of course, “hates” him and get all pissed off, but it’s the most animation I see from her these days, so it warms my heart.

Piper is actually doing okay – better than I’d hoped after weeks of no improvement, but not as wonderful as before this latest episode.  But the prednisone has made enough of a difference that I’m pleased.  My vet says it is possible that she has a brain tumour, which is sad, but in a way is better – I mean, I would rather she has something tangible that will eventually lead to making a decision I cannot question, rather than just kind of falling apart for no reason, and her physical health waxing and waning, because that makes it much harder to make a decision, if you know what I mean.

Anyway, right now she seems relatively happy.  The snow pleased her very much, because her whole life, her most favouritest game EVER has been for me to kick snow in her face so she can jump up and bite at it.  Her front legs don’t really leave the ground anymore when we do this, but she still is thrilled.  She is also – for a dog who can barely walk – remarkably able to stay on her feet when she indulges in a game of tug with one of the other dogs.  I am continually shocked at just how determined she is – she NEVER loses a game of tug, even when she plays with the Grim Reaper of tugging (AKA Peetie) who will tug so fiercely that a) she nearly kills the dog on the other end of the toy and b) will actually kill toys in her quest to win the game.  But she never wins against tiny 25lbs of old lady Piper dog!

Peetie herself remains resolutely annoying AF.  We’ve had a couple of incidents lately of her fighting with my other dogs – she started a brawl with Winter recently, and then she decided to fight Spring (who fights terriers?  Honestly).  In both cases, I have no doubt that the terriers instigated it in some backhanded way … Winter was, if I recall, laying on a dog bed growling for no good reason (because Winter = weird).  And Spring was standing behind me in my computer chair when the Peetie-and-Silly roiling ball of play bumped into the chair and Spring snarked at them.  But the worrisome thing is that rather than just giving the offender a wide berth, which is the preferred course of action in this house (I mean, when you have this many dogs, someone is always getting snippy about their personal space) she launched at the dog and started a brawl.  I DON’T find this acceptable (especially when I’m in the chair they are brawling in!).  And a couple of times since I have found her side-eyeing and bristling at Spring, which I also DON’T find acceptable.  As such, I have been chatting up a former adopter of mine who is potentially interested in adopting Peetie.  She doesn’t have any terriers, and just one other elderly dog.  It might be a good fit.  It’s funny because Peetie is actually super social with other dogs 99.9% of the time and happily greets and plays with anyone new, but I just can’t have her scrapping with my terriers.  I guess she’s just maturing, and maybe she isn’t cut out for a multi-dog household.  And I am sure Dexter won’t miss her biting his back legs whenever he is in motion, a habit I cannot break stupid Peetie of.

Pretty, but also pretty damn annoying.

The puppy would miss her, and I would too, but only because she’s good at keeping him entertained when I’m busy ;-)  The other day I gave Silly a smoked chicken foot someone gave me a package of, because he was gallumping around the house being generally irritating and there was still an hour to go before we left for hiking.  Peetie wanted that smoked chicken foot REAL bad, but there’s one thing Silly is pretty firm about and that’s that One Does Not Try To Take His Food.  Even FightyPeetie knows better than that.  So she weighed her options after staring at him for a while, and finally decided to offer him something in trade.  What Peetie finds valuable, and what other dogs find valuable, are not always the same thing … so Peetie tried to trade him the smoked foot for an empty food bowl.  Worse, she tried to trade him his own empty food bowl.  He may be Silly, but he’s not stupid, and he did not fall for it ;-)

Springaling is no worse for wear after her scrap with Peetie, though she was a bit extra clingy for a couple of days, because for all her terrier snark, she is a very sensitive and emo little creature.  But I found her a new jacket at the thrift store, so she’s stylin’ at least.

 

Everyone else is pretty much as you’d expect.  Dexter is getting soooo deaf now …. the other day he was napping on my bed and I walked by the bedroom, popped in to give him a smooch on the head and I startled him so bad he jerked awake and bashed me right in the nose.  **stars**  Also, apparently I can never, ever get a photo of him without his tongue hanging out, so I have just given up even trying.

 

The WooTWoo are getting old :(  I always think of them as kind of ageless, but lately I have noticed that TWooie loses his footing / balance sometimes – like I bumped him with my knee the other day and he just … fell over.  And Wootie is either losing his hearing, or losing his desire to bother listening to what I have to say – it’s really tough to tell which one it is.  It’s very possible that in his advanced age he just doesn’t give a shit about listening to me.  At least he still makes for pretty portraiture:

 

Whereas his brother just gives me stink eye.

Addy “my legs fell asleep!” Pants remains her delightfully naughty self :)  These are her ‘THERE’S A RABBIT!!” ears, which are ridiculous.

 

And this is Alfie, just because I liked this photo (drool not withstanding)

 

I could probably blog some more (and will!) but I also have to get ready to go to work, so instead I will just leave you with this valentine’s gift of a group photo (minus Silly, who has no “stay” yet, and Piper, who was at home).  But since it’s the day after Valentine’s, I’ll give it to you for 50% off ;-)

2018

By 7 Comments

2018 – just like 2017, only with more rain, and less sleep.

Ugh.

If it could just. stop. raining for like a few days, I would be ever so … much drier.  I know I live in The Rainiest Place On Earth and everything, and have for pretty much all my life, but I’M SICK TO DEATH OF IT.    In October we had two whole days with no rain.  In November, three whole days.  In December it snowed, just to break up the monotony of rain, and now in January it has rained 20 out of 28 days so far.  But that’s only because everything was frozen for the first week of January and it was too cold to rain.

DOUBLE UGH.

Near constant rain means nothing is ever *quite* dry, including the ends of the sleeves on my coats (which I have to switch out sometimes twice a day because apparently “waterproof” is just a suggestion, not a fact) and the collars and/or hoods of the sweatshirts I’m wearing, and my ever rotating gang of shoes and boots that live pretty much permanently up against the heater with the sincere hope they will dry out before I have to rotate back to them again.  Plus there’s soaking wet dog and the never ending cycle of dog laundry of wipin’- towels and wet dog blankets and let us not ever not remember the peed-on dog beds, because tiny dogs with tiny bladders that go on strike as soon as the sky starts spitting at them.  You can never get totally warm when the damp permeates everything like this.  Dear Mother Nature, please turn the faucet off!

There are no good photo opportunities in the grey and rain either.  Even when I get a rare afternoon off from the streaming skies and bring the camera out, it’s still grey and dreary and darkish and I am totally demotivated by the photos I do manage to take.  That makes blogging kinda difficult, unless I start posting reruns.

Right now the dogs are all asking to go out for a run and I don’t wanna go! Well, Addy isn’t asking…she’s in my shirt (making typing difficult) and doesn’t wanna go outside as much as I don’t.

But I have to go, because while adult dogs can coexist tolerably in the house without exercise for a day or two, this cannot.

THAT eats my furniture when he’s bored.  And staying inside is boring, even when we play games of tug and clicker.  At this exact moment he is laying with his head on Dexter’s thigh and I can see that he is eyeballing Dexter’s tail which is wiggling in his sleep, and thinking of biting it.  Which means we gotta go out before there is bloodshed.  BRB

Annnnnd, we’re back!

It’s the Year Of The Dog so I suppose it was only fitting that everyone get puppies and leave me seething in a green fit of jealousy.

Ann got a puppy.

This is Fever, she’s a border collie X whippet and is itty bitty!!  And so flippin’ cute.


And The Sadist got a puppy.

She’s an Aussie with a tail.  She’s basically just a carbon copy of Niko.  Also itty bitty … and also flippin’ cute!

And this is Dorothy’s Sonic, who is not a puppy, but he’s super adorable.

And what did I get?

THIS.

He is not itty bitty.  He is 26lbs at 16 weeks old(!!!)  He is extremely Silly, so that’s how he got his name.


A person bought Silly as a smaller puppy and decided he was a “monster” and tried to make his breeder refund her money.  When that didn’t happen, a friend of a friend heard about him and was so horrified by the lack of like the person had for the puppy that she bought him from her and then surrendered him to me.  Other than his gargantuan size, he is definitely not a monster!  But he is kinda crazy, so it’s fitting he ended up with my oddball crew.

(The breeder is aware – and pleased – that I have him and has even invited me to come meet his parents.  Please don’t send me messages about contacting the breeder)


He’s a pretty smart dude – pretty well housebroken, fairly well mannered for the most part (though he does like to put paws on my counter and snarf up everything that comes within reach of his pointy face) and he isn’t even all that whacky in the house.  He has already adjusted to our routine – get up and go outside for about half an hour, have breakfast and then nap until we go hiking in the early afternoon.  He does tend toward a bout of craziness about 9pm when he thunders and gallumps around the house throwing toys in every direction, but that’s pretty normal puppy stuff.

He figured out very quickly that TWooie is mostly all bark and very little bite and TWooie figured out pretty quickly that even as a clumsy-limbed, legs all akimbo wherever he goes, adolescent Silly can out-maneuver TWooie the butterball, so he has given up trying to pull out clumps of Silly hair altogether.

Nobody else seems to mind Silly at all, except poor Mini Mama, who seems to lack the ability to convince him of her intent to kill him when he pounces on her.  I mean, even Addy and Fae clued him into that right away, but somehow Mini Mama can’t quite drive the point home, so we’re working on that.  She is such a nice dog.  I am forever confused about how she still isn’t adopted.

I never thought this sentence would come out of my mouth/off my fingertips, but thank doG for Peetie.  She is endlessly tolerant of Silly and will play with him as often and for as long as he wants to wrassle or chase or tug.  She keeps him entertained when I cannot.


Because I’m fairly busy.  I’m also boarding these little ladies until the middle of February, while their parents are off having fun in the SUNSHINE of Costa Rica.  Usually I quite like their parents, but as I sit here with the ends of my hair dripping rain down into my sweatshirt, not so much.  Fortunately, Kita and Lupa are the nicest and easiest dogs ever, I am always happy to have them to visit.

You’re probably thinking “hey, that looks like sunshine in that photo and you keep complaining about non stop rain!”  Well don’t be fooled, I made the sunshine in post.  That’s how bad I wanted sunshine.

I made it up in this one too.

Silly is even respectful of Piper (but she has Mad Teeth(tm) so he doesn’t have a lot of say in the matter) and doesn’t ever knock her over or otherwise make her life difficult.  Which is a good thing, because her life is difficult enough :(  She is not bouncing back this time like she did last time and is still having a great deal of difficulty walking.  We’re at three weeks now since she lost her back end, for the most part and she’s just not really improving.  It’s frustrating to not know what the problem is too, at least for me.  For her it must just be frustrating because her back end gives out on her after a few moments of standing or walking, and she has a definite problem with circling to the left … sometimes she just circles endlessly to the left.  I make sure she gets at least a small amount of exercise by walking around the acreage with us in the mornings, but more often than not I end up carrying her because she will end up laying down in the mud somewhere and when I try to herd her back to the house, she wanders off to the left and falls down again :(

Her cognitive function also seems impaired, but it’s kind of a chicken or egg thing and I can’t really tell if her cognitive decline is a result of her physical decline or the other way ’round.  She gets stuck in weird places at odd hours of the night, like in a corner of the bedroom where she wouldn’t normally go at 3AM, and wakes me up crying for help.  Sometimes she wakes me up 3 or 4 times a night, which is really messing with MY cognitive function in the daytime hours, because I can’t get a solid night’s sleep.  Sometimes she gets stuck because she slips on the laminate or lino … the other day I came home and found her asleep on a pee pad in the dog room presumably because she couldn’t get to her feet on the slippery surface.  I tried confining her to xpen and that stressed her out so much I couldn’t do it again.

I *think* we are managing her pain well enough – it’s hard to say of course, but she isn’t groaning as much as she was and she isn’t all hunched over either.  She is still continent, though it’s difficult for her to squat to eliminate, but she only pees herself when she gets stuck somewhere and I can’t get there fast enough (like when I’m, you know, asleep).  And show her a hockey ball and her eyes light up and she’s after it like a … well, maybe not like a *shot*, and more like a three legged hamster on a whiskey bender, but still she wants to play.  And oddly, she will join a game of tug with the Flying Squirrel and stay on her feet no matter which way Peetie whips her all around.  It’s the craziest thing.

But I want her to get better, because I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing waiting (hoping) for her to get better or not.  I mean, this can’t be much of a life for her, fiercely independent as she is.  Whenever I have to pick her up (which is fairly often, given the frequency with which she falls down) and she doesn’t fight me as I carry her, my heart breaks a little, because she HATES being carried.  It’s like she knows how vulnerable and helpless she is.  I am afraid to make a decision because what if I make it a day too soon and she would have spontaneously recovered like she did last time?  But how long do I wait?

These are the questions that would keep me up a night, if I weren’t so freakin’ tired from being awoken several times a night.  As awful as it was to lose Tweed so suddenly, I had no other choices to make with him – he had a very terminal cancer.  Even Gemma went from fine to unable to breathe overnight, and she was suffering, so I had no other choice to make.  But this I think is worse … especially with her bloodwork being so great and radiographs being so damn useless.

*sigh*

In other news …

Dexter.  “Hiding” behind one blade of grass.  Some things really don’t ever change.

Mr. Woo, best poser ever (now that Tweed no longer holds the title).  This was the beach on a very foggy day, and I am so pleased with how it turned out!

Fae can give him a run for his money though.

Even the turkeys are excellent posers!  Like father, like son … Terrence and Philip.

It’s so tempting to keep this puppy, guys, even though it would be the stupidest thing ever for me to do, given what’s going on with me right now … but so tempting, because he is SO RIDICULOUS.

However, he is going to be pretty huge.  I’m not sure he’ll fit in my lifestyle (ie, where am I going to put him in the dog hiking van??)

But that FACE!  LOL

 

 

Dashing Through The Snow …

By 7 Comments

This is the kind of snow I like!  Sure it’s cold and stuff, but it snowed one big-enough dump to make the world fluffy and pretty, but the roads remain clear and driveable.  My landlord plowed my driveway so I can get up and down it, and the dogs have fun in it*, but it has not trapped me on my property.  All good things!

(*Addy doesn’t have quite as much fun in it.  Yesterday I took everyone out and she complained mightily that despite a sweater AND a winter coat, it was intolerably cold and she was miserable.  So I put her back in the house with a chewy which made her happy for a while, but then she decided that everyone was having fun without her and she was intolerably lonely, so she yapped and howled her little head off until I went inside, redressed her and brought her back outside.  Lather, rinse and repeat.  I love my little fair-weather diva, even if she does turn her nose up at warm clothing, and then turns into a ridgeback when she goes without it.  I have no idea how she manages this with no hair!)


I bought her an adorable little turtleneck sweater at the feed store, because it was only $10 and because it was long enough to cover her bum and the neck flips up to cover her throat. I thought she would appreciate the warmth.  Instead I just walked past the bedroom and found her naked under my covers (heated blanket is still on!) and her turtleneck in a tiny heap on the floor.  I don’t know why she is so allergic to clothes.

But she is not allergic to COOKIES, which is convenient for me, because I did a fun little session with my doggies where I put one in a sit stay and then threw a cookie at them so I could capture the moment before and during the leap for the cookie.


There were a lot of photobombs until everyone figured out they’d each get a turn.  But some of them turned out awesome!

I like this one of Wootie; I even caught his curly orange locks in motion just as he was preparing to “leap.” His actual leap was more of a faceplant, but the pre-leap was pretty adorable!

I didn’t get any of his brother, because he would sit and watch the cookie land, then haul his fat arse out of the snow and saunter over to consume it as his leisure.  TWooie does not believe in wasting perfectly good energy.

Winter was adorably frantic.  The one uppy ear is his anxiety tell.   WHATIFTHECOOKIEDISAPPEARSOHMYGODOHMYGODWHEREDIDITGO?WHYWOULDYOUTHROWACOOKIEAWAY???

And then the mad scramble to get the cookie before the snowmonsters gobbled it up.

Springaling looks like a fox pouncing on a hare in a nature documentary.
(Yes her nails are recently trimmed.  No, after all these years, I can’t get them any shorter than this!  She has the world’s longest quicks)

Fae won the whole day though.  As if her obsessive tracking of the cookie’s arc through the air wasn’t adorable enough …

… the “Meercat” pose that preceded it was KILLER cute!

She may be a rotten, spoiled, hateful little beast, but man is she ever cute.  I went to my parents’ for Christmas dinner and when I came back home, Fae practically turned herself inside out with glee.  She kept trying to scale my body to get at my face so she could lick it, but when I picked her up she was so excited she would thrash around and hurl herself to the floor.  I was afraid we were going to end up in the Animal ER if she kept that up, so I eventually just sat on the floor so she could reach my face.  Unfortunately, I sat in Piper pee, because old dogs and continence aren’t always super good pals.  Merry Christmas to me!

Speaking of cute … a friend of mine is fostering 7 border collie X whippet puppies and asked if I could get some photos of them.  So brought the entire pile of the little suckers over on the weekend and I got to indulge in some serious puppy lovin’s!

Look at these impish little faces!  Also, look how lovely my landlord’s chicken barn door is for photos!

Also, look how they mob poor Addypants!

Addy’s not stupid though … she indulged in her favourite activity for a while (puppy humping – she channels Puppy Uncle Tweed sometimes) and then her second favourite activity, which is running away from puppies who cannot catch her speedy little self, and then she’d had enough of being mauled by puppies and she led them straight into a pack of Terrifying Turkeys which stopped them in their tracks so she could make her escape.

Our goal was to get individual shots of them and composite them altogether for a group photo.  I wish I had photographed them inside, because it was a bright sunny late afternoon and the sun and shadows change so quickly while wrangling recalcitrant 8 week old puppies that it didn’t turn out awesome, technically.  There is just no consistent shade on the property for this kind of shot at that time of day.  Not my best work, but still really flippin’ cute.

ALSO super cute … Mini Momz!  Why on earth has she not been adopted yet?  She is such a wonderful little dog.  When I woke up this morning she was spooning me, with her head sharing my pillow and her body under the covers with me.  She is SO MUCH LOVEBUG.  She can also convince ANYONE to play – even TWooie!  Even FAE, who has finally caved to her charms and has a good wrassle with her every afternoon.  I just don’t understand how everybody could not want her.  If I could, I would just keep her all for myself.


This guy is pretty cute too, although I am a little tired of virtually every photo I take of him being this Crazy Face.  He used to be such a charming poser when he was a pup … now in his middle age he is like that crazy uncle that makes rabbit ears with his fingers in every family photo.

Although he mostly behaved himself for our group Christmas photo.

And here’s Peetie.  I still have nothing good to say about Peetie.  The passing months don’t make her any less annoying, and there were no Christmas miracles that turned her into a pleasant-to-live-with dog.  At least she is consistent.

Now Christmas is over.  Living alone sometimes sucks because I didn’t get anything for Christmas as my dogs are lazy freeloaders without any spending money.  Got a little tired of seeing all the fabulous cameras and lenses and gear that people in my photo groups got from their families for Christmas, so now I’m staying away from facebook for a bit until I get over my snit about it.  Because inside me there is a 9 year old girl who really, really likes unwrapping presents.  What did you all get for Christmas this year?  I hope it was awesome!

Terrence got another pardon, so he thinks Christmas is fabulous :)

“I Used To Read This Blog

By 8 Comments

…by someone named “The Food Lady” but she stopped blogging like a month ago for some reason.”

*waves*  Hello!  Remember me?  I know some of you remember me, because at Nationals last weekend I had no fewer than three different incidents of perfect strangers walking up to me and saying “Hey, aren’t you The Food Lady?  I read your blog!”  This made me feel guilty, because there has been no blog to read since early July.  Worst (extremely) minor dog-related celebrity EVER.

I have had a real busy month!!  Between clients, shooting trials, competing and the extreme heat and weird orange haze that hangs over us all here due to the history-making apocalyptic wildfires that are consuming my province, not to mention my Very Angry elbow, opportunities to take photos of my motley crew are few and far between.

So let’s get down to business and I’ll tell you what’s been happenin’ ’round these parts.

My Springalingaling went to the AAC Nationals and did WAY better than I could ever have imagined!  As you all know, Spring and the venue Thunderbird are not good friends.  For the past several years, Spring has “eliminated” in the ring due to some unknown stressor that causes her to fear Thunderbird in all its white sand glory.  So when we went to Regionals this year, our goals were simple and minimal:
– eat lots of cheese
– have lots of fun 

We were successful in both of these endeavors, and even though Spring did not hit a single contact or get a single clean run all weekend, she was pretty happy to be there, did not befoul any of the rings, and managed to qualify for Nationals.  On the basis of this success, our goals for Nationals, though still simple, were:
– eat lots of cheese                            
– have lots of fun                              
– try to hit at least some contacts

And once again, my happy, narrow little doggie pulled through!  She ate all the cheese.  She was having a good time out there.  She hit EVERY SINGLE CONTACT and she managed to pull out three clean runs out of six.  She had one bobble at the weave poles in Standard 1 and I sent her off course into the wrong tunnel mouth in Jumpers 2 (totally my bad) and in Gamblers 2, which she absolutely could have run clean, in the closing I was too tired from the heat and smoke and early mornings/long days and accidentally sent her over an off course jump.  Again, totally my bad.

BUT let’s recap – my nervous little doggie found her Brave and ran at Nationals, despite her multi-year phobia of Thunderbird and despite the fact that since the Sadist stopped teaching we have had no opportunity to train since essentially November of last year.  And despite the air quality index being somewhere between stuck-in-a-coal-mine and trying-to-breathe-on-the-surface-of-the-sun.  I suck, my dog is awesome.  Cheese is god.  And Spring even managed to pull out a podium placement in her Standard 2.  Even Tweed, winner of Regionals, never managed a podium placement at a Nationals!  And to top off what was already an amazing weekend for me, she won an award for the Top Rescue Dog in the Regular division.

I’m literally the proudest of her I have ever been. NOT because she won things (although I *do* enjoy winning things) but because she had such a good time and was so willing to work for me despite all our challenges.  So I took this shitty photo of her with her ribbon.

Such a good girlie!

This is NOT a good girlie.  Her tally for August is: one baby duck eaten, one baby chicken eaten, one homicide with her partner-in-crime Winter perpetrated against an innocent adult duck.  Of course she is happy about it though. She’s an asshole.

(Asshole #2)

All my precious babybabies went back to the rescue headquarters to be neutered and head off to their new homes.  I miss them so much!

Although I will apparently always have the “eau de puppy pee” odor to remember them by.  I took everything out of the dog room this week, scrubbed the whole thing down with the steam mop (parbroiling my arm in the process.  F*ck did that ever hurt!) and liberal vinegar, but still the stink lingers.  Any suggestions for a good, safe odor remover?

We had a houseguest for a little while who got off to a rocky start by jumping out of the car and immediately killing a chicken and putting holes in my beloved turkey Terrence.  We spent the next few days making use of a long line and reminders that killing my poultry is wrong (Addy and Winter have, obviously, still not grasped this concept) and by the end of her stay, she was pretty reliable about following the No Murders On My Property rule.  Peetie, in her innocence, thought the houseguest was wonderfully fun.

Alfie is still with me, until October.  I love him so much.  I DO NOT WANT TO GIVE HIM BACK.  Would it be wrong to flee the country with him tucked into my backpack?

July was full of photo shoots of other people’s doggies, which makes me so happy, because I love doing doggie photo shoots so very much.  Also I like paying my rent :)

This is Stanley and Brunswick, who are besties, as you can see by the way THEY ARE HOLDING PAWS (and no, I did not pose them this way, they did it themselves!)

This is Malcolm and Lila who henceforth shall be referred to only as The Goobers.

This is Texas The Tripod, whom you’ve seen before in my composite, but I love this photo so much I needed to share it.

This is Mia and Kasper, who are so photogenic that I couldn’t pick just one photo to share, so you have to look at two different ones.

(yes they are on railway tracks.  no you shouldn’t lecture me on the perils of shooting on railways tracks)

(yes they are standing in a boat that does not belong to me.  no you shouldn’t lecture me on using someone else’s boat)

This is Robbie, who is crazy-for-tennis-balls!

I have 4 or 5 more shoots lined up for this month, but would love to have more, so feel free to contact me if you want to do a session!

Everything else is 100% normal around here.  Piper is back to her old self, absolutely and completely.  No more wobbles, no more head tilt, hiking three times a week.  She is a remarkable fighter! Not even phased by bears (slash-totally-oblivious-to-the-bear)!

And now for the ultimate in OH MY GOD photos …. but first!  Some kind of blogging law says I am required to advise you all that in exchange for my testimony I received this product free as compensation.  But let me tell you that I would rave about it anyway because JUST LOOK AT IT.  LOOK AT IT!!!

Is this not the most awesome thing you have ever seen??  EVER???

Susannah of Crochet Critter Craft made this for me in the likeness of His Orangeness, Mr. Woo.  It’s a drink holder, though it has never held a drink around here because I keep putting it next to Mr. Woo, laughing until I cry, and photographing it.  It is one of the most awesome things I have ever received in my life!  IT LOOKS EXACTLY LIKE HIM!!  You need one of these in your life, and then you need to take photos of it with its breathing likeness, and then you need to send me photos of that.  So go to her shop on Etsy and buy one immediately!

I mean COME ON!!!

And you know, I am always happy to help promote the products of your creativity (except porn.  Peetie has gone into heat again and I see enough humping every day that I really don’t need to see any more) so if you have something you want featured in my blog (and I promise to blog more often than once a month!) feel free to contact me!  I love to help people promote their awesomeness, so don’t ever be shy about asking!

And now me, Captain Orange and 11 of our closest friends are heading out for an afternoon hike :)

 

 

 

Rotten Eggs

By 12 Comments

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??