I’m an only child… October 17, 2009

Mom here:
I’m sorry but I had to take Colin back to the shelter Thursday afternoon. Last week he knocked me down twice, bit the instructor, bit me, and corrective training only made him worse. Wednesday night, he went after the neighbor’s dog and tossed it across the yard, knocked me down and tried to bite the back of my neck, and then went after Lily. I’m sorry. Enough is enough. He had to stay in his crate just about 24/7 because of the bad behavior while out of it. He flipped me and my chair over a couple of times. The ringing phone sends him into a fighting frenzy. He tries to get at every smaller dog he sees. I can’t trust him. And if he’s to be a service dog, or a therapy dog, I have to be able to trust him 150%. I feel bad for him, but not guilty about taking him back to the shelter. I had him for a month and things were just getting worse instead of better.

But there is good news. I took Lily to class yesterday morning, told the instructors what was going on, and since Colin only had one of the seven sessions, Lily gets to take his place in class. Let me tell you– she was awesome! She had to be shown what “sit” and “down” meant but once she got the idea, she did it! And stay! She actually stayed!! After the “leave it” drill, she wouldn’t take that treat for love nor money!! And on the 40′ recall?? She actually ran right to me (with some coaxing, of course) but she did it! A couple of the other dogs took the scenic route but she went as straight as an arrow! After class is play time where we let the dogs just be dogs and while she didn’t actually play, she did wander around. And when things got too rowdy for her, she went and stood by one of the bigger dogs, even responding to a puppy bow a couple of times! She was awesome!

Lily here:
I don’t know why Mom’s so excited about me coming to her. Of course I’m going to go to her when she calls me– especially when she’s waving a piece of cheese at me like the checkered flag at a NASCAR race! I’d come to her when she calls me when we’re outside too but not yet– there’s still too many things out there for me to discover! BOL

As for Colin… I miss not having another of my kind here but Mom keeps saying she’s going to find the right dog for us this time. She keeps saying a Great Dane. I know what “Great” means– it means “Good!”, but I don’t know what “Dane” means. I hope it’s something good too. (Oh wait– I know what a Great Dane is– it’s a horse in dogs clothing! Doogie and Gretchen are Great Danes and they’re okay. Big but okay. So I guess in this case “Great” means “big”.) But he did scare me the other night, and I have enough things I need to learn to be not afraid of without having to be afraid of my own brother. I’m glad Mom won’t tolerate “sibling abuse”. He’s basically a good dog, just really messed up. I hope he finds the right home soon…

You’ll have to excuse me now… if I act real cute, I think I can wangle a woofer* from Mom before we go to bed!

*woofer: dried meat chip, looks like a very over-done grilled hamburger.

This is better than a shock collar… September 24, 2009

Mom here: I was so fed up with Colin’s barking that I was actually thinking of getting a shock collar. I HATE shock collars. But while pricing shock collars, I found this cool little gizmo:

PetSafe Bark Control Pet Training System

The Ultrasonic Bark Control Pet Training System is a small unit designed to control your dogs barking with ultrasonic sound. The unit is activated when the internal microphone picks up the constant barking from the dog. The high-pitched ultrasonic sound startles the dog which interrupts the barking.

The Ultrasonic Bark Control can be set to work automatically or for manual operation. Operates on one 9-volt battery (not included).

It is fantastic! Especially the manual operation feature. Colin’s a humper (excuse the wording but…) and telling him “NO!” or “OFF!” would just lead to more humping and lots of barking. The theory of several folks is that he was with a family that thought this bawdy activity very amusing and never tried to correct him for it– or correct for anything else either. Then when he was no longer “cute and cuddly” they stuck him outside, and eventually just let him go to fend for himself. (Why anyone would spend that kind of money for a dog and then just turn it loose is beyond me. Oh well– their loss, my gain.) Anyway… I get this little gizmo, stick a battery in it, and as soon as I sat down, Colin tried to hump my leg. I pushed the button and he jumped back, shaking his head, barking like anything. Then — just like that — silence! It looked like he stopped in mid-bark!! A few minutes later, he tried to climb on me again. I just pointed at the gizmo, said “Colin! OFF!” and he backed off so fast he almost fell over himself! When I go into the back room to work on the computer, I put up a baby gate so Lily can see me but not get in– this is also the room where Harry and Bubba live and she is a prey dog… Normally, Colin would stand at the baby gate and bark and then pull the gate down. Not this morning! I brought the gizmo in with me and as soon as his paw touched the gate, I gave the button a short push. He backed off, started barking, and again stopped in mid-bark! I LOVE THIS GIZMO!!!!!

Lily here: I don’t love that gizmo! Every time it goes off, I hear it too. But I know it’s not for me ’cause as soon as Mom tells Colin “No!” or “Off!” or whatever, she always says “Lily’s a good girl” and gives me one of my favorite treats. We call them “chicken nickles”– they’re little round bits of dried chicken. I like the crunching sound they make! But I guess I can live with the strange noise Mom’s gizmo makes as long as it keeps Colin quiet! BOL

OMD! What has Mom gotten us mixed up with? September 20, 2009

Colin

Colin, a 10 month old Anatolian Shepard, is my new big brother, and Mom’s new headache. Not really. He’s just a puppy who was never taught right or wrong about anything. Mom’s friend JBV thinks that Colin’s old family treated him like a lapdog and everything he did (including trying to mount everything and everyone around him) was cute and encouraged. And then he got out of the cute and cuddly stage and they just dumped him. He was found as a stray, no collar, no tags, no micro chip. He hadn’t been on his own for very long ’cause the shelter doc said he was in great shape and his health was perfect.

(What? Oh, okay.) Mom said I should put in this pic she found to show you what a full grown Anatolian Shepard looks like. Aren’t they the coolest? BOL

Anatolian Shepards

Colin’s main problem is he’s extremely hard headed. Mom says he’s ADHD all the way! Gets something in his mind and he fixates on it. His mounting urges are out of control. He’ll quiet down and lie down next to her chair while we watch TV and Mom will pet the top of his head. Instead of lying quietly and getting more pets, he’ll hop up and try to mount her arm! He’ll walk quietly and politely on a leash but if Mom stops to check traffic or whatever, next thing she knows Colin’s trying to mount her leg. I’m embarrassed to be seen in public with him right now! Mom says she needs to break him of his “bawdy behavior” before he breaks her! And I know she’s afraid of falling down ’cause she can’t get back up again by herself. I’m afraid for her with this galoot! If he does knock her down, I hope she has her phone in her pocket so she can call for help ’cause I’m sure not big enough to help her get back up again.

He does have potential tho. He’s already learned “sit” and “come” (which is more than I’ve learned! BOL) and almost knows his name (he was Cooper in the shelter). I guess if anyone can work a couple of miracles with Colin, it’ll be my mom.

Good-bye, Bridget. September 1, 2009

I think Buddy told you about his friends Bridget, Jordan and Gem. They are Cocker Spaniels, and for awhile I (and my “sister” Ava) was living with them before I came to live with Buddy and Mom. Well, two days before Buddy crossed the Rainbow Bridge, her mom and my mom took Bridget to the vet’s because Bridget was in so much pain– worser even than the pain Buddy was in so it was a lot of pain. Bridget’s mom said Bridget deserved to die with grace and dignity, and so she did, in her mom’s arms, just as she was the day she came into this world.

April 7, 1996 - August 27, 2009

Mom said to put in one of her favorite memories of Bridget: the day she stole a head of red cabbage out of the grocery bag!

Red cabbage-- and Brussel Sprouts-- didn't stand a chance around Bridget!!

Good-bye, Bridget; we’re gonna miss you!

Life as an only child… August 30, 2009

It’s kinda quiet around here without Buddy. I miss him a lot. So does Mom but she’s trying to be brave for me. She told me I could take over this blog– wow do I have big paws to fill! I’ll try to do my best.

I made a giant leap of faith today: I went out the door all by myself to go potty. It was scary but I did it. Mom was very proud of me.

Good-bye, Buddy. August 29, 2009

March 17, 2000/August 29, 2009

Vacation’s over… August 23, 2009

And so is our access to a computer for a bit. A “Lily Bit” as Mom would say! BOL We’ve had fun, and Lily learned a few things, but it will be good to go home and sleep in our own beds!

We had some “day campers” visit us yesterday: my good pals Doogie and Gretchen. When Doogie saw the size of the front yard, he was in heaven! Finally a place big enough he could really stretch out those long legs of his! Gretchen has real bad arthritis in her hips so she stayed pretty close to her mom. Lily was kinda scared of “the horses in dogs clothing” at first but she warmed up to them pretty quick.

Doogie's the mantle, Gretchen's the harlequin

We’ll try to check in as soon as we can. Hopefully Mom will be able to get our computer fixed SOON. BOL We miss it!!

We’re on vacation… August 21, 2009

Buddy here. Mom, Lily and I are on “vacation” this week. Once or twice a year, we go out to a place in Chesapeake, right next to a place called The Great Dismal Swamp, to house and dog sit for some friends of my mom’s. Normally I would enjoy being out here– all the cool places to explore and stuff. But now, Lily is the one doing all the exploring and is she ever funny! She spooks at the littlest thing! But she doesn’t run away– she runs to me or Mom and then goes to look at whatever it was that scared her: a leaf or a butterfly! BOL She got really curious the first day (we’ve been here since Saturday and will go home this Sunday) and picked up a salamander!! She spit it out so fast! BOL Then she patted it with her foot and jumped out of her own skin when the salamander scurried into the bushes! Now she just watches them– from a safe distance away!

Mom’s glad we’re here this week: she has a working computer here. Ours has had a major hard drive failure: it can’t find the main command line anymore. We were given an old laptop but the CD drive doesn’t work. Comedy of errors there: the old owner bought the laptop with XP loaded on it. Then she went and ruined everything by installing Vista. Now – apparently – the driver for the CD’s not compatible with Vista. It has WiFi but so far the only place we can get a connection is at JBV’s so I guess Mom will have to go there one day next week so she can see if she can find a driver update/upgrade so we can get the CD working. Once we do that, we can plug in the proper CD’s and cables and stuff and get on the Internet via Mom’s cable thingy. Mom’s also shopping around for a good CHEAP place to take the hard drive and see how much stuff can be recovered off it. She keeps muttering about how “Buddy’s book is not gonna be very good without pictures”. What book? I didn’t know I had a book!

I’m doing as well as can be expected. Mom and the vets and I seem to have worked out the proper times and dosages for my pain management “cocktail”. I can still get around under my own steam– it just takes a few extra minutes to get from Point A to Point B and I’m a little more cautious getting out of the car. Suddenly it’s a long way down! BOL The cancer does seem to have spread tho. The vet said it appears to be in my lymph nodes now. Mom keeps making me lie down so she can put cold compresses on the main tumor. It feels good when the compress is cold but I don’t like it after the cold goes away. Then it just feels like a heavy weight. Mom got sneaky the other day: I was lying on that side so she just kinda lifted me up and slid the compress under me! That felt pretty good but I’m too heavy for Mom to be lifting. I guess I’ll help us both out by letting her put the compress on me whenever she wants.

Lily here. Yeah, those salamanders are weird!! And they taste even weirder!! Yuck! I like it here. Lots of places to explore, things to see, smells to smell. They have this really big yard to play in. And something called a swamp that I’m not allowed near. But that’s okay– the swamp is in the scary part of the back yard so I’m not going anywhere near it! I’ve made two new friends– Dixie and MisC. Dixie is a 14 year old Shepard mix and MisC (pronounced Missy) is a ten year old who-knows-what. Neither really want to play with me but MisC taught me how to catch moths (they don’t taste good either but MisC seems to like them) and Dixie showed me a really cool place to lie down where the heat can’t get ya. Only problem there is Mom has to hose us down before we can come back inside: something about mud and clean floors. I don’t mind the hose– it feels good in this heat. Mom took me to the groomer the day before we came out here so I have my summer G.I. cut, but it’s still hot! Mom has to run the A/C in the car for a few minutes before she can even think about getting in it to go anywhere.

Gotta go: Mom’s cooking brunch and I smell bacon! Better get down there before she gives it all away!

Buddy’s doing okay but… August 1, 2009

Lily here. I think he gets tired more quickly. We go out and he’s the one wanting to come back in first instead of me. Mom talked to the vet today and got permission to increase one of the pain meds he’s on as well as the icky stuff he takes for his arthritis. (And it is icky– smells like dead ferrets. No offense to any live ferrets who might be reading this.) But I don’t mind him taking more meds– it means more pieces of cheese for me too! Woof!

Jordan went home today… August 1, 2009

Lily here. Mom took Jordan home today. Boy am I glad! He drove us bonkers last night crying and carrying on ’cause he didn’t get to go home yesterday like he was told by his mom. But it was raining here and my mom and his mom didn’t want to get his crate pad soaked or take a chance on his suture sights getting wet. “What’s a little rain?” you say. A little rain!?! It was raining so hard I could barely see across the street and it was day time!

Buddy here. Yeah, he went home and we have our nice QUIET house back! If he wasn’t whining and being a total wuss, he was scaring Lily with his lampshade. I don’t think she’s ever seen one of those before. And it is quite noisy when he’s trying to play with his handballs and the lampshade knocks against the side of the crate or scrapes along the bottom. But I know he needed those few days spent in the crate to help his leg mend. I hear that having your ACL repaired is rougher on you two-leggeds than it is on us four-leggeds but I’d still rather not have it done on me!

Hurry up and get well, Jordan– you have to do pet therapy for me at the hospitals!