SHELTER UPDATE- a true lady

Shelter stories

Working at the shelter as a volunteer has afforded me the opportunity to meet some truly fantastic dogs. Some of them come with baggage that means they stay at the shelter for longer then they deserve. It's a sad truth that less then ideal circumstances become a temporary home for these critters, but we do all we can to make them content while they're with us.

One of our current long term residents is a GORGEOUS blue pit bull lady named Garbo.

Garbo is young- about a year old- and a total goofball. She loves to play and be snuggled. She's very smart, and is truly a prefect example of all the positives of her breed. She's built for speed, but would rather sit on your foot. We've been working on her training and she has a solid Sit, and her Stay is getting rather good as well.

The only Crime this lovely lady has committed was being born a breed that gets a bad rap. Yes, there are bad and vicious pit bulls- some because they were abused violently once they arrived on the planet, some are just born that way. The fact is the same can be said of ANY breed of dog. Or Human, for that matter. The only thing different about this breed is the tendency humans have to abuse them into becoming violent, and their ability to do damage based on their size and physicality.

They are also loyal, gentle, and very smart. They will happily grow fat and old and be doted upon. They will make sure your house and family are protected while allowing your kids to yank, pull and play all over them without a flinch. The key to all of it is picking the right dog for the right family, regardless of size, shape or breed.

On the day I spent a long chunk of alone time with Garbo, we went into the play yard to get some exercise. She was so eager to go, she practically pulled me there like a sled dog (they don't get out every day, so every chance they have becomes a moment of GREAT ENTHUSIASM, which can be...... humorous). We spent some time just running in circles and sniffing every spot any dog had touched earlier that day.

Then it was Toy time.

The best time EVER.

Garbo very carefully selected her first toy out of the toy basket we keep in the yard. She played with it for a few minutes, I threw it around for her a bit, and a grand old time was had.

Then that got old.

So, she went and got another toy- more playing, more throwing, more running around.

And another.

And another.

By the time she had 4 toys out, I started trying to pick up the discarded ones, putting them on the bench, on their way back to the bucket.

This was totally uncool.

Garbo was very offended by my efforts to take away her carefully selected options. She wasn't truly content until she had about 7 toys actively being enjoyed. We played for almost a half hour, with toys being interchanged in the game as if they were all part of one bigger game.

I was able to reach into the mouth of this big scary 'dangerous' dog and yank toys out with no trouble at all. The only negative result was my being covered in a LOT of dog slobber. Not my favorite part of the job, but you get used to it.

Her ability to identify individual toys, and know that I had moved them, even while she was off doing something else really impressed me. She showed an intellect beyond what most young children have. Even while she was playing, when I asked her to sit for a toy, her butt hit the ground promptly. She had figured out very quickly that when I asked her to sit, she got to chase a toy, and was totally in for it.

Obviously, I have fallen a little bit in love with this dog. I find her to be absolutely gorgeous on every level. Her eyes are filled with intellect and a sad sweetness- she wants to bond with a family so very much. When she has her faced rubbed, she relaxes and I immediately conjure up an image of her sleeping by someone's feet, snoring and happy. She has committed no crime, and she deserves to be broken out of this shelter SOON. She will be an excellent hiking buddy, and friend. She represents a lot of other dogs I've encountered as well. Really lovely creatures who need space to run and people to understand their quirks and challenges.

This face deserves to be looked upon with love every day. She is a dear creature and I have such a strong desire to see good things for her. I want good things for all our... I'm gonna call them tenants.... but some in particular find a way into your heart and become special projects. Garbo has become that for me, as well as many other people who work at the shelter. We all adore her.

The true crime here is that not enough people outside of our staff have realized how great she is....

(see what I did there, I turned the "crime" thing on its head... Yep, I did it. And I meant it.)

Graffiti

OK, so I promised there were more stories to be told. I did not lie. There are ALWAYS stories to be told.....

A couple weeks ago we had a VERY active house. You've already read about the trespassing/ bloody muzzle incident, right? if not, scroll on down, read up on that one. Then imagine on the time line of events, 2-3 days prior to THAT, This happened:

On a Friday morning, I put the kiddos in their crate for the day before leaving for work. They have to still be crated because when they are left out, they get into trouble. Trouble of the ER vet office sort. So, crated they are, every day, together in a large crate, and they don't mind it one bit, I swear. When they get put away in their "house" they get a treat, or something fun to chew on. This particular Friday I knew they'd have a slightly longer day in front of them, so I gave them some rawhide style chews to occupy themselves with. We'd given them before, but the last couple had been sitting in a box in the cupboard for many weeks, so I gave those over and got myself out to work.

What I had forgotten about was WHY those had just been sitting there for weeks. Our delicate flower Piper tends to go through them way too fast, making her teeth and gums bloody and her stomach upset, which results in her either being horribly gassy or downright sick.

On this particular day, she must have been extra speedy because that girl got SICK. She literally shitted her way around that crate in what seemed like an explosive escape attempt. There was shit on the wall behind the crate (all the way to the floor boards) under their mat in the crate, all over the mat in the crate, all over Piper herself, and Odie got hit as well.

Poor, poor Odie- just sitting there, trying to nap when KABOOM! His sister's butt explodes and he gets hit with shrapnel.

For ONCE, I was not the one to discover this madness. These things usually happen when my hubby isn't home for some reason, so I was SHOCKED to hear of this occurring from him. Then I secretly did a happy dance that I wasn't the one stuck dealing with it right away- I had warning.

I got home to a VERY stinky house, and some truly messy dogs. The Hubby was partway through cleaning up the disaster area, having focused on things like the walls, floors and launderables first, shit covered dogs second.

There were Shitty footprints all over the rug in that room, as well as 2 rooms connected- he had missed the fact that it has worked its way through the hairs on Piper's paws, and she was walking around.

So. Freaking. Gross

I sent him to the showers with the dogs ( he was already a mess, so why not?) and I took to cleaning the floors and carpet. Fortunately, it was relatively confined and not huge amounts, so the cleaning process was straight- forward, if time consuming. Eventually everyone and everything was back to normal.... and the smell eventually faded too.

We were very proud of our youthful exciting Friday night......

The next day, we did our weekend things, in and out of the house/ crate, running errands, fulfilling obligations, etc. By late afternoon things had settled down a bit, and The Hubby and I were trying to figure out what we'd do with our night. As we sat on the office couch to discuss this, Odie did his favorite thing and jumped up with us to claim us as his.

"What's that smell?" Asks The Hubby

"I can't smell it... oh god, thats shit", is my reply.

We lock eyes and immediately look down at our innocent little Odie.

I lift him up and turn him to one side.

HUGE shit smear all down his side.

He has found SOMETHING in the yard and decided to go for a new look with it. Just rolled in it like it was finger paint and then come back inside like nothing happened.

We both start laughing, gagging, screaming, jumping up, laughing some more and gathering up everything he had touched to be thrown BACK in the laundry.

The upside was this time it wasn't on his feet, so it was only things that had touched his side..... awesome......

The Hubby took the hit again, and got BACK in the shower with the dog, once again scrubbing shit out of dog fur with his bare hands (don't worry there was appropriate sanitizing done after)

in an effort to put everything back to rights.

I took laundry duty this time, as well as sniffing things to make sure there wasn't lingering particles we couldn't see in the evening light.

Yes, I sniffed things purposely to see if they smelled like shit.

What has my life come to? Sigh.

Again, post bath and laundry- everything was fine. We had a good laugh, and discussed WHY does he keep doing this? Why must one of our kids be a Shit roller? and most importantly, WHY do we have these horribly gross creatures in our home again?

We took that night to sit at home and watch movies again. After struggling your way through shit clean up for the second time in 2 days, the idea of putting on decent clothes to go out... losses appeal to say the least. The dogs curled up and chilled out with us, redeeming themselves by being cute and sweet and CLEAN.

Charges were pressed for both incidents of shit smeared graffiti, both of the accused admitted guilt and accepted their sentence. Time served, they are now both out on probation.

Ugh, gross.

Trespassing

Ok, so we had a active couple of weeks not long ago. Now that the excitement has subsided, I can finally try and catch up with it all.... but where to begin? The shit smears? the bloody muzzle? the excited visitor?

See? I told you it was active.

Ok, I think the most concerning on that list is the bloody muzzle, so I'll start there, so as not to create a panic.

I think it's been made pretty clear on here that one of my pups is a bit of a social misfit. Thats right, our girl Piper! It's not her fault she doesn't know how to deal with the rest of her species, but it is something we have to work with her on constantly. Every walk is a training session, every encounter with an unfamiliar dog is a challenge.... you guys know the drill at this point.

Well, on a lovely Monday night a couple of weeks ago, my ambitious Hubby geared up the dogs to take them on a little run- really make everyone good and tired. Now, this initofitself is a bit of a moment of insanity. To run with a tiny dog and a mid-sized one who work at very different speeds is a questionable proposition. Then factor in that the mid-sized one reacts like a crazy person to other dogs in the neighborhood and increased speed of a run.... Yes, I question the sanity of this decision.

They made it about 6 blocks from the house, then turned down a side road, and came to a yard the Hubby knew had the occasional canine resident- he looked ahead and didn't see said dog in the yard so proceeded forward as if he was good to go past it.

It seems he just didn't see the silent unmoving dog standing at the fence. Piper did though. She bolted across the Hubby's path, cutting him off, and jamming her face between the planks of the fence of this dog's yard. He reacted to the invasion by quietly biting the end of her muzzle- which she pulled back instantly.

The end result was not a hard bite, but some deep scrapes under her nose and on her muzzle in the front. Right in the whisker area. There was a decent amount of blood pretty quickly. The Hubby checked Piper out, saw it wasn't horribly serious, but definitely needed some tending and took everyone home as quickly as possible. He called the vet, which was closed already, and found out that she could probably wait until morning to be seen. Then he called me..... I stayed calm, but was of course concerned. He wanted me to come home right away and check her to see if we needed the ER vet.

I got home about 25 minutes later, and loved on my girl while checking her injuries. She was clearly hurt, but since it was essentially surface wounds, I agreed we could wait until morning. I DID clean it out with hydrogen peroxide though.

If you have not had the opportunity to clean out a facial wound on a dog with hydrogen peroxide.... You have not wrestled with a dog.

She was NOT thrilled with this situation one bit.

I literally sat on her stomach, grabbed her face as gently, but firmly as I could, and had the hubby hand me wet Q-tips one at a time like a nurse in surgery. It took what felt like an hour but was probably only about one minute. I was sweating, she was shocked, we were both DONE at that point.

Good times.

The vet the next morning shaved down the injured area so they could get a good look at it and make sure the damage was as estimated (it was) and some antibiotics. The shaved area looked really silly, and Piper did NOT enjoy being taken in back for that process. She came back out and ran to me, jumped into my lap (hello 36 lbs of dog) as if she had survived a house fire or something. She has literally never been so happy to see me in her entire life.

I was also concerned about the ramifications of the incident- she was already a handful around other dogs, would a bite make it worse? I even wrote our trainer an email to ask for advice on how to handle it to try and head off any behavior backslides. She told me to just steer clear of that house and keep an eye on it.

After a few days of keeping an eye on it, we realized with clarity- Piper don't give a shit.

Seriously, NOTHING changed in her behavior. I mean for a few days she didn't like me rubbing her muzzle- ok, fine, it hurts, no problem; but her reactions to other dogs on the walks- not a lick of difference. It's like it never happened at all.

Um. ok, really?

I mean, good, but..... I was all geared up for emotional warfare..... and nothing?

Right.

Good. No, thats good. Just unexpected. Good though.

At this point, her meds are complete, and scars are healing, but she will probably always have funny skin right there. The only lingering impact seems to be the hair on her muzzle is all cockeyed now. In due time that section of face will be as puppet like as the rest of her is- all shaggy and messy.

So, her assault charges have been dropped with a warning- Do NOT Trespass.

murder.....?

Have I mentioned our small dog is a bit of a hunter? I think I have.

Well, even the worst hunter's bag something once in a while.

Even the worst ones......

here's what happened that made my dog equal to one of the worst ones.

A few days back, I came home from an after work class, and let the dogs back out. They were due for dinner, but they needed to go outside, so I let them out, encouraging that they get down to business, and then came in to prep dinner.

Big Girl Piper came in, as she is always following a human rather then be by herself anywhere. Odie stayed outside - which is not terribly unusual.

I set out dinner, called Odie, and he came barreling in. They sat and waited for dinner, I put bowls down, and Piper dug in. Odie, in an act of true bizarre-ness, took off and went back outside. I was stunned, but figured he was on the trail of something and picked his food back up for later.

When he came back in, I gave him dinner, he ate, and then once again, took off like his butt was on fire. At this point, Piper and I had moved on to the TV portion of the evening.

Eventually Odie came back inside, hung out for a little while, then disappeared into the office, which is normal. What wasn't normal was a few minutes later when I heard him being very active in there. Normally he just curls up on the couch and chills. The movement and jumping noises are odd. After a couple of minutes of this, I got up and went to check out what he was doing.

As I leaned towards the office, I flicked a light on, and for some reason, looked at the floor. Thats when I saw it

A dead bird.

Which had clearly been tossed around the room for the past few minutes.

And Odie

Standing, proud of himself for having killed the (hopefully!) already dead thing.

I used some words. I won't repeat them. You can draw your own conclusions.

After heading off Piper from getting involved, and getting Odie out of the room, I cleaned up the dead bird. It was really gross, and I felt bad for the poor thing. All I could hope for was the bird had been dead before Odie found it, and it wasn't him killing it outside before he brought it in that was keeping him occupied instead of eating dinner.

So, basically, his desert was Dead bird with a side of FLING! YAY!

gross.

gone AWOL

So, time has passed, but one thing remains the same- my dogs are crazy people.

They are both very sweet, very loving, and very charming when they want to be. They are also totally and completely mental.

Case in point- when we go on walks and encounter other dogs, they both go kind of deaf, dumb and blind to anything else- including the human attached to the other end of the leash.

Odie gets over it pretty quickly when we restrict him from getting to the other dog. Just keep walking, and drag him along behind and in a couple of minutes he stops struggling, and moves onto the next thing. One of the joys of having a dog who weighs 15 lbs- there's not much he can do if you don't want him to. Piper on the other hand.... Once that girl focuses on something, breaking her of it is a test for anyone. She locks on and will NOT be distracted for anything.

This has made walking a true challenge. We got our phenominal trainer out to help us, and she gave us exercises to use to help Piper learn that other dogs weren't something that needed to be attacked, just things to be walked past. It's going to be an ongoing process for the next few... YEARS.... sigh.... but she is getting better. Tiny, miniscule bit by bit.

Things we still deal with on our walks are the neighborhood dogs that Piper knows about. She anticipates them, and starts to do a routine I like to call "suiting up" for her encounter. Which is ridiculous 'cause she never actually comes in contact with any of them, but whatever.

She starts walking taller, ears forward, shoulders tense, and breathing like she's about to jump into a cold lake. She starts this about 4 houses away from whichever dog house she's about to come up on. Then as we get even closer, we start the distraction techniques we've worked with the trainer on. That usually gets us through the pass by section relatively well. After that, she will still breathe heavily and occasionally get a good foaming at the mouth going.

We'll go through this several times over the course of a walk some days. Meanwhile, little Odie is attached to my hip, and he just keeps motoring like none of this is interesting anymore. He's been through it so many times that he is now completely unimpressed and unmoved by the excitment. I think part of him is over Piper's outbursts too. If he could talk he'd probably just be telling her to cut it out so he could get to the rest of his walk already.

The worst of all the encounters we have to face is this one particular house. They have 2 small, and yet overweight, chihuahuas in a chain link fenced in yard. They live on a corner, so we get to face them in the side and the front of the house. I call them the Monsters.

The Monsters are not only not discouraged from bum rushing the fence and challenging all comers, but are even let out of the front door specifically to do it. They charge, bark, shriek, challenge, growl, bare teeth, you name it, they do it, and they will continue to do it until you're about 3 houses away. Needlessto say this makes Piper totally lose her mind. It presses all of her buttons several times over. There have been days where The Monsters get so aggressive, and Piper reacts so strongly, that Odie gets going and growling too, and they are both wrapped around my legs that I get really unsettled that someone is gonna get hurt, and there's a very good chance it'll be me.

I've learned to prepare myself better as we approach this house, and to always be hopeful the Monsters will be locked away and not even know we're passing by. I try not to anticipate the madness too much, because I know Piper can feel that tension. I try to project Odie's calm, "whatever, we're walking its all good" demeanor into every step.

Doesn't always work.

I have to admit I've come to hate those Little Monsters a lot.

Not overly fond of the owners who let them out to terrorize any and all passerby either.

I mean, I've been out running by myself and those Monsters do the same thing to me through the fence. It's just insanity.

I will say, every time we make it past that house without incident I am thrilled. Every time we have to pass by the Monsters temper tantrums I send them mental wishes of going mute or suddenly losing the ability to comprehend us. Some days I avoid the house altogether because I'm just too damn tired to deal with it. In my book that is a completely valid way to deal.

All told, the walks get a little better all the time, but they are still something that tries my patience and some days fill me with dread. It reminds me of how socially stunted my big criminal is, no matter HOW sweet she is when she wants us to love her. She was damaged by a family of people who had no idea what to do with her, and now we're trying to tell a stubborn, opinionated teenager to do things our way......

It's a miracle we're all still standing... and walking.

time lapse

Well, there has been quite the time lapse since a blog entry, hasn't there?

I can explain!

Ok, not really, beyond things got busy and the dogs mostly settled into a routine, and the trainer came and helped us, and things got busy.

I didn't even get to the shelter very much over the past couple of months- its been a challenge to get my usual amount of time there. Poor pups barely had time to get to know me, and my hand feeding them treats before I disappeared again.

After the next couple of things, things will settle down, life will loosen its strangle hold on me, and I will get back to having time to getting super frustrated by four legged creatures while simultaneously wanting to take all of them home and cuddle on the couch with them. Yes, even my own personal criminals. I even want to let them on the couch sometimes.

And then Piper Farts.

and I remember why we don't do that anymore.

So, chins up folks, I'm working on it, I swear. Hopefully new content VERY soon. Don't give up on me yet.

thanks

-Seaweed

Forward Motion

Despite all the activities that made me want to open the front door and wish the dogs well, I didn't.

Never even came close, really.

Ok, maybe for a second.

But I promise you, anyone who says they've never hit that point with their animals is either nuts, lying, or not taking very good care of them.

After hitting this point of frustration and wondering if we were really the right family for these pooches- We called in the cavalry- our trainer. She had worked with Piper in a group class setting a few months back (anyone remember the Helicopter move? Yeah, it was that class) and we'd done pretty well considering. Time for some more focused attention and new tricks.

In the meantime, freedoms got taken away, and a new schedule was established. There was to be no more wandering the house with no humans present. So much for getting into stuff when no one was looking. We also realized that not enough energy was being burned- so there are new walks added into the mix.

This requires me to get up even earlier then I already did and walking them for 20-30 minutes every day. 6:45am EVERY day, I'm out there with the monsters, trying to wear them out a little. His Boy (as the Husband is known in our house) is supposed to take them on a similar walk every day after work. That doesn't always happen, but we're getting there.

After we got all that started, we finally had our first visit with our trainer, the magic lady, Nadia. We had 3 things to address with her, the walks being a hot mess with BOTH dogs lunging at every dog they saw was the first one.

This had proven to be quite the pain in my ass when I'm walking both of them and barely awake. But they do- they Lunge and make noise and pull and make general nuisances of themselves every time they see another dog around. I used to think it was a desperate attempt to make a connection and play, but recently it's taken a more "let me at 'em!" tone. I can't have that- uncivilized dogs are unacceptable in my book. More then that, it was giving me shoulder aches and at least once every other day, a moment where I was convinced I was gonna get pulled onto my face flat on the cement. None of this is a good idea.

We showed Nadia the undesired behavior and she immediately had a "game" for us to use to break the habit of trying to get to every dog on the planet. It's something we incorporate into every walk we go on. There's a second part of it, which discourages the yanking on the leash we were contending with as well. This has made walks a very involved process- which is super fun at 6:45 am, let me tell you. BUT- we are making progress, slow (and begrudging on Piper's part), but progress nonetheless.

Next up, we're going to work on front door behavior. We'd like to achieve Polite, as opposed to the current Frantic. It will be another multi step process that will be a daily activity. As all training is, sadly. No magic bullets yet..... but maybe someday.

(OMG how great would that be? A magic pill you give the dog and you get like 5 days of solid communication where you can EXPLAIN everything to them and they understand, and then they chose behaviors based on logic and desire to make everyone happy together..... Science! I call upon you to get on that crap! Whoever does will be a bagillionaire in like 5 minutes. I promise. )

This is part of bringing home a slightly damaged dog- a rescue who wasn't entirely well cared for in her formative stages. Odie's quick responses to anything the walks, flies, or scurries doesn't help the situation one bit. He's a lover of the chase, and enjoys getting his sister into the act. He gives up quickly though, and Piper just won't quit. She doesn't know how to give up, because she was never properly discouraged from fixations.

Nadia has already been a balm to my frazzled nerves. She's teaching us how to be better wardens to the criminals. She's reminding me to stay calm, as they are only simple creatures who aren't intentionally making me insane. She's reminding the Hubby that trust has to be earned, and guilt shouldn't make us choose things that aren't right for the pups. We're both learning to work together and listen to each other a bit more.

While all this learning is going on, there are still moments where all I want to do is crawl into the bathtub with some headphones on and pretend none of it is real. Sadly, even in the tub I can hear the chaos going on outside the door. Sometimes there's even a nose or 2 on the shower door asking me when I'm gonna come out and play again.

Sigh.

Cute, but..... Ok, fine I'm coming.

It is my job, as warden to the criminals, to make sure they are rehabilitated though, so taking a deep breath and doing what is best for everyone is part of that job. Apparently, so is waking up really early, and facing the world despite being blurry eyed and fuzzy headed (mostly literally) every morning for the exercise and training. Not my favorite part of the job, to be sure, but hopefully sometime in the next few years I can retire, and just be a regular Joe, hangin' with her pups, who don't care so much anymore.

Ah, retirement..... that'll be a good day. For now, I take pleasure in having called on one of the best trainers I could ask for helping us. I also enjoy the moments where we find a sweet spot with training and things click in and work right. Those moments are usually fleeting, but it gives me hope for a future where walks are enjoyable again, and there's a possibility of being able to come through my front door with out stepping on anyone.

If you're LA local and want the info on our miracle worker trainer- you can find her info here: http://www.thebarkingbunch.com/

I can't say enough good things, seriously.

At a complete and utter loss

OMG these dogs.

O

M

G

The husband didn't help anyone on this one either. Sorry babe, but it's true.

Last night, after work and a post work gym session, I FINALLY make it home, ready for dinner and sleep. As I pull up, my 2 favorite criminals were sitting in the front window waiting for me. I thought to myself "is there really anything better then that?" and looked forward to cuddling with them on the floor once I got myself settled and showered.

Between my car pulling up and me getting in the house the little one took off for the backyard. Not the weirdest thing ever, but not entirely normal either.

I soon found out why.

Someone (cough coughpiper Cough) had weaseled their way into my bathroom kit from my trip last weekend, and pulled out EVERYTHING in there. Might as well have turned it upside and shaken in.

Ok, so I found things in stages- The first thing was on the rug by the front door- it'd clearly been dragged over there to occupy some time while waiting for me to come home. It was my nice, pricey (well price-ier anyway) moisturizer with SPF in it, it got turned into this:

(side note- really recommend this brand of skin care- cruelty free and smells yummy)

Yeah.... there was lotion all over the rug. So, that was awesome. I was like- how did you get this.... OH NO! As the realization of what had happened dawned on me.

I started yelling at everyone... who was Piper, 'cause Odie had taken off and was hiding in the back yard, 'cause he's not stupid all the time. Piper crouched into her "Please, don't kill me, I didn't mean it" pose which leaves me no room at all to keep yelling at her.

As I head into the office, I see this:

(sorry for blurry, my rage made for kinda crappy picture taking)

What you see there is the remains of 2 plastic sandwich bags, 1 more moisturizer container- in pieces, 1 bar of body glide (a thing runners use to prevent chafing, no matter what it sounds like), several gobs of the actual lotion, and a couple of hair ties. That was all I could fit into the picture, there was also some Q-Tips, a few more shards of plastic bag and bottle label also in that room.

More screaming, more cowering.

I rounded the final corner into the master bathroom where the kit had been stored on the floor, waiting for me to finish unpacking it, and found the cherry on top of this entire experience:

Yep- the remaining content of the white bag thats in front of the toilet. Toothbrush, soap, head bands, MANY bobby pins, another empty plastic bag, several Floss containers, etc. Dumped all over the floor and sifted through for the "good stuff". The toothpaste I can't remember if I still had in there or not is gone completely- no sign of it at all. So, that might be down someone's gullet at this point.

I utterly lost my mind. There was not a person in the family who was safe at that moment. The Husband is lucky he was at class when this all went down (although if he'd been home it wouldn't have happened, vicious cycle there) because I had told him several times that Piper kept stealing out of the bathroom so he either had to lock the kids up or close that door very specifically.

You see, the best part of this is- they NEVER do this stuff when The husband is gonna be the first one home. Nor, do they eat his stuff. Nope, they wait for it to be my turn, and then they stealthily find MY crap- usually pricey- and EAT IT WHOLE.

3 days prior I had found Odie chewing on the remains of a mascara tube they'd stolen out of my gym bag. We didn't catch Piper 'cause she'd already discarded her half of that prize.

But man were their lashes lovely.

So, I'm the lucky one who gets to come home to this total mess, and financial burden, and lose my mind. I have never screamed at them like that before. It only lasted maybe 45 seconds before I gave up and just started cleaning up. Their ultimate punishment was the solid stonewall style ignoring they got for the remained of the evening. That drives Piper insane- she HATES being ignored. She tried everything- behaving like a good girl, sitting quietly and staring at me, coming up and trying to put her head on my knee- you name the game, and she played it.

Nope, not working today cookie- Momma is on the verge of a meltdown.

Yes, I was worried about them getting sick, but quite frankly, they're gotten into so much stuff at this point, I kinda wait to see what happens. Since they were both acting normally (and guiltily) I just left it at that, as opposed to paying insane ER prices for something that might be fine. We'll keep an eye on them for the next couple of days, and I hope I don't regret that at any point, but right now it's the best we can do. If I rushed them to get X-rays every time they broke into something and ate it, we'd have to sell the house.

I've never had this before- my previous dogs were either insanely limited to where they were allowed to go in the house (regretful of that choice, trust me) or just POLITE enough to not pull this crap. I've tried to be really aware of setting them up for success by not giving them access to things that seem tempting- the food cabinet, the bathroom, Flip flops laying around (thats an Odie thing I still can't explain). I realize, crap happens, but man- steam was coming out of my ears on this one. It's gonna linger for a little while before it finally subsides. I am just SO tired of things getting trashed- MY THINGS- for no apparent reason.

Next up on the agenda- Longer walks, more things to chew on, and more closed doors around the house, and most likely a good long negotiation session between husband and wife to make all those things happen.

Until all those come to pass- Probation. All of you. Behave.

Re-education

Of our 2 dogs- both of which are terrier mixes (as best we can tell)- Piper is definitely our needy child. They are both VERY interested in being with us as much as possible, (which is apparently a very terrier trait no one told me about) but Odie can and will occasionally wander off on his own. Piper on the other hand can only be convinced to spend time on her own if she KNOWS we're not going anywhere or doing anything interesting. By interesting I mean moving from one room to the other, or opening a kitchen cabinet.

The other day I got off of work a little early and was able to head home to let the dogs out before dark, and hang out with them in the yard. They had been cooped up for about 7+ hours at this point, I would think the FIRST thing they'd do would be bolt outside to use the facilities. Well, they did head outside after a couple minutes of following me around, and determining I wasn't going to take them on a walk. We all headed outside, and Odie started stalking around, doing what dogs do- protecting the border, establishing no intruders of the squirrel or bird variety had crossed the line.

Piper on the other hand would NOT leave my side. In fact, when I sat down, she draped herself across me and stayed there for about 15- 20 minutes. I decided to take a picture of her/ us.

Who waits 20 minutes to pee? I mean, come ON, just get things done here little girl!

She's a very sweet kid, but I'm starting to realize something about her- She's THAT kid.

Everyone had a kid in elementary school that was nice enough but totally socially inept. They were a kid would was obsessed with medieval military, or had some weird thing about wearing the same mismatched socks every day. They had some friends, but not many, and all of them were a slight bit odd. The rest of the class thought the kid was ooookkkay, but just hard to talk to. That kid usually had a strange bond to their mom, and occasionally also starred as the "smelly kid".

So, thats my dog. The weird kid.

She definitely has a STRONG attachment to her mama, and doesn't totally know how to play with the other kids. She has her one special friend that gets her, and digs her program, but everyone else seems to not mesh with her style. Her style is clunky and awkward at best, but still, no one seems to know what to do with her. I don't blame them, even as a loving mama there are days I look at her and go "why do you have to be SO HARD on everyone? can't you just play like the other dogs?"

The one moment of peace I can find is knowing that most of those awkward kids in school grew up to be lawyers and rocket scientists and doctors. They used their quirks to become something great.

Now, I realize I'm talking about a dog here, so chances are she's never going to make anyone live a better life, or fly to the moon (although, really, do we know for sure?) but maybe, just maybe, she can figure out a way to be something really groovy with our help. Maybe in a few years she'll end up being a great therapy dog, or agility dog, or just a dog that can play with other dogs without starting a fight...... A girl can dream.

In the meantime, I'll accept her devotion, and try to work on her training- which will only help us both get through this awkward time. I'll try to take a deep breath and hope for the best every time we have a new experience instead of feeling a sense of dread and doom. I'll pay the extra money to get our trainer to keep working with us and her on getting these basics of life under control. I will probably not do any of these things in a picture perfect way, but I will try. 'Cause I want my kid to end up a lawyer, not a medical testing test dummy.

SHELTER: Parole & Release

Since I started volunteering at the local shelter, I've taken certain dogs on as personal projects- dogs I work extra hard on and with to get them adopted out asap. So far all of those dogs have been adopted, and successfully. My work with them may be fairly minimal in the grand scheme, but I figure every little bit helps.

It's sorta like being a probation officer- I don't get them released, but I've worked with them to try to make their transition easier out there in the real world. I like that part of my job. Getting some of those dogs more relaxed and ready to find their new humans.

One of my first prized pups was a lovely mutt lady named Oreo. It was an unfortunately awkward name for a really charming, and scared girl. She was about 4 yrs old and had been turned in by an owner who couldn't keep her anymore. She was about as insecure as any dog I've seen before or since- she was convinced everything was there to be mean to her. The loud noises and people moving past her kennel- it was all too much. I saw this and decided I was going to get her to relax.

After spending a good chunk of time with her, and using a good bit of treats as bribery, she started to relax, and ended up in my lap. Which was no small feat considering she was probably 50 lbs. I spent even more time in there with her, and she started showing interest in the people coming past.

Oreo stayed with us at the shelter for a few months. We ended up taking her on a hike (a program we do with certain dogs in the local mountains once a month) and she did fabulously, not only on the hike, but with the other dogs that were around her. She was a dream dog, and I wished I could take her home every time I spent time with her. I knew it would be hard to see her adopted, but I was glad when I came in one day and she was gone. She'd been adopted a few days prior, and had been sent to her new home.

The pictures I took of My little Oreo are still some of my favorite. She helped me realize that volunteering was a good idea after all.

This past weekend, I was out for my longest training run for my upcoming half marathon. The good bit of the first part of the route was along a local bike path that runs near the house. I run this path on a semi regular basis these days, and see people walking their dogs all the time. A short bit into this path, on this day, I saw a lady walking a dog that looked really familiar.

"Excuse me, I hate to bother you, but did you adopt your dog at the Burbank shelter?"

"Yes, actually I did"

" Is this Oreo?"

"Wow, yeah- how'd you know?"

'Cause she's one of mine!

It was Oreo, with her new mom out for one of their regular strolls. She looked fantastic- Healthy, happy, alert, and confident. Just what I had pictured her when we'd worked together. We chatted for a couple minutes, I explained how I knew who this woman's dog was, and Oreo gave me some kisses. The dog was responsive and I don't know if she remembered me, or just knew I was a lady who was being nice to her, but I choose to believe she remembered me. I was fairly smelly by then, so anything she recalled of me was in hyper drive at that point.

Seeing one of my special project dogs doing well in her new home seriously got me through a LONG run that day, and continues to make me happy every time I think about it. The staff at the Shelter was thrilled to hear how well she was doing, which also makes me happy when I think about it. I did my job fairly well, along with the efforts of probably many others, and we got this dog into a home, and made her part of a family. All of our efforts, all of our caring- it all contributed. We get to do that all the time, but you rarely get to see the actual results. It's good.

Reversal of Fortune

Almost exclusively the dogs are the ones committing the 'crimes' in my life. That's kind of the point of this blog after all. They do the troubling activities, I report them- and sometimes pass judgment.

This past weekend, the roles got reversed- much to Piper's dismay, and physical injury.

Before I get into the meat of this story, I have to put the disclaimer on there- Everyone is FINE. The damage done was minor and has already been forgotten. There is no need to worry about the current state of anyone involved. You can go ahead and wince along to the appointed moments. Trust me, you'll know them when you see them.

It all starts with The Criminals badly needing to be professionally groomed. Nails needed trimming, glands needed expressing (so gross) and in Piper's case- since she doesn't shed and has curly fur- she needed a good trim. We made the appointment to take them to the Petco groomers as our last grooming place turned out to be a bunch of A-holes, despite doing a good job with the dogs. I knew Petco would be a crap shoot, but it needed to be done and time was of the essence.

We headed over, everyone in their seat belts, totally unaware of what was about to happen. I unloaded Odie out of my side of the car and started heading towards the door to the grooming Dept. Suddenly, I hear The Hubby yell "Unlock the car!"

I turn around and all I see is him bending down behind the car, looking at me somewhat frantically. He yells again " UNLOCK the car!"

Well, my car doesn't have the fancy unlocking fob thingy, so I walked back over to HIS side of the car to figure out what the hell is going on. As I round the corner, he says "She's stuck, unlock the car, I can't get her out" and I see Piper, tail stuck in a fully closed car door, trapped.

The Hubby goes to grab Piper to prevent her from pulling on her tail any more then she already was, and she, naturally, lashed out- because that shit hurts- and nipped at him- catching 2 of his fingers in the process. This causes whats left of my ability to focus to fracture and I start digging for the keys I had dumped into my bag and asking is he was ok... Dumb.

This must have taken an actual 45-60 seconds, but in hindsight it felt like I was moving in slow motion. I can't even imagine how long it was in dog time.

So, I unlocked the doors, that door was opened, and Piper was released from her nightmare. She wouldn't let me touch her tail right away, and my concern was it had been broken. Upon inspection, I could tell that her skin wasn't broken, there was no blood, but she was just totally freaked out.

On the other hand, there was some blood on The Hubby. Piper's nip had broken skin on his fingers and he was bleeding a fair amount. It was a total surface wound- her teeth has just scraped his skin, but on the fingers, that's a decent amount of blood. So we grabbed a towel out of my car (thanks to having dogs and working at the shelter, I pretty much always have at least 3 towels going in there) and took care of that right away.

After collecting ourselves for a few minutes, and everyone catching their breath, we man-handled Piper enough to know she was fine, and actually, now that the shock had worn off, seemed to be feeling little to no pain. We went ahead and dropped her off with the groomer, with the instruction to touch the end of her tail as little as possible due to what had just happened.

The next day, after everything was LONG over and everyone had a decent nights sleep, I checked Piper's tail again. This time she let me grab it all I wanted with no flinching at all (reaffirming the judgment call from the prior day that she was fine) and I discovered it- The Bump.

The very last inch or so of her tail now leans a little to the left.

Yep- broken.

But only barely

And she doesn't seem to mind it at all.

To add insult to very literal injury- because I'd asked the groomer to leave the end of her tail alone, they ended up giving her a "lion cut", Which means her head looks enormous and the end of her tail has a flag- like quality to it. Thankfully, she's kind of dumb and has no idea what she looks like right now. She's mainly just happy to be alive.

The lasting wounds for The Hubby are more of the "OMG I hurt the dog" variety then anything to do with his fingers. Those healed fast enough and are fine. He keeps checking her tail and the way she moves it though- the guilt lingers. It will for a while, understandably, and that's part of why I love him.

Through all of this, our tiniest criminal, Odie, just sorta stood and there with the look on his face of " whats all the noise?, why is she crying?, where are we? Wait- there's water here, isn't there? You're gonna let them TOUCH me with WATER?! are you INSANE WOMAN?!" and more along those lines. The actual moment of injury left him completely unaffected. He's lucky that way. The bath didn't actually kill him either, despite his best efforts to convince us otherwise.

So, like I said, it's important to note that everyone involved is fine. Maybe a little shaken, but ultimately fine. The crime here was undeniably committed by the human aspect. The thing about that is, we still have the thumbs, so we still ultimately win. The lack of broken tail is kind of a win too, although scars make you look tough, so I guess in that regard, Piper comes out ahead.

Stealing??

If you left a mathematics textbook out, and your kid went and took it and used it to learn... would you consider it stealing?

See, the thing there is, they weren't supposed to take it per say, but it didn't hurt them, and might have helped them to do it. So, is it really a crime? Or is it a genius, inadvertent form of reverse psychology?

The story behind these questions goes a little something like this:

This morning, I was taking a shower, as I do every day (but nice try with the stinky kid joke) and the dogs were roaming free, as they do. We've gone a good long while with this arrangement now, and been relatively problem free.

What we've also been doing for a few days now, if using a product called Rescue Remedy to help alleviate some of Piper's stress while there's workmen in the house renovating our kitchen. It is supposed to help calm stress, and is an entirely herbal concoction. I put a little on her treat every morning and then put her in her crate for the day. It seems to have been helping, as she's gotten her voice back after barking herself hoarse for about 2 weeks.

So, these 2 facts add together this morning like this:

I got out of the shower and noticed her box of RR was gone... I went into the living room to find this:

Empty box, shredded on the floor.

CRAP!

not again!

Damn this dog figures out how to lull me into thinking rules have been established then, BLAMMO, she gets into something.

I go back into the bedroom to discover the bottle in pieces on the floor. The bottle is entirely empty, with NO remains on the floor- it is bone dry. When the elements are put back together, the bottle is a mess, that looks a little like this:

Yep- the squishy bit at the top is entirely gone- down Piper's gullet somehow. The top had been chewed on enough so that it was entirely pulled off. the liquid was gone. Piper was laying right by all this looking unbelievably guilty. After I yelled at her for a minute, she followed me towards the door, then stood staring at the floor for about 2 minutes. It looked like this:

So, basically, My dog got herself good and stoned off herbal stress relievers.

Who does that?

I mean, come ON junkie.... ease up.

I checked with the website for Rescue remedy, and whatever slight concern I had about her getting sick was relieved- you can' t OD on the stuff. Basically it just wasn't going to do much for her.

I give her credit- she'd seen me use it to do something to her treats, and must have figured it out- it has something to do with food. Beyond that the entire event seems ridiculous. I mean, the stuff can't possibly taste that good.

The end result as the day came to a close was Piper had a nice relaxing day, and was gassy as all hell. She seriously was farting wet baby diaper farts all evening. A Charming attribute for everyone involved, to be sure.

But the question becomes- is it really a crime, if she stole something that was ultimately good for her? I mean, she essentially stole and ate a bunch of herbs/ vitamins. The only damage she did is costing me about 10$ and some unfortunate flatulence. I have a hard time finding the energy for a conviction on this one... a stern word or two, some angry glares, and.... Moving on.

We all learned a little something from this- 1) Piper will quite literally eat anything if she thinks it'll be interesting enough. 2) an exceedingly hefty dose of herbal stress relief will really only make you think the floor is talking to you and give you gas. And finally 3) crimes are less criminal if they're ultimately good for you.

SHELTER: fear is no crime

I pulled a shift at the Burbank Animal Shelter today- something I haven't had much time to do over the past few months. It was great to finally get some puppy play time in , and get some pictures of some of the current residents. I like taking pictures of our dogs (and cats sometimes) that will hopefully be used to market those who need a little extra push in the PR department. The head shots taken of each animal as they come in are usually of them at their worst- terrified, being manhandled by a stranger, and in terrible lighting. Every once in a while me, and one of the other volunteers- who is a MUCH better photographer then I- go over and try to just take as many pictures as we can. Today I only got to 4 animals, but I may have helped 2 others find a home- so it all breaks even.

One thing to keep in mind as you walk the halls of the shelter- any shelter- is that these dogs are in a form of jail. At our shelter we try to keep it white collar style- you know, tennis and keds as opposed to solitary and body searches. No matter what though, being in jail will heighten your personality- if you tend to be kind of quiet, you'll get quieter. If you tend to panic, you'll totally freak out. If you're mean, you'll get meaner. If you're sheepish, you'll get beat up. For people looking for dogs, this means, keep in mind that they are a more dramatic version of what they will be in your house in 3 months. It also means that if they are barking at you, it may not mean they will drive you insane with barking all the time at home- they might just be freaked out and not know what else to do.

One of the dogs we worked with today was given the name Darla. She is a little chihuahua mix who was BEYOND flipped out by her enviornment. She was uncertain, AND cold, AND wet (thank you mother nature for snowing in LA for the first time in years) AND in heat, so feeling kinda out of sorts in that regard as well. Poor little girl was just in sensory overload.

She did fairly well considering all of these factors could have easily made her want to kill

everyone- just out of self preservation. Instead, she sat there and shook a little and let us love on her and remind her that everything would be ok. She also posed for pictures like a friggin pro. I think part of her knew that I was doing something helpful when I made the flash go off.

I have no doubt someone will come in and find her fear "simply adorable, and we HAVE to take her home today" pretty soon. The little ones who look super pathetic tend to get homes pretty fast.

Another kid we worked with today was Romeo. Now he's another story altogether. He's a cattle dog mix- 10 yrs old- turned in by an owner who had health issues and could no longer care for him. This guy looked timid and fearful, but as it turned out, he's just older and choosey about what he lets bother him. When we got in his kennel, he was cautious but not totally freaked out. After some treats and finding his scratch-me-please sweet spot, he decided we were a-ok by him and we could stay as long as we wanted.

His lack of fear was equally touching, as he clearly has never been mistreated in any way, and yet he still ended up in the shelter. He's a confident guy who picks and chooses what he wants to get riled up about. A family came in and met him- considering him fas a 2nd dog for their family, and he did great with everyone. He loped around the play yard and made nice with everyone, while still staying on his own program. He's underweight, so he's clearly stressed and has every reason to be fearful, but instead he has just become quiet and reserved. I hope this doesn't make it harder for people to appreciate this older fella, 'cause he seems unflappable.

All told, shelter dogs, like people, all have their own individual ways of dealing with a less then ideal situation. They all have fear to some degree or another, but it's pretty rare that the fear leads them to actually commit a crime (biting, lunging, totally going mental every time someone walks past) Which just proves- they all deserve to be pardoned.

With dogs like these serving time, and just waiting to be let out, why would you go anywhere else to find a new pet?

Projectile/ endangerment of others safety

We have 2 dogs- a little one who tends to be very measured in his actions, especially when he's on the hunt.

The other- a medium one who tends to get into everything, eat anything, plow into anything with the joy and enthusiasm of someone who doesn't know any better.

If either one was going to get into something and end up ill as a result, which one would you put your money on?

Wrong.

It was the little one.

He was the one who ended up nearly single handedly destroying everything we own in our living room.

With Vomit.

Right, so here's what happened as it was reported to me, since blessedly I was not home when this all went down. I was running a 5k, so I was paying my own price. I'll gladly trade a 5k for dog barf any day, just as an FYI.

So the night before, someone had barfed a little bit, but we never saw who it was, so we just cleaned it up and went on about our business of getting ready for bed. Dogs will sometimes just sorta spit stuff up- like babies. So, you clean it, and you move on.

The next morning, I snuck out pre-dawn, and left the Hubby to hopefully sleep and deal with the dogs. The worst I was expecting was they'd wake him up and I'd hear about how early he got woken up and how it was all my fault.

Instead of this, when I turned my phone on post run, there was a text with a photo attached- a photo of dog barf all over the couch. The text " please come home soon".

Yipe!

Apparently what happened was this- Odie threw up in his crate/ bed at some point over night. When the Hubby went to go clean that up, he barfed again on the floor. In usual form, Odie retreated to the couch- his safe haven since his sister can't get up there. At this point, he proceeded to barf 3 or 4 more times, not only just on the couch, but on the rug (as he tried to get down, and was barfing along the way).

In my imagination the sound track to this was The Hubby going " god damn-it Odie! on the floor! get outside! Something!"

Poor kid had gotten a chunk of plastic toy in his system and his system fought back. He was sick on and off for the better part of the day, and the cleaning continued much beyond that. See, the added benefits to this are: 1- we can't take the cover off our couch and wash it, so if anything seeps in, we're screwed and 2- we have no washer / dryer right now, so the washable rug can't actually be washed.

The chunk of toy finally drained the poor kid of anything he had left in his system, most likely working it's own way out in the process. The next day (when we had decided we'd go to the vet if he was still acting ill) he was fine- perky and hungry and fighting with his sister like nothing had ever happened. We, on the other hand, now have a couch that smells better, but not awesome, and a rug that has a weird discolored spot in the center of it which may or may not ever come out.

Yet again, the criminals strike, and we pay the price... damned animals, if they weren't so cute.... especially when their sick (Odie was in my lap and just a sad sack all day, it was adorable)... it's a good thing they are I suppose.

Public Indecency

Have I mentioned that we just bought a house and moved into it? Right, yes, I did.

Did I also mention that on the 10th day of us living there, we began a process of remodeling the kitchen that has us living in a dusty, cluttered section of house with appliances in rooms they weren't meant for?

No? I didn't? well, yeah thats what we did.

Go ahead and question the sanity- I have been, endlessly.

So, in the midst of all of this, the dogs have been in their crates a bit more then ideal. We try to make up for it by giving them as much quality time with us, and in the yard/ world as we can. I don't know if it's a great solution, but its the best we can work out right now. It's been hard on all of us, to say the least.

So, with all this going on, plus the prior commitments the humans in our house already made before all this insanity began- we've had little to no free time the past couple of weeks.

In fact, this past sunday morning, I was off running my first 5k of the month (don't ask how many I'm doing- it's sorta stupid) and my husband was stuck with the dogs. Apparently everyone woke up around 8:00am. Odie had apparently vomited within the first 5 minutes, leaving my husband to start his day cleaning up puke. Always a fun way to start the day.

While he was cleaning that mess up, Odie went into the living room to roost on a couch, as he normally does. While he was up there, whatever it was that was bothering him came back.

By 9:00am, he had barfed multiple times ON the couch, on the (woven) rug, on blankets that were on the couch and the floor.

When I got back to my car and turned my phone back on, I had received a text picture of a mound of dog puke with the caption "Come Home Soon".

Ok, first of all, did I need that picture?

gross.

and second of all, Come On Little Dog- stop puking ON things!!

Poor Hubby had to scrub as best he could to try and get barf out of the woven rug fibers, and off the couch before it soaked in. Because, of course, we have couches that the fabric can't be taken off and washed. We also have no washer or dryer that can function in our house right now thanks to the kitchen remodel. The barfy blankets got bagged up, and later that day, some very sweet friends let us bring it over to wash them.

We figured out what was causing all this, but only after maybe 4 more moments of dog barf magically appearing on sections of floor. He'd been chewing on a particular toy, and we're pretty sure he swallowed little chunks of it without us noticing, thus an entire day of feeling crappy AND making the house stink something fierce.

Before bed, We had done several versions of cleaning and gotten about 98.5% of everything handled. The dogs had both gotten baths to clean whatever we couldn't see off of them. We had survived yet another moment of "why the hell are these animals in our house?" By the next morning, we were all feeling much better. Odie was back to his usual self, pouncing on his sister the moment they were let out.

Disgusting creatures though they may be at times, they're also very cute when they don't feel good and slowly climb into your lap with the eyes of "please take care of me". They're also very sweet when they check on their ailing 'sibling' who keeps getting crated to contain the barf. (Piper would go check on Odie if she hadn't seen him in a while- it was very charming)

All told, this crime was a misdemeanor at worst.

It was also really, really nasty.

Old crimes, new digs

We bought a house! And we live in it! Like, for reals, all the time, all of us, we live there now!

Holy crud, that was a big shift.

Despite our best efforts at adjusting the dogs to the new place, we knew it was gonna rock their little world pretty hard. Check in that column- world rocked.

Their poor little insecure selves spent the first 3 days almost literally underfoot. For Odie it was literal a couple of times, Piper just kept getting kicked in the shoulder. They continue to go the wrong way when given commands to go outside or to their 'houses'/ crates. Although it is interesting to see how they make the connections- their door outside used to be through the kitchen, so now they go that way, despite the new door being at the other side of the house. Their crates used to be in the living room, so they still head that way, despite their crates being in a totally different room now. And people say Dogs are stupid, brainless animals..... feh.

The insecurity is also manifesting itself in the renewal of some old crimes.

yay.......

Piper is the MOST affected by this change (yet another time where she is just like the human who picked her- resistant to change) and therefore her renewed crimes seem to be directly connected to that. She has peed on an area rug twice- the same one- while one of us was in the room with her, but not paying attention. Thankfully, she's blocked from getting into the guest room and marking that spot again. She also felt a strong enough attraction to a tube of (pricey!) hand lotion to grab it off the table and chew on it for a good 10 minutes before I found her with it. Less then charming, to say the least.

Odie on the other hand, has a renewed interest in rolling in inappropriate things. Oh yay- my favorite. Hopefully this will fade once he's found all the nasty stuff and caused us to pick it up as a result. Of course, we do have fruit trees now, so there's potential to have semi constant rotting things to deal with. Again I say... yay.....

On the flip side of this coin, we've learned new things about the dogs now that their environment has changed a bit.

Odie is a mouser! He yelled at, then tried to pick up and run with a mostly dead (hopefully) mouse last night. This was AFTER he'd pawed at and tried to dig up a dead rat carcass over the moving weekend. So, clearly his hunting Jack Russell genes take over around small rodents. This could be a very helpful attribute, or it could end up with dead rodents all over my yard. I know where my vote falls.

Piper is endlessly eager to please! (I guess that's not entirely new) but she has adjusted to new changes well in some regard. She's learned to get on her pillow when she's in a room with us, which is a new trick as she never had pillows before. She also likes to be where we are, so if she has to be a certain way to accomplish that, she's amenable- thus she'll stay in a doorway as long as she can see us. She picked up on new boundaries of new rooms within a day. See- she is smart! for a dumb dog anyway.

In general, I'd say the transition is going well, if a little bumpy. We're revisiting some old crimes, but hey, everyone relapses once in a while. We'll re-institute the Rehab procedures and see what progress we can regain. In the meantime, if someone has a secret to getting dogs to remember things like where the door is, feel free to let me know.....

No crime, just cute

OK, so this isn't a crime, it's not even really that funny a story, but it is evidence that every once in a while my dogs are just stinkin' cute.

(thus why they are still in my house)

I was going into work late this morning, due to an appt I had, so I decided to hit the road and do a decent length run. It's become something of a tradition that after a run like that I sit outside in the back yard with the dogs while I cool down. I stretch a bit, then sit on the stoop and watch them run around. It's a great opportunity for my heart rate to come down while spending time with them.

When we first got Odie, I'd sit outside with him every morning, so he's gotten really good at knowing just how to come over and sit in my lap. We have a very definite position when he's in the mood, and he'll push on me until I get into it.

This morning, Odie bolted the moment I opened the door- there were squirrels to yell at and leaves to overturn and sniff. Piper on the other hand was practically glued to my side. It's like she thought I'd left them forever and was just SO HAPPY I came home again.

So I sat on the stoop, and she tried her best to get all 4o lbs of her self into my lap. She got very perturbed when she kept falling off, so I finally shoved her into a position where her front half was across my legs and her back half was on the stoop next to me. She then did me the great honor of trying to clean all the sweat off of me with her super stinky licks. *eye roll* Thanks sweetie, but you can stop that now.

So there we sat; sweaty, gross me, and a 40 lb curly mop of a dog for about 8 minutes. At this point, Odie had stopped his squirrel hunt and noticed the cuddling that was going on. From about mid way down the yard, he full out sprinted over to us, shuddered to a halt next to me, then slowly, and methodically, climbed into my lap, shoving his sister aside inch by inch.

This went on for probably a full minute, with Odie slowly wiggling his way into his favorite position on my lap, and Piper fighting for her space as well. Throughout it all, I just sorta watched this land warfare and waited to see what would happen. The end result was Odie on my lap in "his" spot, with Pipers legs under him, and head resting on top of him.

So frickin cute!!

We sat like that with them watching squirrels and birds pass by like some bizarro two headed creature, and me letting my heart rate come down, for about 10 minutes. I honestly could have stayed there all day if I wasn't so gross and smelly. It was just so nice to have them both so calm and relaxed, not fighting (although I do find their fights to be the height of good comedy) and just chillin' out with me. I would kill to have a picture of that moment, but alas, I just have to try my best to remember it.

See- I'm not so harsh with them all the time. Just when they're being crazy. The rest of the time I adore the mental patients.

Crimes continue into the new year

So, things have been insanely busy over the past couple of months, and quite frankly, the dogs have had to settle for fitting into the picture instead of being the focus of it. These times happen, and the dogs have adjusted pretty well, all things considered. Until the other day....

Part of what has been keeping us busy is we bought a house. We're prepping to move in this month (so again, regular updates may not be happening as much as I'd like) and we started bringing the dogs over to the empty house to get them acclimated to it before we just walk them in and go "get used to it!" On our first visit to the new house, within 30 minutes of being there, Piper peed on the ONE CARPET in the entire house.

*head*desk* Really?

Oh, and this happened not 5 minutes after my husband had unknowingly stepped in poo in the yard and dragged it into same said carpet.

So within 30 minutes of being homeowners we had shit and pee in the one carpet we'd purchased.

Right

Awesome

We cleaned it up, and wrote Piper's choice to pee off to the smell of the previous owners dogs. Odie hadn't been taken off leash long enough to give him the chance to do the same. I had figured the boy dog would be the culprit and kept him tight to me.... who knew Girl dogs would be just as territorial?

(did I mention I've never had a girl dog before?)

Knowing that room would be a problem, we closed it off to the dogs the next couple of times we took them by. Until last night when we were showing some friends the new place, we go into that room and within 45 SECONDS Piper's squatting to pee again. Fortunately, I had my eye on her this time and caught her before more then a drip came out.

Damn dogs! I can't have nice things!

Rug Doctor is now on my speed dial and will be helping us out with this problem.

Meanwhile- Shelter adventures are continuing. as soon as I get more time to get in there, I'll have more updates from the incarcerated. Look forward to those adventures- cause there's always something going on

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!