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!!!