We took Dahlia up to the cemetery for a little exercise. Garrick and Nate joined us and Garrick walked her for a little while. We met a yellow lab named Sam who was SERIOUSLY ball focused and his people tossed the ball for him and Dahlia a few times. It was fun to watch. I managed to get one video of the two dogs coming back.

( A few pics + a couple videos )

Today turned out to be beautiful instead of rainy. What a surprise. We took Dahlia and the kids (David's two nephews, Garrick and Nate, and niece, Elizabeth) back to the sledding and ski hills nearby. We all climbed all the way to the top of the ski slope this time (well, David's mother and Elizabeth didn't make it there, but the rest of us did). We had a great time. Behind the cut are a whole bunch of photos.

( Read more... )

I don't know the back story on this one. Usually I do, but earlier this week I was simply contacted and asked to help out with a transport of two three-month old Aussie pups, litter mates. I'm not sure how purebred puppies from the same litter end up dumped at a shelter. Or abandoned. Or however they were found and then put on a transport to Ontario. But there they were. Two completely adorable Aussie pups. How can you not fall in love with those faces?

I met up with the previous person at the Super 8 motel in Henrietta, a common meeting spot for our Aussie transports (in fact, the person I met in Henrietta and the person I met in Syracuse I've done transports with in the past). There I was introduced to the dynamic duo, who the shelter was calling, apparently, Canoe and Kayak (I have to admit that I'm not fond of the names!). The boys looked virtually identical until I spent a little time studying them. one had more white on his face and once he was out of the crate and on the ground, I could see that he had much more white overall.

The shelter had sent the pair with slip leads, one of which was a silly looking Christmasy one made out of cloth. I hate slip leads. I really need to pick up a few cheap regular leashes and toss them in my car for future transports.

The boys were incredibly affectionate and just wanted to be in your lap giving you kisses, kisses, and more kisses. The larger of the two really loved being petted in the same way Dahlia does. He'd throw his head up with this total look of ecstasy on his face. Yep, he'll be eating up the belly rubs someday soon.

I secured them in my car, not an easy task with two wriggling Aussie boys both wanting to kiss you. While hooking up one of them I ended up with quite the tongue bath! Silly dogs.

They settled right down for the trip and slept most of the way out to Syracuse. I realized on the way out that the easiest transports are puppies and older dogs. It's the teenagers, the 1-2 year old dogs, who are the most difficult to deal with! They're fully grown puppies who often want to chew everything or crawl into your lap. The Aussie pups were content to curl up together in the back seat and sleep.

When we got out of the car in Syracuse, there was a woman there with a friend and her pit bull. Who was wearing a pink coat to keep her warm. The dog was incredibly sweet and good-natured. She would jump up on her owner when she asked her to and give her a hug. I got a kiss from her and she just adored the Aussie pups. She was a rescue too. Apparently dumped when pregnant, had her pups, had recently weaned them, and was then adopted by this woman. She still looks very much like the mama dog. Just a sweetheart. It was fun seeing the Aussie pups play with her.

Then the Aussie pups hit he grass to do their business and get down to some serious puppy play. They had a blast rolling around in the grass together. Sadly, the next person showed up and after a quick exchange, off they went to rescue.

I know these little pups will quickly find a home!

( Pics )

The day started off with taking Dahlia to the vet's (at 8:30am on a Saturday morning...argh!) for another lyme titer. Another $80 down the drain. I'll find out on Monday if the levels have come down far enough to not worry about it or if she needs more antibiotics. I hope this is the end of it. I know Dahlia would very much like to avoid another blood draw until her heartworm/lyme titer in April. And my purse would very much like to avoid it as well! We also found she had gained 1.4 pounds. I was afraid she had with the addition of the wet food so we're going to try to redo that a bit, give her a bit less in with the dry and see what that does. She's getting more active with the drop in temperature so she ought to be able to easily lose some weight this winter.

Then we visited with my folks for a little while, gave my Dad his birthday presents and just relaxed with them for a little while. By about 9:30am Dahlia was getting antsy and ready to get on our way, so we headed off to the Erie Canal Park for a 2 mile walk/run.

She had a blast! She only met one dog (the rest were either too aggressive or just too busy running with their owners to get to meet). The dog she met was some little schnauzer/poodle/something or other named Boomer. He looked like a tiny fat little sheep. Dahlia was off leash when we saw them coming and so was Boomer, so I let her stay off leash. She did something she's mor and more doing. She remained calm but then dropped into a sort of border collie crouch and froze. Absolutely froze. And then took off running at the poor little creature. Stupid me didn't tell her to stop and she barreled up to him like a crazy dog. Luckily she immediately set to sniffing and all calmed down but phew! Boomer's people were really nice and just adored Dahlia. They were a little freaked out by her intensity at first, but then saw her come out of it and relax, so they were fine. We met them on the way back too and I kept Dahlia under better control the second time around.

Dahlia ran a LOT of the two-mile trail. At one point she was sniffing and I kept walking. I was a couple hundred feet away from her when I called her name. She came barreling after me, then whipped around me and spun to face me, laying down. Then she jumped up and rushed me, trying to get the leash I was holding. We played a lot. IT was great fun.

On our way out we ran into an old family friend and a woman who just thought Dahlia was an amazingly awesome dog.

After the park, we ran to Petsmart to get some canned food for the Vermont trip (well those Nutro toppers so she can just have the one topper and nothing that needs to be saved for the next day). We got chatting with the Blue Buffalo rep for awhile who was very impressed with Dahlia's soft shiny coat and her personality (we feed her Blue as her kibble). The Nutro rep was almost most impressed with her and both oo'ed and ahh'ed over her. It was nice to have her so appreciated. At one point while they were petting her she just laid down and they both thought it was cute.

We met a 6 month old Aussie mix puppy there whose person asked if she could meet Dahlia (she's in the puppy class there and trying to socialize her pup with adults too). They met and had a nice time. Dahlia also met a nice boxer and a Pomeranian who growled and snapped at the puppy and the boxer but who was fine with Dahlia since Dahlia approached and immediately laid down in front of her. Cute.

So overall an exhausting morning of running around, but a lot of fun.

This afternoon, not so much fun. I spent WAY too much time at Walmart getting my oil changed. Ugh they were SO unorganized! But now the oil is changed, I have new windshield wipers, and new floor mats. All set to leave for Vermont!

Tomorrow I transport two 3-month old Aussie puppies. Can I keep one?

I took Dahlia down to the park today and took some pictures. She just got groomed yesterday so she's looking all spiffy!



( More back here )

Dahlia is off to the groomer's today. Poor girl apparently looked like she was being tortured as they took her away from David. Of course, once she gets back there she'll become super flirt and make the rounds saying hi to all the doggies. Her "tortured" act doesn't fool me one teensy tinsy bit! The folks from the place tell us she's an incredible flirt with all the other dogs. They all adore her there and one older lab named Chester follows her around like she's the cat's meow (and Chester is almost always there as he belongs to one of the workers). He has a thing for black fluffy dogs.

So nice try girl, really, but I'm not stupid! lol

Last night we were out on our walk and Dahlia was sniffing around when I noticed, back toward a house, a dog tied out (to the tree). I told David to watch out as the dog started to come toward us. It moved slowly though and seemed interested in Dahlia. The strange thing? Dahlia didn't rush the dog. Usually when she sees a dog she gets so excited she has to run right over to it, sometimes a bit faster than she should. Sometimes she does a sort of border collie crouch and freezes and THEN rushes the dog (I'm trying to work on that one!).

But this time she went up slowly and the dogs touched noses and met very nicely. The dog was very calm and didn't rudely sniff Dahlia or anything. He just wanted to come say hi.

I noticed as he came into the light that the poor thing was missing patches of hair all over his body and some hair looked like it was growing back in. He looked like he might have mange or something along that line.

The owner then pulled in (her friends had let the dog out and were keeping an eye on him from inside the house -- I could see them in the window) and came over to talk to us. It turned out that the dog was named Zeke. He was a Newfie/Shepherd mix and he was 17 years old! She said he didn't have mange or anything like that, "he was just old." She had had him since she was in high school and just adored the dog.

And the really amazing thing? He still wanted to play. And Dahlia wanted to play too! She started play bowing in front of him and gently coming up to him with her play/growl face on. She would sort of dance around out of his range and then come up to him slowly and jump back. He even play bowed a couple times and ambled around her. It was like two dogs playing in slow motion and it was really awesome to watch.

At one point, Dahlia play bowed and jumped back out of his range. He came over to her and simply reached out a paw toward her. It was so incredibly sweet. I wish I had a photo of that moment. It's an image that will stay with me forever.

I took Dahlia down to Barry Park to get some photos of her in the Autumn leaves. Gotta have some October/Autumn photos for my calendar after all! I brought out the silly "jester" collar I picked up for her and her stuffed pumpkin. Just for sheer cuteness.



( More back here )

Dahlia and I were on our walk this afternoon and stepped onto the grass to avoid a woman and her rather enthusiastic young pit bull. What does the woman do? Stop on the sidewalk near us and say "Should we cross the road?"

Um no...why don't you just KEEP WALKING?

And the dog is training at the (retractable) leash to greet Dahlia. She told me he was friendly and I said that Dahlia was too. Well, on THAT she released the button the retractable and the dog RUSHES Dahlia, jumps on her head. She rears up and growls/air snaps near him and he tries to go after her (not sure if it was in play or not), but I backed her up and the woman finally got the intelligence to yank her dog back. Her response "well, he's usually friendly." My response? Well, I wasn't quite sure how to tell her that her dog was rude and ignorant of proper canine greeting behavior and freaked Dahlia out.

But...

To top it off. In order to get away from him she backed RIGHT INTO a big bush with burrs in it. She had TONS in her fur. I pulled all the ones out of her back end and hips. But...they all got into her tail. Like 10 of them or so in a big clump with her tail fur all wrapped around it.

OH NOES NOT THE GIGANTIC TAIL OF DOOM!!!!

I ended up rushing back to the house where we attacked the tail with a little bit of scisssor work and a lot of brushing. Dahlia was NOT a happy dog and ended up laying in my lap with her ears back and her eyes looking all buggy while David got it out (plenty of experience from his last dog). Her tail just has a chunk of it out near the base, but the rest looks ok. Poor girl!

I took Dahlia out to the Doggy Mall today (Petsmart, Pets Supplies Plus) to get some more food. We came back with a bunch of awesoem stuff: besides chicken chips and duck and sweet potato treats, we also got a bunch of canned food: Some stuff by Evanger (whole chunks of beef and pheasant, nothing else bot those in it!) and Merrick (various kinds of "stews"). They're all chunks of meat, rather than the ground up canned stuff. I really like the chunks for her. Somehow it feels fresher and looks better to me. So she got a bunch. We add about half a can to her food at night and mix it all together. She chows it right down!

I took some photos of her this afternoon hanging out on my couch. You can see the cut on her nose. It's pretty big, the poor girl. It looks like she tore a chunk of the black off. It's been like this for nearly a week and while it doesn't look worse, it doesn't look better. Anyone know if these sorts of nose cuts take a long time to heal?

( Some pics )

Of what? Of Dahlia of course! lol

First this one, because it was too cute.



( A few more )

Last week I got an e-mail from the folks with ARPH looking for transporters for an extra special transport. Lincoln, a tri-colored Aussie needed a ride out of Cleveland, Ohio to Ottawa. The story told about Lincoln was heartbreaking and horrifying.

[Lincoln was] rescued from shelter by someone who was transporting for another rescue. She noticed this dog covered in motor oil that had dried over matted fur. He was placed in the shelter thru a puppy door and warden didn't know how they could have shoved him in there as door pretty small. Vet felt he could be saved. His bandages are changed daily for the next couple weeks. The whites of his eyes are very red and vet says it is stress, as no damage whatsoever to the eyes. Here is his pix. Great with other dogs and appears to be housebroken. Loves loves loves people and very velcro.

The picture that was attached (which you can see at he top left of this post) showed a very happy dog in a cone. Lincoln the conehead. With all he had been through he was still smiling. I think that shows a lot of promise for this wonderful dog.

With tears in my eyes, I immediately signed up for the transport.

The drive out this morning was uneventful, except for the typical NYS construction and a good amount of rain. It was rather unfortunate that we were in the midst of a downpour as it meant little time outside for Lincoln and not as much time for me to get to know him.

The person I was to meet in Rochester was running a little bit behind (caused by a miscommunication as to where they were meeting), so we got Lincoln out of her car, let him do his business and got him into my car rather quickly.

My first impression of him was that he appeared somewhat traumatized. His eyes were wide open. You could see the whites. He looked around himself as if he were in a bit of a daze, not quite sure where he was or where he was going. He didn't seem to be able to focus his eyes on anyone or anything. Once we got him on the ground (due to his condition and his multiple stitches he wasn't allowed to jump on his own), he darted back and forth. He still had the cone on his head, so he would try to sniff and was then thwarted by the giant cone. I'm not really sure if he was traumatized or if the cone was leaving him a bit disoriented. It would leave me that way if I had that thing on my head!

We lifted him up into my car and placed him on the pillows in my back seat. There he seemed to settled a little bit, though he spent much of the trip pacing back and forth and looking out the windows (what the passersby must have thought of Lincoln the Conehead!). At one point, he decided he wanted to be up with me in the front, though that attempt was thwarted by cone once again. He ended up settling for standing with his paws on the divider and trying to stick his face into mine. Also rather difficult with that cone! I'm sure I would have been covered in kisses and had a dog in my lap if it weren't for that darned cone!

I do have to say though that nothing Lincoln did was done frantically. He was completely calm the entire time, though I did get some smiles out of him by talking to him for much of the trip. His eyes were no longer red, though they were wide open. I'm not sure if that were from stress and nerves or if his eyes are always like that. Either way, he was a sweet dog and a really handsome one. He'll find a new home soon I'm sure. I look forward to hearing about his new life!

( Pics )

I'm reading Patricia McConnell's latest book, Tales of Two Species: Essays on Loving and Living with Dogs. It's a collection of the articles she wrote for The Bark magazine (she still works for them).

In a section discussing what dogs have lost and gained by being housebound and not let out to roam the neighborhood all day, she says "What we can do is be mindful of how often our dogs have the freedom of choice. How many walks has your dog taken in which he got to decide where to go? How often does your dog get to decide when to stop sniffing? Ever let your dog choose the direction to follow at the dog park? These are good questions to ask ourselves as we exercise our dog's minds and bodies at dog parks and agility trials."

David and I always try to give Dahlia a bit of freedom. Not only do we allow her off leash in safe places as often as possible (and I'm very thankful we have a nearby park where we can do this frequently), but we also allow her to choose her own direction to go in on leashed walks. I often stop at the sidewalk and ask her which way she wants to go. I let her choose until I feel her choice is going to take us too far from home and make the walk back tiring for us both. But ultimately she gets to shape our walks. Sometimes she takes us on familiar walks we've done many times. Other times she takes us to new places or on a different route through the neighborhood, doubling back and following unexpected paths. We let her stop and sniff and spend all the time she wants taking in the "pee-mail." I'm sure some would think it indulgent and still others would consider Dahlia the "alpha" in the relationship. I'm glad to see that Patricia McConnell agrees with our choice.

A friend of ours has been borrowing David's camera and reported that the battery seems to give out after only 4 or 5 photos, so I decided to charge it up and use it in my camera. Well, I got more than that, but still only about 25-30 photos (significantly less than the often 400-500 I can get on my other battery). Both David and I went down to Barry Park and took pictures of Dahlia (yeah I know...surprise surprise!).

( Some photos )

Outside of the two crazy incidents, yesterday was a lot of fun. David and I took Dahlia up to the park in the morning. She got to play with a yellow lab for a short bit (and yay for the guy telling us his dog was harmless and that he was fixed!) and then chased after a ball for a bit. She actually got the zoomies and ran around us a few times with it before eventually coming near us and dropping it. She's no expert fetcher, but she's getting better at it!

Then David headed off to church with his parents, Dahlia and I took our ill-fated walk, and then spent some time just hanging out on the porch.

The afternoon was spent tromping around down by the Connecticut River in Bellows Falls, checking out some more mill foundations and getting some more pictures. We finally got a chance to relax some that evening and I finally finished the book I had been reading and started another. All in all, despite a couple bumps on the road due to crazy and arrogant people, we had a nice day.

David's mother, btw, drove by the house with me and she took down the information about the guy and his dog. She's going to go over to Town Hall this week to talk to them about it! Rock on Marta!

( Some pics from yesterday )


This morning we took Dahlia for a walk in one of the local cemeteries, had a nice lunch and then headed home. It was a pretty easy trip home though traffic was a bit much sometimes. We left about 1:30pm and with a 15-20 minute stop in Chester to check out the antique store, got home in about 5 hours. Not bad at all!

( Some pics from this morning )


On the way home, we stopped at this lovely church in Hoosick that we've always meant to stop at. It's just beautiful!

( A couple pics )

Yesterday we decided to take the trail up Fall Mountain (across the river in New Hampshire). Now, it's not a REAL mountain. It's really a big hill (at about 880 ft), but it's still a pretty steep trail, especially for me. We took it slow and stopped frequently as I have asthma and it was a rough trip up at times. But other than that it was quite ok. The trail is nice in that it starts out steep and then flattens out a bit at the top. Dahlia had a blast on the way up, checking everything out and trotting on out ahead of us. She explored out into the woods a bit but always stuck close to us. We got to the top (something known as Table Rock, which the locals have been calling it for ages) and the view was SO worth the climb! We spent a good 45 minutes or so on the top, taking pictures and just relaxing. The way back down was pretty easy, though Dahlia must have been tired as she stopped and laid down several times. We ran into a nice couple on their way up. Rather than leash Dahlia up, I told her to stay and she froze in her tracks (good girl!). The couple love dogs though so I let her go up to them. Turned out they had a 15 1/2 year old Shepherd mix they used to hike with but he was too old to do it now. Later on down the trail we ran into a family from Michigan who were heading up. It was nice to see some folks and their kids out there. They were all enthralled with Dahlia and gave her plenty of ear scratches and hugs and chin scritches. She eventually just flopped own on her side in front of them waiting for her belly rub. Silly girl! They were just amazed at her sweet temperament. I think the family would have taken her home if they could have! lol

( Some pictures...Warning: a picture of bees in here, not sure if anyone has any fear of them! )

Yesterday we went out to Franklin, NH again. We've been out there 3 or 4 times together now. It's one of the towns David is doing his dissertation on, so we keep going back. This time he wanted to walk along the opposite side of the river from where the path is and try to get some shots of the (paper) mill foundations over there. That meant there was a lot of tromping through underbrush and trees, and climbing over things, including the old foundations. It was tough going, but we had a lot of fun. Well, at least until the end. David went on ahead and I stayed with Dahlia (you didn't think we left her behind did you?) because the area was too precarious for her and he came back a muddy mess. One shoe got totally sucks into mud and he ended up losing his balance and falling. His pants from the knee to the bottom were all covered in mud, as was his butt, the lower part of his shirt, and his hands. LOL Luckily I had the blanket I use for dogs in my car, so we were able to cover up the seat and head to Walmart where he found a cheap pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt to change into.

( A bunch of pics of the day )