Sadie update

Sadie is not standing or walking, and has not relieved herself in any way since Foster took her. The lack of urinating is what had me freaked. The vet was unable to determine what was wrong with her without further diagnostics, which we declined for the time being ($$). She is still eating and drinking, which is a very positive sign, so Foster will watch her for the next day or two to see if her situation improves. They prescribed Rimadyl, a pain reliever, and are hoping that will allow her to get up and move around a little more. If she does not improve in the next couple of days, diagnostic testing such as xray and bloodwork are indicated. She is an older dog (arthritis?), recently had spay surgery, and has had a ton of transition, so we are hoping that is all it is. Her temp and other stats were mostly normal. She is heartworm positive, is blind in her right eye (we think cataract) and has a boney mass on her left foreleg. She is clearly terrified, so that is amplifying whatever problems she is having. She is a sweet, sweet girl.

When I approached her at Foster's house, no one else was in the room, so I walked up to her slowly on the side I knew she could see me. I averted my eyes and walked up to her kind of sideways so I wouldn't intimidate her. I crouched down next her her with the side of my body facing her and put my hand near her (I didn't reach for her) palm up so she could sniff. She did and gave me big kisses hello. She is SO sweet - she would be dangerous for me to foster. This is a new foster to Rescue Angels and he is fantastic. He's really committed and obviously very compassionate. She clearly trusts him. I really hope she improves.

Emergent Foster Case

I don't know if I have ever mentioned that I am the Foster Coordinator for my rescue. I had sort of stepped back from it while I was dealing with Cheetah and the puppies, but I am dipping my toes back in.



Earlier today I got an email from one of our brand new fosters telling me that he was a little worried about Sadie. After going back and forth a bit I have learned that she can't stand up because her back legs are too shaky, and while she has been eating and drinking, she has not eliminated one time since he got her last night. She is also utterly terrified, and flinches like she has been abused. Although now I find out she is also blind in one eye, which can make a dog flinchy.



Foster doesn't have a car so I am picking him up at 5 to go to the vet. I am worried that she is in kidney failure. He also sent me some detailed pictures and I can see she has had puppies and it looks like she was spayed within the last month or so. This could be a complication from surgery. I will have a better sense of it once I see her in person. I'll keep you posted.

Schroeder the Goof

I just realized I forgot to post this update from 7.27.09

***

The first picture is of Schroeder on his back. I stood over him and took the picture.

The other pictures are of him and his food dish. He starts throwing his dish around when he thinks he should be fed. He has also been eating all my raspberries, grapes(which are not that good for him so I cut a lot of them down) and any other fruit he can get to. He loves apples, watermelon, blueberries, etc...

Cheetah 7.29.09

I am feeling much better today. PA and Daughter came over for dinner last night and for some reason it settled me down a lot. Cheetah did amazingly well having them in the house. It was my hope that since she had met them twice before in various settings (and is sleeping with PA's shirt to familiarize her with the smell) that she would be less reactive about them being in the house. This proved true and we only had once or twice when she scared Daughter with insistence that she remain seated. But she eventually settled down enough to let everyone move freely and she was even doing tricks for Daughter! It was great. Hopefully I can hang onto this feeling until Saturday. I don't expect it to be easy that day, but it would be great if I could remain at peace until then. This is going to be so good for her - after playing with Daughter all evening she conked right out at bedtime. And I find I am never at a loss for things to talk about with PA. :-)

Cheetah 7.28.09

Yesterday, Cheetah was challenging. It started when I let the dogs out after I got home from work. I went and changed my clothes and went outside and there was Swiffer, but no Cheetah. So I did my loud come here whistle, and she comes trotting over the other side of the back fence. Sigh. She hopped it like a gazelle, and I just didn't have it in me to yell at her. Also, she did what I asked by coming when I called her, and I should not have let her out on her own, so I had no real reason to yell at her. I just thought with Swiffer out there too, she'd stay put. No dice. Ah but she had been hunting. She carried with her a mini soccor ball that likely belongs to the kids behind and a house down from us. She had the time of her life playing with it. It was better than her own balls because it was hard won - she had been successful on the hunt! Even when she is bad she makes me laugh.

So we came in and I fed them and decided to take a shower. As usual she hid in the bedroom while I showered. Afterwards, while I was drying off I noticed a spider on the bathroom floor. I am not one to kill bugs, but Cheetah has a ball chasing flies, so I thought this might interest her too. So I went and got her and she came slinking in with her tail tucked (please don't give me a shower). I pointed out the spider, but she was too worried to see where I was pointing. I kept saying "Cheetah, look!" but she thought I wanted her to get in the tub. She kept going and looking in and pacing back. She alsmost jumped in at one point, which I did NOT want bc we have a slow drain and there was still water in the tub! It was cute though because she was trying so hard to please me and just decided to brace herself and do what she thought I wanted. Finally I gave up on the spider and just dismissed her so she wouldn't work herself into a total frenzy. I plan to bathe her Friday before she goes and I don't want to traumatize her.

So then I grabbed the book I was reading and invited her back outside. I sat on the deck and watched her sniff around the yard and then got engrossed in my book. The next thing I know, I hear her start barking and look up in time to see her ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FENCE again running toward the neighbor's house and the other barking dog. I hear a guy's voice but not what he was saying. But it didn't sound good. This time I did not whistle. I yelled for Cheetah in the "OK you really screwed the pooch now" voice. She turned on a dime and came back over to the fence. I said "what are you doing over there?!" "Get back over her now! COME!" Now, this is not the advisable way to get your dog to come to you. It never ceases to amaze me that a dog will come when someone is yelling at them. Would you come to a crazy angry person screaming at you in a language you did not understand? But she did. And she went directly into the house as I stomped in after her. Thank god PA has a 6 foot privacy fence.

Later I was sitting on the couch and she started mouthing me and trying to get me to play. I have really been enforcing the no teeth rule, because of Daughter. So she out and out nipped the front of my ankle. I have a very fast reaction time for that sort of thing (which is handy for corrections) and immediately said HEY! I can scare a 300 lb linebacker when I do that because it is sudden and it comes right from the diaphram. She went and laid down as soon as I did it. She chooses NOW to get nippy?

Oh but there's more. We went down to the basement to watch some TV and I shut the door to where the cat was and invited her down. Mr PM caught her starting to pee on the carpet!! WTF?? OK so now I am getting concerned bc she just doesn't really do that. He took her right outside and she did not go. He caught her early in so it wasn't much, but still... I have a few theories.

1. She was marking right outside the cat room (for obvious reasons)
2. She is getting sick
   
3. She is really picking up on my grief and being reactive
4. She is being selfless and trying to make her departure easier on me :-P

I suspect #3 is the answer. But I am keeping an eye on this in case she is getting a bladder infection or something.

She then proceeded to try to eat Mr. PM's backback, so we got her a toy, which she ripped to shreds. She investigated the garbage, which she never does, and she decided to harrass poor Swiffer, which had me standing over her a good part of the show. In her efforts to appease me, she managed to knock over my drink with her tails sweeping back and forth at coffee table level.

The whole night was just one thing after another. I finally lost my patience when the drink went over. Then everyone calmed down and laid down - and of course the show ended around that time, so we went to bed.

This morning she came in and woke me up with her usual enthusiastic nose in the face and some licking and snuffling. I have resolved to try to calm down more and thus calm her down. She is SO attuned to the emotions around her.

So I started to talking to her in the bed this morning. She does this thing where she will look at me and woof, like she is talking back. She wakes me up in the morning so I can get up and come feed her. Really she just wants me to get up, but she seems to find the breakfast a nice bonus. My goal until Saturday is to just be in the moment with her as much as possible, so that she can relax as well.

Fostering

After Cheetah leaves Aug 1, I will be taking the month off from fostering. I expect I will have a lot of Cheetah updates, and on August 16, there is going to be a Rescue Angels reunion taking place at my house, so I will get to see some of the dogs I fostered before, plus about 100 I haven't! I will likely have some pictures and stuff from that. It is my hope that when I start up fostering again in September, we will fire up the webcam again so you can have live pictures when we have a puppy (or two). I won't always have puppies, but I have had quite a few in the past, before the litter.

Cheetah's first visit to new home

I find that I am having a hard time reporting on this, so please forgive if the posts become a little sparse.

Cheetah's visit went well yesterday. She was nervous but we stayed until she calmed down (a little over 3 hours). She showed a real affinity to Daughter, although she got carried away and nipped a few times. I am working with them on how to handle that and nip it in the bud (no pun intended). Her excitement level was particularly high as both my and PA's anxiety level was up (I was sad and she was nervous about what I thought), and I am sure that was revving her up even more. It was also about an hour car ride, which was super stimulating, and I gave her Dramamine. Cheetah seems to have a reverse side effect from drugs you would expect to make her sleepy.

She did manage to sneak away and poop in daughter's room (!!) but PA was very cool about it and understanding. It was actually my fault because Cheetah was barking at me - which usually means she is telling me something - but I took it as excited barking and failed to let her out.

But they had fun toys for her (just the kind she likes) and PA made her chicken and rice for dinner, which she of course thought was AWESOME. We ended by taking her for a walk around the neighborhood, and she was downright impressive with little Daughter holding the leash. She was walking loose lead and often healing. I am here to tell you - that is a big accomplishment. She never ceases to amaze me with her progress.

It was neat for me bc I got to see the video of Daughter finding out about Cheetah, and I got to see the house and neighborhood. There are a lot of dogs around, which she will love, and PA has a bench seat in front of her front window, where Cheetah can perch during the day and watch the world go by as she enjoys doing.

It was a reality slap for me though - I am not handling it too well. I know she will be in good hands and I will see her again eventually, but at the moment it is not any easier. This morning she came and hopped into the bed (placing her head right on Mr. PM's pillow - it is pretty cute) and gave me a lick on the face and I woke up to her tail going a mile a minute waiting for her morning scratch. It's just hard.

I will try to take a lot of pictures and some video of her this week. I will be focused on spending time with her though so I don't know how successful I will be. PA and daughter are coming to our house to visit Tuesday night to give her yet another chance to get used to them. Then she will go home Saturday. I will take her and stay with her until she calms down enough for me to slip out. I think it will be more traumatic if she sees me leave, since she does not understand goodbye, so I will say my goodbyes to her before that, so she doesn't get aggitated when I go. The goodbye is for me, after all. And I will not handle it well if she is crying at the door when I leave.

Cheetah's adoption

Well, it sounds like all went really well and Daughter is super excited by her birthday surprise that Cheetah is coming to join her family. I have to admit I was a little worried that she might want a puppy instead or something along those lines. But PA tells me she is giddy with excitement. That makes me really happy - and I suppose really sad too because it solidifies everything. But knowing how excited they are and how much Cheetah is wanted and will be loved makes it a little easier. It is really nice to be able to tell PA what mixed feelings I have about all of this and not worry that it will put her off. She is very understanding and I appreciate it. It helps not to have to try to hide it.

We are going for a visit tomorrow. I have been prepping Cheetah with a car harness the last couple of days. She doesn't love it, but she also doesn't bark her head off in the car! That is pretty bonus. Anyway I will let you know how it goes.

Happy birthday to Daughter!

Poppy 7.23.09 blog update

Poppy wears the cone of shame. LOL

The dreaded e-collar.

lesson for the day

Do not try to teach "off" with a peanut butter sandwich. It is both futile and messy.

Cheetah - a complete history

For all of you hard-core Cheetah fans out there - I thought you might enjoy this slightly redacted letter that I wrote to Cheetah's prospective adopter after she asked me a few initial questions. (I do nothing half assed.)

* * *

OK here we go.

History:
I do not know very much about Cheetah before she came to me. All I know is that she was pulled at the last moment by the person who does our pulls for us. I tend to stay out of the shelter side of things or I would have a pack of 500 dogs. But she was not a scheduled pull, I do know that. We always pull from high kill shelters and she came from North Carolina. The person just thought she was sweet and grabbed her the night before she was due to be euthanized. She was adopted right off the transport by a woman named ["FO" first owner] who fell in love with her right away. A few days later I got a call from Kristina, the Exec Director of the rescue telling me that surprise! Cheetah was pregnant with "no less than 7 puppies" and what in the world were we going to do. FO had no intention of giving her up, but she could not handle the puppies in her apartment. Somehow I talked my husband into letting me take her in and help her whelp. I immediately bonded with Cheetah and she trusted me from the get go. She came a few days before she whelped so she could get used to the place. I had the spare bedroom all set up for her, but she decided my bedroom closet was more to her liking and started nesting in there. So at the last minute I cleared out my closet and threw a tarp and some newspapers in there and gave the closet to her. I had never whelped puppies before so it was quite the experience for me! I read everything I could get my hands on and she had 9 beautiful little puppies. The entire time she laid in my lap and had no problem with me handling these strange little things coming out of her. The vet estimated her to be about a year old at that time - it was probably her first heat cycle. We took her to the emergency vet when she continued to push for over an hour after the last puppy with no results, but it turned out she was just pushing. Unfortunately while we are at the vet, one of the puppies stopped breathing and we could not get her going again. But the other 8 thrived. Cheetah and the puppies lived in my closet for 4 or 5 weeks before moving to the spare bedroom when it got too cramped for them. I would often sit in there with her in my lap while she nursed. The puppies really tore her up nursing so it must've been painful but she would lay there if I stayed with her.

Once the puppies weaned, she went back to FO. As I mentioned briefly, FO lived in an apartment. At this point in time, Cheetah still had raging hormones and had been through a lot of transition. When left alone in the small apartment all day she tore up the carpet and ate a bunch of school books. She also barked a lot. Then when FO came home, she was not very active with Cheetah and Cheetah did not get enough exercise, which exacerbated the situation. She became leash aggressive and snapped at any man or child she came across, and wasn't too thrilled with strangers in general. So, upon threat from her landlord, FO made the heart rending decision to surrender her back to the Rescue, knowing she would end up back with me. She went into boarding for a week as the last of the puppies went to their new homes. I took her back right after her spay surgery. She had some trouble with her incision (she should not have been spayed so close to having just whelped) so I was applying warm compresses to her twice a day and giving her antibiotics. She was very cooperative and extremely easy to pill.

Thinking back to when she first returned to me, she is not even the same dog now. Her fear of most people is gone. I do take control of the situation when she meets someone and tell them how to approach her. I have read a ton and went to 16 hours worth of seminars on how to work with fearful and/or hyper dogs. I have desensitized her to many things, changed her food, and she is well trained in a few key areas. We have a little way to go, but taking her to the dog park, I always get compliments on what a sweet, well-adjusted dog she is. I love her very much.

Dog Door/Crate Training:
She has neither a dog door, nor a crate. Despite FO's experience with her, Cheetah has never destroyed ONE thing in my house. In the beginning I was completely paranoid and she always had a treat ball and a bone of some sort and a new stuffed toy every day to keep her busy. But after changing her food and learning a few other calming techniques, and after she got into the routine of us going to work every day, I have noticed that she spends most of her time sleeping during the day. She likes behind the couch, in the bay window, and in our bedroom on the floor the best. So now, while I do try to rotate out her toys to keep her occupied, and I still give her a treat ball and the occasional chewy, it is not with the maniacal fear of her eating my furniture I once had. In other words I do not dump a truckload of stuff on her every morning anymore. She likes to have the room to move around in the house, and we have a finished basement to which I can shut the door (ranch style house). She she hangs out on the main floor all day (about 1500 sq ft) and Swiffer and Lexy, my Pomeranian and kitty, hang out in the basement. I am comfortable enough to leave Cheetah and Swiffer alone, but I still don't trust her alone with my cat (who is elderly and doesn't need the stress so I just keep them apart). We don't have a dog door but if we did I would not use it with Cheetah. This is because while we have about 1/2 acre fenced yard, the fence is only about 3 1/2 ft tall and she could go over it any time she felt like it. She generally doesn't, but I wouldn't leave her unattended with a fence that short. Initially I might be concerned about her barking until she got used to the environment.

Kids and Men:
Right now I am not worried about men at all. I would show you how to have people approach her to make sure she doesn't feel cornered or threatened. I feel pretty much the same way about children, but I don't get to observe her around them as much, and am just plain old more cautious when it comes to kids, so I would make sure she looks comfortable and relaxed. If there are a ton of kids running around that might be a situation for her to get used to. In my opinion, children are freaky to her because they tend to move quickly and unpredictably. They also tend to be higher energy than most adults. That is what a dog might pick up on and get riled up about. Cheetah is also a herding dog, and might try to herd them. She definitely prefers it when Me, my husband and Swiffer are all in the same room. When a dog herds sheep, they nip at their heels. If she tries to herd a bunch of kids, I could see that happening. But she hasn't been tested with that many kids, so I can't say exactly what would happen - that would just be what I'd watch for as it is common behavior in a shepherd breed. Introduction is everything for her I think.

MOTIVATION:
Cheetah likes treats, and loves her toys, but I would say her primary motivation is praise and attention. She responds very well to positive reinforcement methods. I do use treats for training, but generally I determine what she wants the most in that circumstance to get her to do something. For example, when she was torqued up on the gentle lead the other night, and barking her head off, she quickly learned that barking meant stop and silence meant we could proceed. Since that's what she wanted, she figured out within about 1/2 a block that no matter how excited she was feeling, she was not going to bark. By the way, since then I have determined that the gentle lead is more of a distraction than it is worth because she HATES it on her face, so I switched her to an Easy Walk halter with good results. She is a puller on the leash so she needs something to discourage her from doing so - I am not a fan of prong collars or other pain based deterrents. She absolutely knows I am in charge and I am the leader, but I do not pull "dominance" moves on her. I am very aware of my body language and of hers. I anticipate her and control her environment. She trusts me and feels I protect her, so she is obedient.

SLEEP:
She is a love bug and if I am home, she is at my side. She is not allowed on furniture and does not understand why Swiffer, her foster sib, is. I just try not to allow fosters into situations future owners my not like. She will make a play for the bed if I am in it alone (I admit that I have let her up there). But has never tried to jump on the couch or anything like that. She sleeps in our bedroom on the floor. She has a bed made for her, but she more often sleeps between the wall and the bed over by my husband. It must feel safer over there - she tried to move her puppies there once too. If she has any trouble calming down, turning out the light does the trick. She will stay put in the morning until my husband gets out of the shower and let's her out in the back yard at around 7:30. We go to bed around 10:30 or 11 most nights. Around 10 she is likely to head into the bedroom, assuming she has had enough stimulation during the day.

TOYS & PLAY:
She loves stuffed squeaky toys - she likes to play with them for anywhere from an hour to a few days and then rip them apart and extract the squeaker. She has never swallowed a squeaker. So I spend a lot of time at the sale bin at the pet store. :-) She never rips apart my stuff, so if she wants to rip apart hers, I figure that is her prerogative. This is something to keep in mind if your little girl has stuffed animals though - she is not likely to know the difference. Keeping them off of the floor will probably be enough of a deterrent. She doesn't even pull her own toys out of the box i keep them in, which is easily accessible to her. But anything on the floor is fair game.

She also likes plastic squeaky toys and balls - she doesn't rip those apart. She likes a variety of treats - I usually get a selection and stuff a treat ball. I have a few of those and she LOVES them. I think the molecule ball is her favorite. She has some rope toys she likes. Her favorite chew is a jerky stuffed pork bone. She'll spend quite a bit of time on those. She likes bully sticks too. She is a smart dog, so I focus on changing things out for her often and giving her variety.

She adores it when you get down on the floor with her to play. She likes to fetch, but really loves a good game of tug. Note: I like to "play rough" a little bit and wrestle around. She likes to use her mouth and has never once clamped down on me inappropriately. However, we all make mistakes and she has amazingly strong jaws - she can crack apart her bones like they are crackers. So I do not allow her to put her teeth on me, even gently. I am not worried about myself, but if she were to get carried away playing with a child it could end tragically. I do not believe she would ever bite on purpose, and like I said - so far she has never made a mistake. But I strongly recommend if you take her, that you continue this no teeth policy 100% of the time. She understands "no" perfectly well and stops what she is doing instantly if you say it.

Another game we play is chase. I never play this with her outside. But inside I will do a play bow and take one of her toys and run with it. She will chase me around and I will eventually throw it, and then I will chase her for it. Then I will do things like hide behind a door and jump out at her as she creeps by looking for me, and chase her for the toy. She LOOOOOVES this game. I never ever ever ever chase her outside bc I do not want her to get the idea it is ok for her to run away from me when it is important. I give her very clear signals as to the beginning of the game when we play inside so that she knows when I am playing and when I am serious.

FOOD:
We have been experimenting with food. She is currently on Solid Gold, which contains no corn or byproducts. Since switching her off of Science Diet (a corn based kibble) she has become a much more calm and stable dog. I am currently playing with the ratio of canned to kibble she gets.

Breakfast: I've been changing this up lately for various reasons, but right now she gets about 1/2 cup of high protein kibble, mixed with about 1/2 can of either Trader Joe's wet dog food or 1/2 can Solid Gold wet dog food. I add 2 capsules of probiotic supplement whenever she seems a little "off" or if I know she is going to be in a stressful situation that day and (sometimes) a dropper full of Rescue Remedy. The canned food is significantly lower in protein (9%) than the dry food (44%). There are unofficial implications (not scientifically proven) that lower protein levels promote a calmer dog. The corn/serotonin correlation has been scientifically determined. Canned food is historically nutritionally sub par to kibble, so I try to strike a balance as I continue to study this stuff.

Dinner: 1 to 1 1/2 cups (depending on activity level that day) Solid Gold kibble at a regular protein level (22%) topped with 1/4-1/3 cup (I eyeball it) nonfat yogurt (either Greek or Vanilla flavored).

She is significantly calmer and easier to manage since I switched her away from a corn based dog food (I am happy to tell you about that if you are interested). For a while she had some awful gas but as I have played with her diet, that has mostly subsided. So I think I am at about the right level now. She is eating less lately too (reflected in the amounts mentioned), so I think she is self regulating after recovering from nursing the giant puppies and trying to gain back some weight. She looks to me to be at a healthy weight now. She burps after she eats, which is pretty hysterical.

She is well behaved and so far does not beg. She did counter surf one time, but a) we should not have left it out; and b) she was still nursing and ravenous all the time. Overall, she is not that food motivated and has not done it again.


Routine:

• (my husband) lets Cheetah out in back yard after his shower. She doesn't go out alone bc she could jump the fence if she wanted to, but won't if we are watching her. She is less inclined to do so when Swiffer is out there with her, and now that it is summer and there is more shrubbery blocking the view. She also knows it makes us very unhappy when she does it (it's only happened a handful of times and she always comes back).
  
• After 9husband) lets Cheetah back in, he takes Swiffer (my dog, who is meak in nature and generally does not enjoy Cheetah, despite Cheetah's attempts to play) for a walk - Cheetah watches them leave and then comes and complains to me that they went without her. Sometimes she tries to get in bed with me.
• I get up and feed Cheetah breakfast (Dan feeds Swiffer and Lexy, my cat) and freshen her water bowl in the kitchen. I prefer to feed Cheetah myself (Lexy and Swiffer are often covered by Dan - esp in the morning). Before she eats she must sit until I put down her bowl and release her. If she jumps the gun we start over. Occasionally I interrupt her feeding by making her sit, petting her, sticking my hand in her bowl or taking her bowl away, just to make sure she is not developing any food aggression issues (she's not). However she will take assets away from Swiffer. She doesn't mess with her bowl, but the other day she stole a pizza crust from Swiffer and barked at her. So just keep an eye on that sort of thing. I corrected her and she didn't fixate at all when I took it away from her. But purely dog on dog, I could see her getting possessive with a bone etc.
  
• I play with her while I am getting dressed. This usually consists of some tug of war and or/fetch. Sometimes she just sits and watches me, follows me around, or goes to her post at the bay window.
• I fill her treat ball and leave it on the kitchen floor
• I rotate out her toys or sometimes add in a new one - she loves to destroy stuffed toys. Lately I have noticed she doesn't play much while we are gone. She sleeps. All of the playing and destruction happens while I am there to supervise :-)
• Sometimes I leave her with a jerky stuffed pork bone or other chew. Again, she usually waits until we come home to actually eat it. Chewing is a great way to relieve excess energy.
  
• I often turn on her CD "Through a Dog's Ear" and leave it on low volume/disk repeat. If I remember to do this at breakfast, I do, as I do not want her to associate it solely with me leaving.
• I tell her good-bye and that I will be back later. She usually just looks at me (unlike later in the day when she would show interest in coming with me.)
• She hops up into the window and watches us drive away. Based on the times I work from home, she spends her day wandering to various nap spots. She might play with her treat ball a little or grab a drink, but that's about it.
• Most of the time she is in the window when we return from work. She greets us at the door when we come in. She clearly knows our car because she will bark at a strange car.
• I let her out in the back yard and she hops around for a while, chases any birds dumb enough to stick around, and does her business. Lately we let Swiffer out with her and they have a good game of chase. Cheetah then helps me get Swiffer to come back in the house! (It is my one failing with Swiffer - she does not come reliably.) Cheetah responds very well to calling her and especially whistling.
  
• (husband) or I feed the cat in the basement and I feed the dogs in the kitchen - they eat the same thing and I set them up at different ends of the kitchen at the same time. So far no problems or thievery with this system. I stand in the middle in case anyone is tempted, but I can walk out with no problem.
• If it is dog park night we get in the car, which Cheetah is always raring to do. I limit dog park to 2 or 3 times a week to control adrenaline levels. Note: she is a nutball in the car. She loves it (she used to hate it) but she barks at everything. I tried a citronella bark collar and that had some effect, but the battery immediately died after the first use, so there wasn't consistency. Since I can't really pull over and stop every single time she barks I am looking fro other motivators. It has occurred to me recently that she loves having the window open. SO I am going to try closing the window every time she barks and putting it back down when she stops to see if that works.
  
• If we do not go to the dog park, I will often let her back out in the yard to play a little more. She never goes out unsupervised, as she has proven ability to jump our fence if she feels like it. However she is well trained in recall when I whistle.
  
• At some point during the evening I usually try to take her for a significant walk. I had been using a Gentle Lead and I use a very light weight cat leash to avoid unnecessary pressure or pulling sensation on her face. She usually expresses a lot of frustration for about a block (she rears up and does this high pitched bark, as well as dipping her head trying to get the thing off her face). I simply tell her no and continue walking when she struggles and stop walking if she barks. Lately she is controlling herself in the presence of birds when we walk!! This is a huge deal. She is also getting the idea about sitting at a curb. We will stand there until she does it - sometimes she is more ornery than others. I just say "sit" and if she doesn't initially do it i will gently touch her about where her tail is attached. (I do not push her down.) I do this once every 30 seconds or so until she sits. Then she is rewarded with verbal praise, petting and progress. I JUST started her on Easy Walk harness and since we have such an easy back yard, I have not walked her on leash enough yet to tell you how well it works, but it is promising and I would recommend it for her.
  
• If it is crummy out I make a point of running through extra training exercises. Sit, Down, Targeting, Paw, Up (on hind legs), we are working on Stay (I forgot to release her the other day and Dan called my attention to the fact that she was still sitting in the kitchen! haha), and we are just starting Off (don't eat the treat sitting in front of you until I say so).
• She usually takes a bit of a nap near where I am sitting. At some point I turn off her CD.
  
• I play with her or sit on the floor and cuddle her
• more sitting and napping or she self entertains.
  
• I get ready for bed and she usually plays around or sits in her bed. She usually follows me back and forth as I prepare for bed. I freshen the water bowl in the bedroom.
• I tell her it is bed time and most of the time she lays down. If she is restless, this is usually remedied by turning out the light.

Remaining Triggers:
I think we have narrowed the field of triggers quite a bit. Things that still bug her seem to be as follows:

• someone running will often bug her, especially if she cannot investigate or attempt to herd (is on leash or behind a barrier). Note: *I* do not like to run, so I have never run with her. But I strongly suspect she would be fine with it if I did it and she could be with me while I did.
  
• things that look out of the ordinary to her - bicycles and motorcycles are particulalry offensive but cement trucks, a pick up that has something big in the back, an open window in the car next to us, a man in a business suit... all fit that bill. She doesn't really care for seeing people move from one place to another under any power other than their own two feet, at a walking pace. However, they laundry list of things that look weird to her is shrinking.
  
• most wildlife: birds, rabbits, squirrels (I don't expect to ever fully remedy this one as it is based in pure instinct)
• territorial: no one is welcome in our house unless you live there and certainly not if she has not met you before (she has been fine with Kristina, the Rescue Exec Director, entering our house in the past and she did great when one of her puppies visited with owners so we are making progress.) This is a tough one to desensitize bc we don't have people over very often except cleaners every 2 weeks and occasional family visits. This is her worst remaining problem from our perspective. In a new house I would recommend having a lot of people over initially before she decides the house is hers, to get her used to the idea. Part of the problem may be that she had her puppies in my house. She was not territorial until the cleaners scared her and she felt the need to defend them one day. I saw the whole thing on webcam.
  
• She is generally excited beyond belief in the car and barks at "everything" - other dogs being walked, the things that look out of place as mentioned above, people, etc. My theory on this is that it is not unlike the fence or the leash - she can't get to the thing that is exciting her. AFTER the dog park she is less barky than before.
  
• Big thunder and lightening storms - not as bad as Swiffer but seeks comforting. We use DAP spray, dryer sheets, Rescue Remedy and a calming collar. In my opinion only the Rescue Remedy is significantly effective.
  

Former Triggers (or at least mostly former) and other accomplishments - hooray!

• Men - seems gone
  
• People of any ethnicity other than Caucasian - seems gone
  
• Children - huge strides, not yet sure if it is gone but she has been doing great - it might be gone
  
• More responsive to recall under excitement or distraction (she has always been good under no stress to a recall command.)
  
• More self control on a leash in the presence of exciting stimulus (like a bird)
• More well behaved on a leash (still needs work. she is of course more likely to be well behaved if she has had a chance to blow off some steam)
  
• Faster sits at the curb (still needs some work)
  
• Reliable automatic sit/stays until release before eating
• Generally not hyper anymore
• fences - if there is a fence and there is someone on the other side of that fence - it was offensive. I think this was a subset of the territorial problem, but I am not quite sure how it fits. Anyway, she seems much better with this at places like the dog park. She definitely likes one of our neighbors better than the other (but so do I so she is probably picking that up from me)
  

HOUSE TRAINING & CRATE:
She is very well housebroken - the only time she has ever had an accident in the house was right after she had the puppies and she had very little control. She will tell you when she has to go out - if she has to go badly, she will come up to you and bark. I just sort of know now when she has to go. She mostly goes twice a day and that's it. She always poops the second she gets to the dog park no matter what so be prepared for that!

She has never been crated while with me. I have never seen a need. She spends most of her time looking out the window or sleeping. She is alone for 8-10 hours a day. She adores sitting in the bay window. She absolutely needs stimulation and exercise after a day of inactivity, but she does fine on her own.


HEAT & DOG PARK:
She does OK in the heat - the dog parks I take her to always have water available and she will drink a lot if she is hot. She does like the water, but she has not shown an interest in full out swimming - once she got in up to her chest, she turned around. She is terrified of baths - i must have done something wrong there. I took her in the shower with me (something her pups have done with their new owners all on their own so I thought it would be less traumatic. No dice.) I don't think she would mind if you put water on her though, as long as you do it in a non-confrontational feeling way. If she gets hot or tired she will take a break and lay down as long as she feels safe.

She does very well at the dog park with most dogs and most people. The only time she has gotten into a skirmish is if she feels she has no escape and the other dog comes at her. There has never been a time when I have been unable to predict that response coming. But overall she has good social skills and will avoid confrontation when possible. I keep a close eye on her, but I try to see what she is going to do before I call her off or step in. Usually she makes a good choice. She likes to stalk other dogs and then leap out at them. But she doesn't attack them, she pulls back before she reaches them. It's a throwback to her herding instinct. It freaks out the owners of little dogs, but she never hurts them. I only call her off if the owner is getting freaked, never because she has hurt or threatened a little dog. The owners are way more freaked out than the dogs. When dog fights break out at the dog park, I always call her to me (dogs all go running when they hear that happening just like people) and she will do a u-turn on her way to the show to come back to me. Of course I always praise her like crazy for that.

TOWNHOUSE:
One of her puppies went to a townhouse so I asked the owners what they thought about that now that they have had her a while. Here is what she said. I will tell you up front that Cheetah is not as hyper as her puppy, who is about 5 1/2 months old right now.

"I've been thinking about how to answer this. It is really hard to separate [puppy] from being a puppy and her being a very high energy breed. But, for what it's worth, this is my two cents:

As far as having [puppy] in a rowhouse, it is not a problem. I don't feel that it is too small of a size for her. However, we do have the benefit of having a nice, fairly large (for a row house), fenced in backyard that she can play in whenever she gets too crazy. Also, we live 1.5 blocks from [a park], which is a hopping dog park. She goes there almost every night. And, when we don't do that we're taking her running in the Arboretum or to Shirlington. We have found that we HAVE to do something very active with her every day or she goes crazy. She hasn't destroyed anything, but she drives us nuts until she gets at least 1-1.5 hrs of activity. We don't have a dog walker that comes because [husband] works from home and can let her out/spend time with her throughout the day. She may benefit from several long walks throughout the day instead of one big block of play time, but we've found it works better for us to spend and hour or two doing something very active with her.

Also, we've found that several people at the dog park also have Aussies. They have similar sized homes and it sounds like it hasn't been a problem for them either. But, they are all runners and take their dogs for a long run each day.

I'm not sure how active Cheetah is, but if she's high energy and the potential owner can give her a good bit of exercise each day, I think she should do fine in a rowhouse. "

Please let me know if you have any other questions. As you can see, I am happy to answer. No matter what you think of anything I have said here, I hope you will meet her and get your own impressions, and make sure that nothing was lost in translation.

Oh, one more thing. When Cheetah had her puppies I had her on a webcam so we could watch them from work. As such, she has a VERY devoted following (as you saw from all of the updates). Would you be open to keeping us updated on her progress and how she's doing if you adopt her? I am also planning to do a litter reunion in April 2010, and she would be invited to that.

Cheetah big news

I have some news that is probably going to disappoint some of you, because I know many hoped I would keep Cheetah. I wanted to wait to tell you until I was pretty certain, since we have had disappointments in the past. I think I have found a great home for Cheetah.



All of the pictures in this post were taken by her prospective adopter ("PA") this weekend when we met at the dog park.

Let me start by telling you that I came as close as you can come to keeping her. Mr. PM and I had some - let's call them "lively" discussions about it. He strongly felt that Cheetah was not a good fit for us, but he relented if it would make me happy. I was all set to plow through with that. But I also did not feel right about bringing another individual into our home permanently if he was not really on board with the idea. That didn't seem fair to anyone involved. I also felt the annoying grain of truth behind his viewpoint (which pissed me off for the record). In the mean time I got an application on Cheetah, and thought "this person had better blow my socks off or there is no way I will even consider this."

Then I had the week to myself while Mr. PM went to a conference for work and I had some time alone with the animals and my thoughts. I really observed the dynamics of what was going on, trying to remove the rose colored glasses. Here are some of the things I realized.

1. My elderly cat is still stuck in the basement. The only time she comes out is when the dogs go outside. The last time she came upstairs, I picked her up and she hissed at me, because she felt trapped and was afraid the dog would come back. Cheetah now often accompanies me into the basement, and when that happens, Lexy is stuck not only downstairs, but trapped in a room with the door closed so that Cheetah doesn't chase her. If I leave Cheetah upstairs, she cries because she can't be with me. It is a no win situation.
2. Swiffer is still terrified. Yes, she fights back, but all of her body language still indicates fear. I am worried that she is going to start developing permanent issues out of her nervousness.
3. The thing about Mr. PM I already mentioned.
4. We are planning to have a baby. I am not known for my stamina, but I am known for going whole hog and getting completely focused on one person or thing. Cheetah, while a completely different dog than even a month ago, still requires my constant vigilance to control her environment. She is a sensitive, high energy dog and will always require a lot of me, no matter how good she is. I know myself well enough to know that my energy level does not match hers, and I am likely to fail her as my focus in the house changes. I am already failing Swiffer and Lexy due to my focus on Cheetah. I can't take the guilt.
5. Rescue Angels knows that if I adopt Cheetah I was likely to be less available as a volunteer to foster - if I tried to adopt her they were gonna put up a fight (I would've won, but still...)
   
6. I found someone who will love her the way she deserves to be loved if it can't be me.

Make no mistake, this was an excruciatingly painful decision for me. When I came to the realization that this was probably going to be a good home for her, I sobbed for two days, and Cheetah became very difficult to deal with. But as soon as I found my peace with it, she became an angel again. Quite amazing how sensitive she is.

So let me tell you a little bit about this family. It is a single mom with a daughter. The mom (who we are calling PA) lived with her mother (we'll call her grandma) as she raised 2 Aussies. So PA knows and understands the breed. We had some extensive back and forth on email, and I am convinced she believes in the same basic principles that I do as far as training goes: that being primarily positive reinforcement, with consistent, firm but gentle limits.

I am also quite confident that Cheetah would hold a place of priority in the family of which I approve. I think I really knew this was the one when PA asked me how Cheetah reacts to cleaning people. I told her, well, Cheetah tries to make the cleaning people believe that she is going to eat them. PA responded: OK - I don't like my cleaning person that much anyway, I can do without her. Now, I do not expect PA to entirely rearrange her life around Cheetah. But the fact that her knee jerk response would be to do so makes me happy. That was the night I sobbed myself to sleep, and Cheetah slept in the bed with me. :-D

I met PA, daughter and grandma this weekend. PA plans to tell her daughter about the fact that they are getting a dog this coming weekend for her birthday, so we were discussing Cheetah as if they were investigating her for a friend to see how they would get along. PA was already enchanted with Cheetah from her pictures and videos (yes, that is one of the reasons I took more videos last week) and she fell even more in love while interacting with her at the dog park. We spent over 2 hours together and my gut tells me this is a good move. This is not because I feel pressured to adopt her out (which I sort of felt last time). This is me coming from the perspective that I will keep her for better or for worse if I do not find the right fit for her. But I believe I have.

Things I like: (I couldn't possibly list them all but here are a few)

• Daughter clearly loves dogs and is used to being around them. Cheetah is no longer reactive to children (daughter is under 10) and did not mind when she started scampering around. I see potential for a really neat relationship there.
• PA knows Aussies and has realistic expectations about the breed and about Cheetah.
• PA has a bigger back yard than I envisioned when she told me about her house.
• Grandma has SIX (6) dogs, 2 of which are Aussies, so Cheetah will have lots of doggy friends and stimulation.
• Grandma has 5 acres, many of which are fenced, and PA and daughter spend a lot of time at Grandma's.
• Cheetah will be the center of the universe (only dog) for at least a few years, but she will also have a very social doggy pack to play with and lots of room to run around.
• PA has access to 2 dog parks near by.
• I have told PA about every conceivable skeleton in Cheetah's closet. Every behavior issue, all the training I have done, her chance of backsliding a little when she leaves me... everything I could think of. To be honest I kinda thought at first it might drive her away. When it didn't, it convinced me even further that she was going to take on Cheetah in a loving and realistic manner.
• It also made it much easier for me to even consider all of this when PA told me she would keep me updated with whatever I needed: pictures, videos, updates, and even visits once Cheetah is bonded and settled in. So I don't feel quite like I am losing her the way I would if she was just being adopted and spirited away, never to be heard from again.
• I just plain old like PA.
  

Cheetah came to me at a time in my life when I needed her as much as she needed me. She will always be incredibly special to me, and I got her a little medal that says "I saved a human" on it that she will take with her. She really helped me through a difficult time in my life, both by gifting me with the chance to help her whelp and by just being her. I am not sure yet the exact date of her departure. After PA tells her daughter this weekend, Cheetah and I will have a house visit and see how she does. I will go on gut feeling how many times she should see them before she leaves for good, but I am guessing probably Aug 1 or the following Saturday depending on what works best for everyone. I want to do a Saturday so that I am not fighting rush hour traffic (and thus stressing Cheetah out with my own stress) but yet give her as much of the weekend as possible with PA and daughter. PA is also going to try to take a Monday off or work from home so Cheetah can get settled in.

I feel like PA came to me just at the critical moment when I was thinking of keeping Cheetah. I'll be honest, I am not very faithful when it comes to church, god, etc. But it does seem to me like things do work out the way they are supposed to, due to more than just mere coincidence. We'll call it the Universe. They appeared just when I was sure I would keep Cheetah, but something in the back of my mind was telling me it was not exactly the right thing to do. This feels right.

Oh and I am told that Cheetah can attend the litter reunion in April!! :-) :-)

Belle Update 7.17.09

Belle is doing well. She is great at bedtime – sleeps from 10 to 6:45ish. We are still working on breaking her on the puppy biting but most of her teeth have come in. She was at the vet today for another round of vaccinations and weighs 33 pounds. They are expecting her to be about 40 pounds which seems really small to us since we were use to two 90 pound boys. Our oldest daughter wishes she could sleep with her but we told her Belle had to be at least a year before she could have a sleep over. I have attached a few pics of Belle.

Mouse Update 7.17.09

I asked Mouse's owners if she had been spayed yet to clarify gender. It popped into my head last night.

They responded:
Don't worry - you'll be one of the first to know when the gender is clarified. The deed will be done in a couple of weeks.... She's doing great. We did go away for a week and had to board her. We took her to [a] Pet Resort which is actually nicer then some hotels that [husband] and I have stayed in! She did fine and we were told that she was a staff favorite. When we picked her up, everyone seemed to know her (we decided to take that as a good thing). My plan in the future is to have my parents watch her but we were going away for their wedding anniversary so they were with us...I know I promised you pictures but all the good ones of her have one of the kids in it so they aren't postable - or they're of her sleeping (which really isn't a good representation of our Mouse). I'll work on it and see if she'll stand still long enough for a photo shoot. I think [son] has some good ones on his camera. She sits on his lap in the morning while he does facebook and when he's not here she climbs in the chair and sits in front of the computer by herself. Maybe I need to open her an account - she's probably technologically smarter then me already! What a goofy and affectionate dog we have. She probably makes me laugh a hundred times a day. We talked to a trainer the other day and even he was laughing at her...Hope Cheetah is close to her forever home. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

* * *

Mel says:
That part about FaceBook is hysterical! It reminds me of when I was little, I had this poodle named Choux-Choux ("shoe-shoe") and when my dad would mow the lawn we would pretend he was a monster and sneak up on him and then run away. One time he had the dog out without me while he was mowing the lawn and she stalked the lawnmower by herself! Because that's what you do when someone mows the lawn! LOL!! So that particularly tickles me about Mouse.

Rough Night

Cheetah is not very happy with me right now. Why you ask? Because I took to my bed at 8:30pm. The rerun of The Office just wasn't doin it for me and it's been a long evening.

CAUTION: some gross content

On my way home (I left the office at around 4:15) I finally stopped at CVS to pick up a couple of Rx. I got in line at the pharmacy and there was a guy there with a shopping cart full of stuff - I shit you not. Once I determined he actually planned to check all of this crap out at the PHARMACY, I huffed off to the magazine isle. We are supposed to look for images that evoke something in us for group, so I figured I would pick up a few. $70 worth of magazines later (yeah I know) I was back in line and finally got my prescriptions.

I didn't actually make it home until almost 6pm. Sigh. The second I walked in the door I knew something was rotten in Denmark. I had no idea what it was, but something was WRONG in here. It did not take me long to figure it out. As soon as I hit the hallway that leads to the bedrooms I got slammed in the face with the stench. Cheetah had a biiiiiiig accident in the master bathroom. Sigh. It was baaaaad. She hasn't done anything like that since she had so many tummy problems after the puppies. I then noticed she had vomited on the carpet in the hall way and on her bed, although there was very little evidence left. I know - ew. But she's a dog - that's what they do. I was thankful that Mr. PM is at a company conference this week. If there is one smell he can not take, it is dog poo. Cheetah thoughtfully managed to stay on the bathmat for the most part, so I just folded up everything she hit and took it down to the basement.

Cheetah is so very helpful. Just today when Zibby's owners mentioned she had done some backsliding on her housetraining, I said, "all dog's backslide once in a while." Cheetah was just trying to prove my point I guess.

I wracked my brain trying to figure out what made her so sick. The dog food is the same; although I am playing with the proportion of wet to dry a bit, that should not upset her like this. She had treats in her treatball today - but nothing new there either. I thought and thought about this as I cleaned up and took the linens down to the wash. While I was down there I fed the cat. AHA! I know exactly what it was now! Or at least I had a pretty strong speculation.

OK this is gross, but last night, somehow Cheetah found that great delicacy, the litterbox. I had JUST cleaned it out a couple of hours earlier, but Lexy must've been in there. I caught Cheetah red handed, so to speak. Her breath was HORRIBLE the rest of the night. (Cheetah is one of the few dogs I know who simply does not have bad breath! She also has really white teeth. I attribute this to her age + all the bone and stick chewing she does.)

So anyway, I was glad to have figured that out, but I still decided to give her boiled chicken and rice for dinner to be safe. I figured Swiffer shouldn't have to miss out because she didn't poop in the house, so I made enough for both of them. I used to make this stuff by the vat when Cheetah was nursing. I would literally make 5 quarts at a time.

Of course today was the first hot and humid day in a while - we have been really lucky with weather this year. So naturally with Cheetah getting sick on top of that, I was concerned about dehydration. Chicken and rice is another way to really rally against that. I used 3 cups chicken stock to one cup of white rice and diced the chicken directly into the pot while it was still partially frozen. This way the chicken cooks while the rice boils. Once most of the chicken stock was absorbed, I added about another cup of water. I cook it very low to make sure the rice absorbs as much liquid as possible, and is completely saturated. When I am finished, it is a slightly soupy concoction. This helps to replenish her fluids. I also throw some ice in to help it cool down quickly, so more water. For anyone who has not prepared this meal for their dog before, be prepared to find rice all around the bowl for days. They always root out the chicken first and then go back for the rice.

I am fading fast here, but I have one more thing to tell you. One of our puppy sponsors from overseas is in town and I will be meeting her tomorrow! She found the webcam because she works for a client of my husband's company. As I mentioned, Mr. PM is currently at a conference, which she crossed the pond to attend! So tomorrow evening he is bringing her home to meet me and Cheetah before she heads home. Hopefully Cheetah will have a similar reaction to the one she had when Schroeder visited. We can only wait and see. But I am excited to meet her. I want to say her family bred dogs when she was a kid, but I could be mixing up her story with someone else.

Cheetah is sleeping comfortably now. She still wanted to play a little but she is definitely less energetic than usual. As much as I hate to see her sick, I have to admit it is kind of a nice break. Have a good night all.

Cheetah 7.16.09

I did some filming last night as I realized I haven't posted much in the way of videos on Cheetah in a long while. There are a few new pictures, starting with this one.



And there are a bunch of new videos, starting with this one. (I would have loaded the video directly to the page but it was taking FOREVER.)

Zibby update 7.15.09

Zibby had her surgery yesterday and we picked her up today at noon. She's doing fine. Surprisingly lots of energy. She seems like her normal self. We took her on a walk around the neighborhood tonight, and she did real well. It's going to be hard to keep her from doing stuff for 10 days. She seems normal and she is trying to do everything normally. I figured she'd be lethargic and sleep a lot... not so much.

She's getting big. I forgot to ask how much she weighed when I picked her up today, but I'd guess she's gotta be over 30... probably closer to 35 or 40.

She outgrew her first [training] class... we'll start her up again in a couple months. We are continuing to reinforce come, sit, down, off, and stay as often as we can. It's still pretty hit-or-miss as to whether she listens or not. She's better than our friends' 9month puggle. But not nearly as good as our other friends' 2yr boxer. I guess that's to be expected though.

And she's very comfortable with her crate now. She still prefers to be near us when possible; but she doesn't have a problem going to her crate when we tell her to go (most times) and she behaves while in there.

Schroeder update 7.15.09

From owner: I thought I would let you know that Schroeder has a girlfriend named Millie. She is a 8 month boxer. It is true love. They met on a sunny morning at the dog park (sounds like a romance novel.) When other puppies want to play with them, they hardly take notice. Millie has more energy then Schroeder [Mel says Wow!] and he is tired for most the day after they play. I am sending you a picture of them. It so nice when your dog can find a good friend.

Doggone it, people like me!

I have joined this women's group called Finding Another Way. It is sort of an offshoot of Life Coaching, but with a small group of women plus 2 facilitators. The female facilitator is my favorite. She is a life coach to whom I was referred and she speaks with clarity to me. The male facilitator, we'll call him Stuart does not resonate as well with me. But that's just my initial impression - his sense of humor has poked out so there is hope. Anyway, it is supposed to be a holistic approach to help me figure out what the hell to do next.

What I am supposed to be doing now, is just allowing everything to be as it is. I am supposed to sit with my feelings and not analyze them in any way or fight against them or have any thought about them at all really. "it’s like sitting on a bench with a good friend who is feeling deep emotional pain—let’s say grief. You sit with her in silence, just being with her, not trying to fix her or impede her grieving process by stopping her tears. So in being with what is, you allow yourself the space to feel the emotions and observe the thoughts. Many feelings and thoughts will dissolve in this manner, although some will take longer than others. Some thoughts and feelings will remain persistent and those will require inquiry, which we’ll explore in a few weeks."

Does that sound easy to you? Try it. It is incredibly difficult for a cerebral person to just sit there and allow things to flow through without any analysis, any defense mechanisms, any questioning... just sit with it. It's a pisser. I suck at this game.

I'm still not sure what I think of the whole thing. It is a little bit cosmic touchy feely, which kind of makes me want to slap someone. We keep an online journal and someone wrote back to me "I hear you." I pretty much wrote back and said "Bullshit." Hey, it started a discussion. :-P

But it is a different approach to things, and I am willing to give it a shot. The women in the group are all very interesting. I'll let you know if I figure out the secrets of the universe or anything.

Poppy 7.14.09 blog update

Road Trip

Dixie

This morning I got the news that Dixie, my sister-in-law's dog, passed away. She was elderly and badly debilitated by arthritis, and often needed help moving around and getting up and down stairs. She died naturally this morning. She was a very sweet-natured golden retriever, and I was lucky enough to have seen her this weekend at my nephew's baptism party. I gave her a good scratch, which she seemed to appreciate.

My heart goes out to my sister-in-law. I have really grown to love her quite a lot. She is absolutely beautiful and always impeccably put together - so you kind of want to hate her. But she is so compassionate and sweet that it is impossible. I have really grown to appreciate her presence in my life. For some reason, her giving birth to my nephew has made me feel much closer to her. I really look forward to seeing her at family events and I wish we had more time to just hang out together. But luckily, she is a member of my family and I will have the rest of my life to develop that relationship.

At any rate, she has a similar affinity for animals and I know she was deeply attached to Dixie. I know how hard the loss of a life companion like that can be and I feel just awful for her. At least Dixie isn't in pain anymore, but I know that is not much consolation when you expect to see Dixie when you walk in the door or feel her when you reach down next to your chair. I hope the pain dulls for her and she is able to find comfort.

Sham-eh

Today was grooming day. I have been prepping Cheetah for weeks, having her jump into the tub any time she follows me into the bathroom, getting in there with her and shutting the sliding door for a few minutes before I shower, and closing her in the bathroom with me when I shower (she often goes and hides when she hears me in the shower.) Needless to say, she HATES to be bathed. So I was using some desensitization techniques to try to make it a less frightening experience.

So first we all went out onto the back deck for pedicures. First Swiffer. When Swiff was a teeny puppy of a mere 2 pounds, I managed to cut the quick on my first attempt to trim her nails. I had been trimming Lexy's nails for years, but Lexy's nails are translucent and Swiffer's are not. Both little puppy Swiffer and I were completely horrified and traumatized by the event. Ever since then, she is a big baby about having her nails trimmed and so am I. For 5 years we have taken her to PetSmart for her claws and done the rest at home. I am not proud to admit that poor Swiffer's grooming has suffered greatly ever since Cheetah stepped foot in the house with her belly full of puppies. Long story short, her nails were very long. So I took her out and stood her on the picnic table on the deck, and trimmed her Elvira claws. Because her nails are so long, the quick is overextended too, so I had to be careful how far back I went. Luckily she has ONE translucent nail on each foot so I was able to guage by that and we had no horrific events out of a slasher movie.

Once Swiffer was clipped, I took heart and called Cheetah over. She does not love to have her paws handled but she will put up with just about anything from me, and a few snips later we were all set. Then came bath time. Duh duh duh daaaaaaaaa.

I swear to god she knew what I was up to from the MOMENT we came in the house. I gathered 4 or 5 towels, plus a couple of the "big size" Sham-Wow's. After covering every square inch of the bathroom floor in towels, and prepping myself, I took off her collar and invited her into the bathroom. NOPE. Now I know you are not supposed to call your dog to you for things you know they hate. But I defy you to pick up a 45 pound dog who does not want to go into the bathroom for a bath and carry them in there. Suddenly they are Sumo wrestlers weighing about 250 pounds. If you do not know how to use a dog's own wieght against them, I highly recomend against trying to bathe them yourself! So eventually I coaxed her in and shut the door to the bathroom. Now she was positive the jig was up.

The repetitive training got the best of her, and when I gave her the signal to jump into the tub, she hesitated, but she did it. Bravo Cheetah. So I got in behind her as in practice and shut the door. If the dogs are too big to fit in my utility sink, I take them in the shower with me. Let's face it, I am going to get soaked anyway, and my presence in there with them usually calms them down. So I spent some time petting her and telling her how good she was and then turned on the tub. She wasn't frantic but it was clearly upsetting to her, so I decided to quit drawing it out and just turned on the shower. Overall, she did better than last time.

Even being the doggy Jedi Master that I am (haha) I make the occassional mistake. I was certainly glad I clipped her nails first, because she stepped on my foot in an effort to get out and it felt like someone was shoving nails through my foot. But other than that we had no major injuries. I found that holding her frontquarters helped both to calm her, and to keep her off balance enough that she was forced to do what I wanted.

So the entire point of writing this drawn out bath story (which has got to be boring the eyeballs out of all but the most devout Cheetah fans) was to tell you about the Sham-Wow. First I toweled her off with the usual towel. She also spent some time rubbing herself on the towels on the floor (which was pretty funny for the record). Once I had the initial water off, I went to the Sham-Wow. Honestly, I did not feel it performed any better than a towel, if that well. I expected it to suck water right out of her fur. Not so much. So my review of the Sham-Wow, at least as far as it goes for grooming, is "eh."

After her bath, since it was so warm out, I let her run her usual adrenaline circles in the back yard. She goes absolutely wacko - again - hilarious. There is the added benefit that she is wet so she doesn't overheat, and she dries off quickly. There is the drawback that she is likely to roll around while out there, but she is a dog after all. It's not like we were going to a dog show. It's what they do. I suspect that the lovely smelling shampoo is rather offensive to any self respecting dog. Happily, she just rolls in the grass (as opposed to poop or dead things) so no great harm done.

My big plan was to work on Swiffer with the mat comb after Cheetah's bath, but I took a break that lasted all day. So Swiffer suffers neglect yet again. My goal is to get her done by the 15th, when she and Cheetah are due for more Frontline. I have said it publically, so hopefully I will do it!

Cheetah 7.11.09

Short cute story. Swiffer and Cheetah were out in our back yard. Swiffer is traditionally difficult to get inside, but it was raining so I thought maybe she'd come right in. No such luck. So I sent Cheetah to chase after her, which she did and got her to come up on the deck. Then Cheetah was out in the yard sniffing around after completing her chore for me. I was getting more and more frustrated with Swiffer after repeated attempts to get her in, and finally pretty much yelled at her to sit. At this Swiffer proceeded to look at me like I had two heads, but Cheetah came dashing up on the deck next to her to complete a perfect sit. It totally cracked me up and calmed me down enough to get control of the situation and capture the runaway soaked ball of fur.

Who was it that is supposed to be the problem dog again?

The Nest

I found Birdy's nest! If I had been any closer to it, it would have bitten me. It was just inside the big azalea bush near where I found Birdy. I don't know what made me see it today as opposed to any other day. But because of where I found Birdy, I am quite certain that was her nest. It was very well camouflaged and high enough so that Cheetah would not have been able to get to it. It was empty, which I consider a good sign, and it was sort of set on an angle. I don't know if the chicks did that as they got bigger and jumped out, or if it was built like that. It seemed pretty steady so I would guess it was built that way. The way it was structured it would have provided some protection if it rained, on top of the protection from the surrounding branches. So now I am pretty certan I put Birdy back in the right place and she practiced and flew away.

Neat sighting last night

Last night when I was turning out the lights to go to bed, I looked out of our bay window in the front of the house and saw an outline of something really tall in the street. My first thought was that either it was a deer or a werewolf, because it was too big to be anything else. Being that we seem to have a distinct lack of werewolves in Northern Virginia, I went with the former as my main theory.

So I froze in the dark and just watched. It came right toward the house. It was a pretty large buck with a decent sized rack. It was so majestic and in the dark it felt almost ethereal. He came right up to the front of the house. He stood next to the front porch for a while and then moved out of my sight line. So I went to another room in the house and watched from there. He had a nice snack of our shrubs and flowers in front of the house and then walked off to the side of the house and literally just vanished. No matter where I went I couldn't see him.

As a sighting like that will often do, it lifted my spirits and made me feel more grounded before I went to bed. It is so neat to have the kind of wild life around that we seem to have. Foxes, deer, rabbits, chipmunks, all kids of birds... I feel like I live in a Snow White fairy tale sometimes. I never expected this - I am in suburban DC. But there is a relatively significant park land right behind our cul-de-sac, even though it takes me about 5 minutes to get to the nearest Starbucks (the hallmark of today's civilization.) I feel like I probably would not see as much if I lived farther out in the country, because the wildlife would not be tempted to come so close to the house. So I kind of get the best of both worlds. It's nice.

Maddie 7.9.09 update

Maddie gave me a photo shoot this morning. Here is what she looks like at 5 months! She's a big lean girl...and still growing! Her paws are huge and her tail long like a cat's tail...it even sways when she wags it...like a cat, haha.

Zibby update 7.9.09

Not much new since we got back from outer banks. We discovered 4-mile run in Shirlington within the last couple weeks. It's fenced in for 1/4 mile and there's a spot where dogs can get down to the
creek and play in the water. Wow... Zibby is all about the water now. She loves chasing sticks in the water and won't come back until after she finds it. She's a really good swimmer. And it really tires her out, which is great. With these hot days lately, she gets hot and tired pretty quick at the parks, and then comes home and terrorizes the house. So we are having to come up with cooler options like swimming holes. I haven't taken my camera yet to the 4-mile run spot yet, but I'll try to remember soon and post some stuff to flickr.

Zib is getting spayed on Tuesday. We'll let you know how she does.

More dog stuff

Shocking I know. I went to PetSmart tonight and picked up an Easy Walk Harness for Cheetah. I only tried it briefly. I am not sure if I had it fitting her properly. But she did walk loose lead. That is a first so I am hopeful.

Of course I could not go into PS and buy just one thing! So I got a few toys and chewies and 2 hard sided dog pools. In August I am hosting a rescue reunion party for everyone who has ever adopted from Rescue Angels. (Not to be confused with the litter reunion I will have next Spring.) This is because I have the biggest back yard and am crazy enough to offer :-) I believe the tally is up over 150 dogs at this point. Even if only 1/3 come that is a lot of dogs! (not to mention people.) So I thought it would be good to have a couple of dog pools on hand. They were only like $9 - how could i resist! That's how they get ya.

But the end all be all purchase. . . they had the SHAM WOW!!! At PetSmart! OK, I am coming out of the closet - I am an infomercial freak. But I never actually order anything. But it was sitting RIGHT THERE!!! How could I resist?! AS SEEN ON TV!!!! Now if I happen to see that lawn edger weed whacker thingy, my universe will be complete.