Savannah's flower

It was getting dak when I took these or they would have been better.  But still very cute!

I couldn't help myself

Just a few more.  I promise.  But seriously-how cute is she?

The rest

Obviously our weekend (and our party) did not end Friday after standard.  First, I had promised Legend ice cream if she got her MACH so we headed straight to Andy's Frozen Custard from the trial site.  Admittedly, the "small cup of vanilla" I ordered her was larger than I expected, but I let her eat it all anyway.

She went on to get two more jumpers Qs this weekend-all of them lovely runs.  In standard the second obstacles Saturday and Sunday were the A-frame and the teeter, respectively.  And we all know how that goes down.  Oh well.

Saturday night we all went to Cheri's to visit with our friend from Albuquerque which also turned into a mini-MACH party as well-complete with cake.  And Legend even got her very own hamburger.  And no, she hasn't been sick from all this junk food yet!

Sunday we enjoyed more MACH cupcakes at the trial thanks to Lori from Border Collie Mom Blog.

Lyric only ran jumpers this weekend but had a nice Q on Friday to start off our weekend  Yesterday was not quite as good but today was really nice.  I didn't run it the way I walked it which ended up causing us an NQ but Lyric did a great job.  Now if we can get standard sorted out.

Savannah was angelic at her first trial!  She was quiet in her crate, learned how to potty right away outside on the leash in a strange place and socialized with lots of dogs and people.  No official takers yet, but some that are tempted.

This afternoon we headed to the lake to meet Cheri and Steve on the boat.  This was a lovely way to end the weekend.  Until the boat broke down.  Fortunately they were able to call a friend to tow us in but not without the hypothetical discussion on whether we would rather starve to death or eat each other.  (We were not that far from civilization but still,  it's a pretty helpless feeling when a boat breaks down.) The boat did start up again before we reached the dock but I hear it's still getting checked out before the next lake day!

That's Xena with us-she's trying to catch all the waves.  And when there aren't enough, she splashes the water to make her own to try and catch!

MACH Legend!

or more officially...

MACH Living in Fast Forward CD, RE, NF

This is the picture worth a thousand words (and way more than a thousand dollars too!).  So I don't have a lot to add other than the day couldn't have been more perfect.  Her runs were lovely, some of the fastest she has ever had and most of our friends were there to see it and in our hometown to boot.  

I do have some people to thank, as is customary after a significant achievement...

To all our training partners and instructors from Teacher's Pet and Paws Express for helping to get both Legend and I started in agility.  And special thanks to "Aunt" Marlene in heaven-I know she's proud of Legend today.

To all our "real life" agility friends for cheering us on all this time.

To all my blog readers out there following Legend's saga, some of you have been reading since Legend's first trial!

To Nebraska Border Collie Rescue and foster dad Scott-not only for giving me this great dog, but for saving her from the shelter.

To Cheri for her endless friendship, and especially all those long rides home where we discussed our dogs and their "issues."

To Jerry for putting up with all this insanity, and for spending many weekends holding the video camera while we were waiting on #20.

But mostly, thank you Legend.  It wasn't always easy, but it's always been worth it.  You are the hillbilly rock star, and I love you.

And since I don't think you can possibly have too many MACH pictures here is one more...

And here are the videos!

QQ #20 Part 1

Part 2!

Savannah and other musings

Here are more pictures of Savannah...because you can never have too many cute puppy pictures.

In other news we ran another 5k this weekend and I met my goal of under 25 minutes.  Which of course means I need to set a new goal of under 24 minutes!  Might take me a bit but I think I can get there. 

The bunnies are not best friends yet, but they are doing some good bonding.  Fingers crossed.

We have done only a little bit of agility lately and its has only gone so-so.  I set up a really challenging discrimination and they are not handling it well.  I guess I should make it a little easier so they have more success. 

Our local 3 day AKC trial is this weekend so you know that means!  Let's hope we can get this done at home.  Lyric is only running jumpers.  I still want to get her on more teeters before trying standard again.  I think I will have some time to do more of that next week. 

Saw a good old-fasioned case of heat stroke today.  It's not a good idea to leave your Boxer chained up outside in the sun for 45 minutes with no water.  This dog's temp was 107 when he arrived at the clinic, not even able to stand.  We did get him cooled down and he was up walking, not panting when I transferred him to the overnight emergenc clinic.  107 is pretty catastrophic though, he's certainly not out of the woods. 

Why are owner's unable to make the connection between their dog limping and being in pain?  I can't tell you how many times I've heard "he limps, but I don't think he's in pain."  It's like they expect them to whine and cry all the time.  Do you whine and cry all the time when you are in pain?  Do you limp because your leg DOESN'T hurt?  I don't get it. 

Have I mentioned Savannah loves the pool?  Because she does.  She is always wet. 

I think that is all.

Meanwhile

There has actually been a few other things going on besides puppy stuff!

Before we headed to Osage Beach to pick up Savannah we ran a 5K in the morning.  I knocked another 35 seconds off my time getting me closer to my goal of under 25 minutes. 

The other reason (well, actually the main reason we went to Osage Beach) was for Renny to Dock Dive.  It was a really big event and we had fun even though we had to wait forever for a table with a view of the pool but here she is jumping.

And here is Kennedy grooming Squirt.  She really wanted to ride, but it was getting late and  was feeding time so we talked her into just brushing.  Which she did.  For a very long time.  We had to drag her back inside after she insisted she wanted to sleep with the horses.  We may have created a monster. 

And in case you need a puppy fix, here is video of Savannah playing.

Preventable

Our first new client of the day presented with an english bulldog who had a number of health problems, the most pressing of which was a serious eye condition that may eventually require surgery.  When she called she had announced to the receptionist she only had four dollars.  The receptionist suggested she get some more money together before her appointment as we really could not do anything for four dollars.  While you probably should not have any pet if you only have 4 dollars, I would think an english bulldog is probably the worst choice ever.  Anyway, let's just say my daily dose of faith in humanity was already running low when new client number two arrived.

Client number two presented with a sweet, gentle red bone coonhound, maybe 4-5 years old.  It's hard to say if he was always sweet and gentle or if it was just because he was very ill but he had a kind look on his face.

The presenting complaints were weight loss, lethargy, decreased appetite, dark and tarry stools, and coughing and/or vomiting up large amounts of blood for several days.  On exam the dog was emaciated, his belly distended with fluid, and his heart muffled by all the congestion in his lungs.  Has he ever been on heartworm prevention? No.  But not to worry, she had googled that and didn't think it was likely.  I glanced at the two small children in the room and even though I knew the answer felt compelled to ask if the dog had ever even been dewormed.  Also no.

While I don't approve of people not taking adequate care of their dogs I find it even more unbelievable that so many of them either don't realize or don't care that by not regularly deworming their pet they potentially expose their children to the devastating effects of hook and roundworm infestation.  Internally I frowned and shook my head and then turned my attention back to the dog.  I decided to use my actual medical degree instead of Dr. Google's and suggested we go ahead and run the heartworm test.  Shockingly it was positive.

I presented the woman with a $900 estimate for treatment explaining that this price did not include any complications, that the dog might not live through the treatment and that he may likely have permanent heart damage and require life long medications, or may not survive very long even if he made it through the treatment.  Naturally this initiated a call to the husband which prompted the inevitable "can you repeat everything to him using my nasty, germy cell phone request."

Ultimately the decided to euthanize.  She left the dog alone in the room while she paid her bill and left.  As she did so, the technician told her, without emotion, not to worry-she would stay with her dog while we put it  down.

A short time later, we gathered in the room where the dog was dozing from the sedative.  He received his last bit of love, maybe his only love, from three strangers as we quietly ended his suffering.  All of which could have been prevented for about $7 a month.  People suck.

False Alarm

Two of the puppies from Savannah's litter tested positive for parvo when rescue pulled them.  One never got sick and the other only spent a few days in the hospital.  But when they brought Savannah to me they mentioned she hadn't eaten well that morning.  She wouldn't eat when we got home that night and didn't eat again the next morning.  Then she had one episode of diarrhea and three episodes of vomiting and just acted a tiny bit puny.  So obviously I was quite concerned it was her turn to get parvo, especially when I found out one of the other puppies was also now sick.  So not only did I leave Jerry alone overnight with a new foster puppy, I left him with a sick one! 

I started her on Cerenia and Metronidazole I had at the house and by evening he texted me to say she was no longer vomiting and was eating.  The trend continued and by the time I got home yesterday she was a wild and hungry girl!  Crisis averted-probably the stress of moving and the car ride and parasites and maybe even corona virus contributed.  But as long as she's better we don't really care what it was.

She has already leaned how to do the stairs, has been getting on and off the small dog agility table, ran through a full length straight 15 foot tunnel, gotten into the baby pool on her own and started up the a-frame!  And she slept all night quietly in her crate without having an accident.  What a good puppy!

Brothers of the Sun

Disclaimer: this post is not about dogs or medicine, but does have some amusing anecdotes so choose if you want to continue...

My friend Linda and I packed our bags for Kansas City this weekend to see the big Tim McGraw/Kenny Chesney concert at Arrowhead Stadium.  I sort of feel like I had been waiting for this concert for 2 years since the last time I had tickets to a stadium show, this happened.  So, anyway, this year seemed to go off without a hitch.  Almost.  We arrived early and checked into our hotel and killed a little time there before leaving.  We should not have.  It took us over an hour to drive the 3 miles to the stadium!  Then we had to pay $27 to park.  By the time we got to our seats we had missed the first opening act and part of the second. Oh well, on to the main event.

I have to say that I was somewhat underwhelmed with Tim McGraw.  I'm not a huge fan anyway but I'm certainly not any bigger of a fan after that performance.  But I really didn't go to see him, it was just part of the package.  Here are a few pics though, for the Tim lovers out there.

 These pictures are of the big screen-actually most of my pictures are.  Although we had floor seats, they were pretty far back.  This gave me a fantastic view of the screens but not so much of the actual stage-such is life when you are five foot three.  I was aware of this issue when we decided to get floor seats but it was still worth it.

Then on to the main event...

Kenny did not disappoint and sang most of my favorite songs.  They concluded the concert with both Kenny and Tim doing a four song encore.

This picture is not of the screen-he started the concert on a smaller stage near our seats and we got to go over and get some pics, albeit into the setting sun.

The rest of these are of the screen but pretty good all things considered.

 Wouldn't be complete without a view from behind right?

And if you like crappy, bootleg concert video here is one for you.

After the concert we were starving and stopped at IHOP, like everyone else.  We waited 20 minutes for a table-not too bad considering.  But what was interesting is that IHOP not only needs a security guard (complete with bulletproof vest and multiple weapons), but he was performing double duty as host, busing tables and bringing people food and drinks.  We had lots of time to observe this because we got stuck with the waitress having a meltdown and waited over 30 minutes for our food.  There are a lot of interesting people at IHOP at 1:00 AM.  After watching our waitress spill a tray of drinks on one of her other tables we asked another waitress about our food.  Finally got to bed around two.  Incidentally the security guard patrols all the way down to the bank (wherever that was).  I'm thinking as busy as he was seating people at IHOP it would have been a great night to rob the bank!

Prepare yourself...

...for cuteness!  Here is Savannah-the new foster puppy as promised.  The light wasn't very good by the time we got home but I had to share!

Pretty cute huh?  She is about 10 weeks old and maybe 12 lbs-gonna be a big girl.  Mom was the english shepherd (blonde and white) and dad was the border collie (a big black and white one).  She is super sweet, likes kids and other dogs.  Curious about agility equipment too.  We will know more about her soon!

Eeek!

I was walking barefoot through my laundry room when I happened across the biggest, scariest spider ever. I don't generally consider myself afraid of spiders but I don't like to almost accidentally step on big ugly ones in my house!

So, like a normal adult female I jumped up and down screaming and got Jerry to kill it.

After he beat it to death and scooped it onto a plate we realized with some surprise that it was plastic. It seems a certain three year old (for reasons I cannot explain since she is afraid of bugs) requested this toy during a recent trip to Chuckie Cheese. Never a dull moment around here these days!

Looks real doesn't it?

Things

I thought about doing a post about how 90% of my daily work duties don't really require a 7 year college education and my chronic lack of intellectual stimulation in private practice but that didn't  really seem to have a point.

So, good stuff.  Legend got in all three days at the local trial in a few weeks which means three chances to get #20 with all our friends there.

We are getting a foster puppy!  They are border collie and english shepherd, and nine week old.  I'm pretty excited-the last two fosters have been almost grown puppies.  We have not had a little baby in a long time.  I don't know which one I'm getting yet but two are blonde and white and I kind of wanted one of those-but we will see what everyone else ends up with.

Kahuna and Summer had a good bonding moment recently.  Still have a long way to go but I have some hope now!

Pics from the Funraiser

My dad was nice enough to come out in 90 degree weather and take these for us...

We dropped our dogwalk off today to get rubberized.  While we there we let Lyric use their teeter.  Naturally she went over it without question several times and even did it again on her own hoping for cookies while we were standing around visiting.  Which I guess is good, but it didn't really recreate any fear for her to over come. 

Bigger, but still sooo cute!

Recent pictures of Kahuna!

 Getting a little crazy-yes he's airborne in this picture!

 Hiding amongst the border collies

 Resting up!

Also, I think he might be a girl.  I'll keep you posted.