Lola is doing much better.  She spent several days sleeping and not eating very much, but now she is eating like normal and is back to playing with toys.  Which I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.  It’s good because it means she’s feeling better, and I don’t want her to be sick.  But I got really used to her just lounging around all day.  Now this energy and exuberance is kind of hard to get used to again.  Not that she’s bouncing off the walls or anything, but it’s still a big difference.

She has been really good about her stitches (actually I think it’s just one stitch).  I’ve even been able to leave the wrapping off of it when she’s inside the house.  Occasionally I see her lightly licking it, but as soon as I scold her she stops.  The only time I wrap it now is when we go outside to play because the yard is kind of muddy.  Every time I bandage it up she acts like her leg is about to fall off!  She could be running and jumping moments before, but put that bandage on and she forgets how to walk.    But once we get outside and she gets to run around she forgets all about it and starts walking like normal (and before anybody says it, I know she’s not supposed to run around with stitches, but she’s either going to run inside or outside, so I’d rather it be outside).
And I do put the cone collar on her when I go to bed at night.  Everytime I get it out she looks at me with those big puppy eyes and I feel like a really mean mommy, but it’s better then her chewing at it and hurting herself more.

She still acts like her but hurts her when she goes to the bathroom.  I think I’ll have the vet look at it when we go in to have her stitch taken out on monday.

So overall she is doing much better.  After monday I hope not to see the vet again until she needs her shots.

Keep your fingers crossed!

I know I haven’t posted in quite a while.  First I was busy, then it just became habit not to write.

But lately I’ve been feeling the itch to write again.  So I’m going to try to post more often.

Quite a bit has happened since my last post.  Lets see, what to start with….
I lost my job a couple weeks ago.  They had been downsizing a lot, first with a dozen or so people in the shop, then with several people in the office, so I wasn’t all that surprised.  I was still technically a temp, even though I had been there over a year, so when I found out they were letting long time office people go I felt it was only a matter of time.
So now I’m on the hunt for a job again.  There aren’t that many prospects, so it might be a while.  But I enjoy being home.  In fact if it wasn’t for the money issue I would probably never leave my house.

The other thing of intrest has been my dog Lola.  She has had an on going problem with Mange, which is a mite that affects the skin.  Apparently dogs always have this mite, but when they are in poor health from a disease or lack of care the mites explode in number and become a big problem.  They burrow into the skin and cause itchy and flaky skin and then the dog starts loosing hair in patches.
I noticed a skin problem when I first got her, and asked the vet about it.  She thought it was ringworm (which isn’t actually a worm but a fungus) which I guess is a common mis-diagnosis.  Once she wasn’t getting better we started looking at other things and found the mange.
So for the last 5 months we have been treating that.  The vet has wanted to see her every 3-4 weeks for an update, so we’ve been there quite a bit.  But now in the last couple weeks I’ve seen real improvement, so much that the skin is almost all better!  So I thought that we we almost done going to the vet all the time.
But then this past wednesday she went out in the yard and came back in bleeding.  It wasn’t really bad, but it was more then just a drop or two.  I don’t know how she did it, but somehow she cut herself on the back of her leg right underneath the dew claw pad (the dew claw is that toenail that is higher up on their front legs).  It wasn’t bad enough that I thought she needed the vet right away.  I had some stuff that’s made for when you trim their nails to short and they bleed.  Being that it was bleeding about like that I decided to try that.  After I held that cut-stop stuff on there for a while the bleeding stopped, so I bandaged it up (so she didn’t bite at it) and thought that was that.  Which it was, until she got up from her nap and started really moving around.  Because that area is at the back of their ankle joint every time she bent her leg she pulled at that area and it would start oozing blood again.  So I ended up taking her to the vet where they gave her a stitch or two.

Then I had to go back to have the mange rechecked on saturday.  Her regular vet wasn’t there when she went in for her stitches, so we weren’t able to combine the appointments.  :(
After I got her home from her stitches I noticed that every time she went to the bathroom she acted like it was uncomfortable.  Then she didn’t really feel like eating, which being that they gave her an anesthetic to work on her leg I wasn’t surprised at (she takes a long while get over drugs like that) but then I noticed her butt was swelled up.  So since we were going to the vet anyway for the recheck I decided to ask the vet about it.  It turns out she had filled anal glands which that needed to be emptied.  Pour Lola really didn’t like that.  Not that I blame her or anything.  I wouldn’t like it if someone stuck a finger up my already sore butt either.  But the good news is that the vet thinks her mange is all gone, so she no longer needs to take meds for that.      Which is really good because she hated that stuff.

So now I have a dog with a cut on her leg (which needs to stay wrapped so she doesn’t rip the stitches out) and a sore butt.  What’s concerning me is that she sleeping all the time, still isn’t eating all that much and she hasen’t wanted to go to the bathroom because it still hurts.  I don’t know if that’s normal or not.  She isn’t dehydrated, and she’s still eating some, so as long as she does those things I guess that is alright for right now.  She was a tiny bit on the chubby side so at least she has some reserves to draw on.  I have to take her back to the vet (yes again!) later this week to have her stitches taken out, so if it’s still a problem I’ll ask about it.

So that’s what’s been up with me lately.  This last week has mostly been all about Lola, but I’m hoping that everything will get back to normal pretty soon.

Things aren’t going as well as I had hoped.  Over all Lola is still a pretty good dog, and she has definately improved, but she is really used to getting away with stuff and she is constantly trying to push my limits and see if I will catch her in it.  Like jumping and pulling on the leash and “little” stuff like that.  At one point this week I really wanted to get my hands on her previous owners and just strangle them.  It is obvious that she is smart, and that she learns pretty quick, but she does need a firm hand.  Otherwise she will just run all over you and do whatever she wants.  But if someone had taken the time when she was young to teach her she wouldn’t have all these bad habits.

Part of the problem is that it is so cold out that she isn’t able to go outside and play like that first week.  This morning it was in the single digits.  So we’ve pretty much been just going out for potty breaks and a really quick walk at night.

I think I’m going to have to find something to do inside to get all of that energy out.  I’ve heard that training tires them out almost as much as “physical” exercise.  So maybe I need to just do something like that.

I’ve come to the realization that I really need to use treats as rewards more often.  Even though she showed initial response with just a vocal command, she now tends to ignore them if she wants to.  It’s been frustrating because she knows what I want, but she just doesn’t want to do it.  Like she knows how to sit on command, but now she’ll only do it when she wants to or with a reward (although I don’t even have to tell her to sit when it’s time to go outside, she just does it automatically).

So for the time being I think I need to carry treats around and use them every time I want her to do something.  Because until she understands that when I tell her to do something, sit for example, that she needs to do it when I ask, not the tenth time or when I force her to.  Until then I’ll need to bribe her to do it.  And I’ll have to do it every single time.
I can understand some of it, like when we are outside and she doesn’t want to sit on the cold ground or snow.  I get that, and I’m not asking her to put her butt all the way on the ground, but she needs to at least attempt to do what I ask.

Dealing with all of those little things is really tiring.  More mentally tiring then anything physical.  The good thing is that she falls asleep at about 7 or 8 at night, but by that time I’m just totally exhausted from continually telling her “off!” or ”no don’t do that” or “stop pulling!”.

I think in eventually she’ll be a great dog, once she learns that I won’t let her get away with bad behaviour and she gets over all this puppy energy, but until then I think I’ll be pulling my hair out on a daily basis.

 

Sebastian has been doing better.  He still won’t come out by himself when Lola is out, but if I bring him out and put him on the back of the couch (his favorite spot to hang out) then he is fine.  Some times he will even stay out when I take Lola outside rather then making a mad dash for the bedroom right away.  He’s even taken to stretching out and falling asleep on the back of the couch.  So that tells you how relaxed he is, or how trusting he is that I will protect him.  He is still sometimes scared if Lola is running around or doing something active, but he doesn’t run he just watches with wide eyes.

It has now been a full week since I got my dog Lola.  And what a week it has been!  I thought I’d give the over all report on how things have changed, and boy have they ever.

Lola was really good the first two days I had her (saturday and sunday the 15th and 16th), she just slept most of those days.  But starting monday she got really wild.
1 – She already knew how to sit, but that was the only manners she had.  She would also race out of the door every time I opened it.
2 - She would mouth everything in sight.  Me, the leash, carpet edges, my coat, my hair (yikes!) and anything else she could get her mouth on.
3 – She practically ripped my arm out of my socket when we went for a walk.  Every time I would pull her back she would just lunge ahead again, choking herself in the process, which caused her to have coughing fits even when we were just sitting around.
4 - She had to go potty within an hour after she ate or drank something or she would have an accident in the house.  Thankfully I noticed most of the times when she seemed like she had to go, and she only had three accidents.
5 - She would not only just jump up on me, but she would actually lunge for my face.  She would also try to jump on the couch (or try to sneak a paw up on it) whenever she thought I wasn’t looking.

She was constantly doing one naughty thing or another.  She seemed to have more energy then I knew what to do with.  I was exasperated, and I was feeling like I would have months and months, and maybe even years, of pulling-my-hair-out frustration before I would end up with a halfway decent dog.

My cat Sebastian was spending all of his time hidingunder the covers in my bedroom.  He would only come out when Lola was in her crate for the night.  And then he would only walk around in my bedroom.  He was constantly shaking withfear and tended to walk close to the ground.

 

Things have really changed in just one week!
1 – She knows that she has to sit every time I take the leash on or off, before I feed her, and when waiting to cross the street.  Some times I don’t even have to ask anymore.  Like when she sees the leash come out she will instantly go by the door and sit.  She now walks out of the door quietly and stops to give me time to close the door before we go on.
2 – She now knows the phrase “no bites!” and she normally hesitates before trying to nip me or anything else on my person (yay!).  She is getting better about not chewing on things she is not supposed to as well.  She only reaches for the leash a couple times, and most of the time I can stop her with a quick ”no bites!” before she even gets her mouth on it.
3 – Most of our walks are nice quiet affairs.  She will still pull when she sees something like a squirrel, another dog or sometimes a car, but other then that when she starts to pull all I have to do is give the leash a little tug and tell her “no” and she will stop.
4 – She now can go with only going to the bathroom 4 times a day.  6am when I get up, 7:30am before I leave for work, 5pm when I get home, and 10pm before bed.  Some times she asks to go out at around 9 something at night, but I don’t mind that.
5 – She knows the word “off!” really well.  I can now tell her to get off something from across the room and she will do it about 85% of the time.

Lola is well on her way to being my “perfect” dog.  She still has some issues to work on, but some of that is just being a puppy.  She spent most of the weekend sleeping.  And she relegated the bouncing-off-the-walls behaviour to playing outside, and stayed quiet inside.  I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel, and that tunnel is a lot shorter then I thought it was.  If she continues at this rate I will have a perfectly behaved dog by the end of the year!

Sebastian is now getting back to his normal behaviour.  He still stays in the bedroom and bathroom while Lola is out, but he is no longer hiding under the covers.  He and Lola have even gone nose to nose a couple times!  I’m keeping their meeting sessions short and sweet, and I make sure to end them before Sebastian tries to run or Lola gets hyper-excited.  I even have evidence that he is going into the kitchen during the night.  He has this annoying habit of opening the kitchen cabinet doors and I have found them open several days now.  Which means that he has to walk past Lola to get into the kitchen.
I don’t necessarily need them to be best buds, but I would like Sebastian go get comfortable enough with Lola so that he can come out when she is around.

 

So as you can tell we have had lots of progress in the past week.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed that things just keep getting better from here!

Lola was much better last night.  She still tried to grab onto the leash on our walk, but would stop when I told her to.  She didn’t spend most of the walk pulling, which was really nice.  I still had to correct her, but she didn’t pull all over the place.

I took her for a 2 block walk (they’re pretty big blocks) and then let her play in the yard for another 15 minutes before we came in.  She was still pretty wired for the first hour or so, but she got sleepy about 8pm and spent the rest of the night in her bed.

She’s still not eating as much as I think she should, especially for a growing pup on the skinny side.  She’s eating about 2 cups a day (1c at each meal), which is about half of the “recommended” amount listed on the bag.  I’m actually putting the whole 2 cups in her bowl at the beginning of the day, and she only eats about half of it.  I’ll talk to the vet about it on friday and see if she has any recommendations.

 

She was pretty good this morning.  She only tried to grab the leash a couple times and would drop it when I told her to.  She was pretty well behaved on her walk this morning.  She still pulled, but not nearly as much, and we had quite a bit of nice loose-leash moments.

The only problem this morning was that she didn’t go potty before I left.  She went when I first got up, but not later after her breakfast.  Which means she has to hold it until I get home.  I’m hoping that she’ll be able to do that.  Although it is totally her fault, because we spent 15 minutes outside in the yard after our walk.  But she just wanted to play, even though I kept telling her to go potty.
So keep your fingers crossed that I don’t come home to a mess tonight.

 

Sebastian was much better last night.  He actually spent most of the night out.  He was still in the bedroom, but he wasn’t hiding.  Lola now knows that he is in there though, and she keeps going to the gate to look in there.  This morning Sebastian stayed out until Lola went to the gate and barked at him.  Then he hid again, but I did pull him out before I left.  I’m hoping that in a few days he’ll come out when Lola is in her crate.  It would be nice to see him great me at the door when I come home.  I’ve missed that.

 

So all around things were better then Monday.  I think it’s pretty good that things are getting better and I’ve only had her a few days.  Lola still needs a lot of training, but I think it shouldn’t take all that long to get the basics down.  I’m hoping to have no leash biting by thanksgiving and no jumping or chewing things she shouldn’t by christmas.

Yesterday was a little bit of a bad day with Lola.  She was just always doing little naughty things, one thing after another.  It didn’t help that I was already tired from a rough night of sleep the night before.

The first thing was that she thinks it’s fun to grab the leash and play tug of war when we are walking.  Every time I got the leash out of her mouth she just grabbed it back up again.  The good thing is with the harness the leash hook is further back on her body, so she can’t just turn her head and grab it, she has to truly turn around to get it.

And when she is excited she jumps up on me.  Which I know is a typical untrained dog thing to do, but it’s still frustrating.  I’ll have to think about how I want to get her to stop doing that.  If I just push her off she thinks it’s a game and lunges right back.  I tried pushing her down until she was laying on the ground and holding her there until she stopped squirming.  That seemed to work ok.

Then she wanted to run around the house like a crazy lady.  Which I kind of understand because it was really cold outside and she didn’t want to run around outside.  So I spent some time throwing toys for her, which was ok.

Then she kept on wanting to jump on the couch.  Which I have decided is off limits for the time being.  I wouldn’t mind her on the couch if she would behave, but I don’t want her jumping around up there.  So I would push her off the couch and say “OFF!” and a few minutes later she would try to sneak back up again.

Then she kept on trying to chew the carpet.  Or the edges of an area rug.  Every time I stopped her she would stop for a few minutes and then start back up again in a different area.

And then she had an accident in the house.  Again, it was kind of my fault, I knew that she had drank alot after we came in from our last potty break, but then I forgot about it.

By the end of the night I was physically and mentally exhausted.  I’m sad to say that I snapped at her a few times.  I was just so tired and I just wanted to have a nice easy night.  But that didn’t happen.

 

This morning was much better.  She was pretty calm and would listen to me when I told her no.  Last night she started whining after I put her in her crate for the night, but after a few minutes she stopped.

I decided (for now at least) to use the term “no bites” whenever I want her to drop what she has in her mouth.  So when she picks up the leash, or if she is chewing on something she shouldn’t be I say “no bites!”.  It worked pretty well this morning.

I’m also working with her on the idea of “mine” and “yours”.  I think that will help with the leash grabbing too.  What I do is take a toy of hers (one that she isn’t playing with at the moment) and call her to me.  I ask her to sit and then show her the toy and say “mine”.  I slowly bring if closer to her and keep saying “mine”.  Every time she reaches for it I pull it out of reach and tell her no, and again say that it is mine.  When it is an inch or two away from her nose and she isn’t reaching for it then I’ll say “yours!” and give it to her.  By teaching her this way she gets used to “mine” and “yours”, and then it will be easier when I start training her to let me take something away from her.  Eventually all I have to do (in theory at least) is say “mine” and she should leave alone or give up whatever she has.

 

Sebastian was better last night.  I bought the Feliway before I went home and plugged it in right away.  He still spent most of the night hiding under my quilt, but one time I went in the bedroom and got him out so he could see Lola, who was waiting at the dog gate a few feet away.  Unlike all the other times he didn’t seem terrified of her, but he didn’t want to be near her either.  He spent most of the night above the covers either on the spare pillow or curled up to me.  Until he went exploring and woke Lola up around 5am.  Then he came running back and hid.  I ment to pull him out before I left, but I forgot.  I’m hoping that he will take the time when Lola is in her crate to come out and explore.

So that’s how everything went since yesterday.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a better night tonight then last night!

The reason I didn’t blog much last week was because I found a puppy!  I went to the humane society on tuesday and totally fell in love.  I thought I would just look, but it didn’t turn out that way. 

So my new puppy, who I’ve named Lola, is a female german shepherd mix with a white chest and four white paws.  She is 7 months old and she is about knee height.  Because she is so small it is obvious that she isn’t full shepherd, but she has to be mixed with something smaller.  I’m thinking beagle maybe?  She totally looks like a shepherd, just smaller.

Like I said I met her on tuesday, I spent about a half an hour with her in one of their “meet and great” rooms and I decided to go home and think about it.  The are closed on wednesday, so I went back on thursday and submitted my application.  She had just been spayed, so she was a little sleepy.  I spent about an hour with her, and most of that time she was curled up on my lap with her head under my arm.  Because she had just been spayed I wasn’t able to take her home until saturday.

But that turned out to be a good thing because I had a lot to do around the house to get ready for her.  I made sure I picked up everything below waist level that she could chew on.  I had to make sure I picked up all of the cat toys that I’m sure she could swallow (or at least try to).  Then I vacuumed really well and washed all of the floors (which I hadn’t done in far to long).  Then I had to get a few last minute things like food and a leash.  I had gotten everything else (like toys and beds) over a year ago, so I was just missing a few things.

Then the big day came on saturday.  My appointment was at 1:15, so that gave me the morning to make sure everything was ready.  Before I left I blocked off my bedroom and bathroom so my cat Sebastian had a “dog-free” zone.  Then I got there and I had to do all the paper work, and then about a half an hour later we were on our way!  She was pretty scared about the car ride.  So she spent most of the ride home with her head on my lap or tucked under my arm.  But I guess I’d rather have that then have her bouncing all over the car.

When I got home I took her out to the yard right away and let her get some energy out before I took her in the house.  I kept the leash on her while she took her first look around the house.  But after that I let her go wherever she wanted.  Which thankfully is wherever I am.  The good thing about that is that I don’t have to worry about what she is doing in another room out of eyesight.

I was surprised how good she is.  She didn’t tear around the house, she played nicely with her toys, and she even knows how to sit!  And she didn’t have an accident in the house.  Part of that was because I was taking her out every hour or so that first day, but it’s a good thing no matter the reason.  She actually spent most of the day sleeping.  She would run around and act crazy when I took her outside, but she was quiet inside the house.

She didn’t eat much supper, I think she is used to having access to food all day long and eating whenever she wants, but after a half an hour I picked the bowl up so that she knows that if she doesn’t eat when the food is given she doesn’t eat at all.
When it came time to go to bed I had to kind of push her into the crate, but once she was in there she quieted down and went to sleep.

Yesterday was pretty good as well.  I was happy to find that she didn’t have an accident in her crate during the night.  I was taking her outside about every two hours and she is very good about doing her business right away and then she’ll come over to me to say that she’s done.  Which is really nice if I just want to run out for a quick potty break and not stand out there for a half an hour.  She did have one accident in the house, but she had just woken up from a really long nap (about 3+ hours I think).  She just got up and peed right outside of the bed.  So I think that was more my fault then hers.  I should have woken her up to take her outside.  But now I know.

I took her for two walks yesterday.  She has really bad leash manners.  She spends most of her time pulling on the leash and then choking because she can’t breathe.  So that’s something I’ll have to work on.  I’m thinking I’ll go to the pet store tonight and try to get a harness for her.  That way I can correct her without worrying about hurting her throat.

She didn’t eat much again yesterday morning, but last night she ate pretty well.  Still less then I think she should eat, but at least she is eating.  I’m thinking (so far at least) that she is eating about 2 cups of dry food a day.  The food bag says she should eat 3-4 cups.  But I can’t force her to eat.  She is on the skinny side, so I’d prefer she eats more, but I guess maybe she knows how much she should eat.

Last night was pretty hard.  She cried several times during the night whenever she heard me moving around.  I think that’s mostly because she can’t see me.  If I told her to be quiet she normally settled down.  I think I’ll leave a radio on during the night and hope that helps.

So over all she’s been pretty good so far.  The only problem has been Sebastian.  He is terrified.  He spent the whole weekend hiding.  When I went to bed last night he curled up to me and just shook.  At one point during the night he must have went to check out the rest of the house, which just happened to wake up Lola, and she got up and started whining and that sent Sebastian flying back into the bedroom.  I’m going to look at getting a product called Feliway which is a pheromone that calms cats.  I’m hoping that will help.  Lola isn’t helping much because every time she sees him she gets all excited, which just terrifies Sebastian and sends him hiding again.  I’m hoping that after a few days he will get better.

So that’s how my first few days with Lola have been!  I’m sure you’ll be hearing lots more in the next couple days.  I’ll try to post a picture of her so that you can see what she looks like.

So I realized last night as I was driving home that I was being silly, obsessing about this dog stuff.

I have the strong belief that what is meant to be will be.  So if I am meant to have Puffin, I will get her.  If I am not meant to have her, then it won’t work out.  It’s as simple as that.

I have always felt that way, but for some reason I was obsessing over this stuff, rather then just relaxing and knowing that things will happen they way they are meant to.

So now I feel completely calm and will just wait for things to unfold.

So I had planned to drive down to my mom’s after work on friday, visit grandpa in the hospital that night, and then on saturday morning go see Puffin at the kennel, and then after that go see Erin at her foster mom’s house.  That was the plan.

My grandpa had a biopsy procedure on thursday afternoon (he was finaly stable enough that the doctors felt they could do it), and was still really sleepy on friday, so I decided to stay home that night and visit him saturday.  (he’s doing much better by the way, he was even able to sit up and do a puzzle!)

My adoption coordinator called and said that because of the kennel cough they had decided to cancel kennel day.  Apparently every time someone comes into the kennel the dogs get all excited, and then they start coughing.  Exactly what they don’t want.  So they decided it was better for them to stay quiet.  So no visit with Puffin.
I then contacted Erin’s foster mom and set up an 11am appointment.

I was a little disappointed about not being able to see Puffin again.  I really wanted to compare the two of them side by side (as much as possible).  But I’d already met Puffin once, so that was better then nothing. 

So I was really excited to meet Erin.  Everything her foster mom told me about her was really great.  And I wasn’t disappointed.  She is a really great girl.  She is SUPER affectionate, but if you tell her to go lay down she has no problem with that.  By everything I saw, and everything her foster mom said, she would work great in my house.
But I didn’t feel a connection with her.  I felt like I was looking at somebody else’s dog.  It was as if she already had a “sold” sign on her.  I felt in my soul of souls that it wasn’t meant to be.

I was a little disappointed, but I already knew I had a connection with Puffin, so it didn’t feel that bad.

Once I got to the hospital I called my adoption coordinator and told her that Erin wasn’t right for me.
She got really mad at me.  She said that she was wondering if I would find any dog that I liked.  I told her that I liked Puffin, but she didn’t seem to want to hear that.  She felt Erin was the right dog for me, and couldn’t understand why I didn’t want her.  We talked for almost an hour.  I tried to put what I felt into words, but either she has no understanding of that connection, or I wasn’t explaining it well enough.  She couldn’t understand how I could think Puffin was right for me after meeting her for a few minutes.

She couldn’t understand that every big decision in my life has been that way.  I knew the instant I walked into both my apartment and my house that I was home.  I knew the instant I laid my eyes on my cat Sebastian that he was meant for me and that I couldn’t allow him to go to anyone else.  I have never regretted any of those decisions.  She even stated that everybody plays the “what if” game.  What if I bought that other house, what if I adopted that other pet…
I have never done that with any of those decisions.  I knew from the start that it was the right decision, and have NEVER EVER thought differently.  Sure my house isn’t fun all the time.  My plumbing is a mess, I don’t have central air, it needs to be re-sided, I have mice….  But I have never felt for one second that this isn’t the house that I was meant to have.  Never.

I told her that the dog’s personality is secondary to that connection (she didn’t like that).  I don’t enjoy the idea of getting a dog that will need hours of walking every day just so it doesn’t bounce off the walls.  But if I knew in my soul that this was the right dog for me, I would learn to live with it.  If I fell in love with a dog that would need constant medical attention for the rest of it’s life, I would except that.  Once I have that connection, I am willing to bend over backwards for them.

Take the situation with my grandpa for example:  My mom and uncle have spend most of their waking hours in the hospital with my grandpa.  They both have jobs, they both have lives, but that was put on hold because the family needed them.  They might complain about the loss of money and the long hours sitting in the hospital, but they would do it again in a heartbeat.

I have that same feeling for my pets.  If I came home and found my house on fire, I would risk getting killed myself to try to get my pets out.  Most people have no problem saying that about their (human) kids, but when I say that about my animals people look at me as if I’m crazy.  I don’t see any differance.

At the end of the conversation she said that she wasn’t sure if the board would allow me to adopt through them.  She thought I was being to difficult.  So I don’t even know if I’ll be able to adopt Puffin.

So that conversation put me in a funk.  I keep replaying it over and over.  It’s not easy to hear someone tell you that what you wish for might not come true.  I know that greyhounds are the dog for me.  If they aren’t willing to help me then I’ll go somewhere else.  It could be another group, or I might even adopt right from the track.

Wow, this is really long.  I didn’t plan on it being this long.  But there you have it.  I’ll let you know what happens.

So I talked to Erin’s foster mom for about 45 minutes last night.  She had nothing but good things to say about her.  She said that she is an absolute dream.  Apparently she doesn’t have any bad habits.  But that could be love talking….  It is obvious that she is deeply in love with her, but they are already at their legal limit of 3 dogs (they are allowed to have a fourth as long as it’s just a foster).

FM (foster mom) said Erin likes to follow people around the house (just because she wants to be where you are, not because she’s clingy), but if you tell her to go lay down, she will.  She has a sassy side.  She likes to toss her stuffiesinto the air and pounce on them.  FM said she is incredibly obedient.  You only have to tell her something once.  FM said that one of her dogs is always slow to eat, and one day Erin went sniffing at that bowl.  All FM had to do was tell her NO.  The next day she stood there looking longingly at the bowl (from several feet away), but with a quick reminder that the food in that bowl wasn’t hers, she left it alone and hasn’t tried to eat it since.
That sounds alot like my cat Sebastian.  You only have to tell him something once.  Only sometimes does he need a reminder.

She’s incredibly smart.  She loves car rides, but once she’s in there she just lays down and watches the world pass by.  She walks nicely.  She doesn’t mind thunderstorms or fireworks.  She doesn’t go in the garbage.  She doesn’t steal anything off the kitchen counter.  She doesn’t bark.  She goes into her crate when told, and doesn’t wine

The reason Erin was retired was a broken hock (what we think of as their knee).  She had to have a plate and several screws put in, but now she is all healed up.  Some dogs never have the plate and screws taken out, but sometimes they do, it all depends on the dog.

I’m interested to meet her tomorrow (OMGit’s TOMORROW!).  I kind of wish I could see her before Puffin, but I’ll just have to really take my time with both of them.  I have a feeling that once I meet Erin I will immediately know if she’s for me or not (compared to Puffin at least).

Oh, this is interesting:  Erin’s birthday is April 7th, and her last race was April 20th.  My birthday, and my grandpa’s birthday is in April.  As is my cat Sebastian, my first cat Samantha, and my mom’s cat Mandy (who was mine in the beginning).  I like the confluence of that.  You can’t look at all of that and tell me that it is all coincidence.  None of it was on purpose either.  I was born 3 weeks overdue (so I wasn’t supposed to be in the same month as my grandpa), the only reason we got Samantha was because the neighbour couldn’t catch her, Mandy was a stray that our cat Shadow brought home, and when I adopted Sebastian I thought he was only 10-12 weeks old, only to find out later that he was five months old, making him an April birth.
I just can’t seem to get away from April birthdays!

IF (and I can’t use the word “if” enough) I do like Erin, I think it’s pretty obvious that she was meant for me.  But I don’t want the idea of a April birthday to cloud my feelings for her.  Like I said, I think I will know the instant I lay eyes on her if she is right or not.  If she isn’t, then it’s no big deal.  But if she is, then WOW!

I got a call from my greyhound adoption rep Cindy last night.  She told me that the dogs at the kennel have kennel cough.  So no dogs are allowed in or out.  They have to keep them quarantined for 2 weeks after the last dog coughs.  So sometimes they are only quarantined for 3 weeks, sometimes it’s 6 weeks.  One time it was 6 months!  Hopefully it won’t be that long.

So I can still go to the kennel to “officially” meet Puffin and walk the other dogs, but she can’t go into a foster home until the quarantine is lifted.

Cindy also told me about another dog Erin, who is a three year old red brindle female.  From what Cindy told me about her, she seems like she could be a good dog for me.  I’m calling her foster mom tonight, so I’ll get more info then.

Cindy said that her big plan is that I’ll go to the kennel, have my “meeting” with Puffin, and then follow Erin’s foster mom home (she is in charge of kennel day, and only lives about 15 minutes away).  If I like Erin, I could take her home with me.  But I don’t think I will, as my house is out of control from spending my weekends in the hospital with grandpa.  I normally do most of my cleaning on the weekends, and being that I haven’t been home for the last several weekends the cleaning hasn’t been getting done.  So I need to get that in shape before I bring a dog home.  I clean well under pressure, so that shouldn’t be a problem.  I have next friday (the 25th) off, so if I like her I might try to work out getting her on thusday night, then I’ll have three whole days home with her before I have to go back to work.

So now I’m kind of up in the air again.  If I’m sure Puffin is for me, then I’ll just have to wait until the quarantine is lifted, however long that is.  But if I like Erin, I could have a dog in a week.  I guess I won’t know until saturday.  I don’t like not knowing.  I like having everything all planed out…..

So today is hump day.  The middle of the work week.

I normally don’t “celebrate” hump day.  I really don’t care.  I do the same work no matter if it’s monday or friday, or anywhere in between.  But, because I can’t wait to see Puffin on saturday, I want this week to be over.  Now.

Do you ever have that feeling where time seems to be flying by, but the long term stuff still seems so far away?  It feels like my days are just running away from me, but saturday still seems like it is AGES away.  It should be much closer by now, shouldn’t it?

I guess it will get here when it gets here.  I can’t make time move faster, so I guess I’ll just have to be patient.

———————————————

On another note:
We had a little family crisis last night.  My cousin (I’ll call him “D“) has been staying with my grandparents for the past several months because he had no where else to go.  But over that time little things have been happening.  Like he doesn’t do things he promised to do (but claimshe did), he claims he doesn’t drink but comes home drunk, things are missing (including my grandmother’s checkbook [which she swears she just misplaced])….

While my grandpa has been in the hospital my grandma has asked him to do a couple things for her.  Nothing major, just stuff like doing his own laundry and taking the garbage out.  They have a very steep driveway (when cars come in they are at such an angle that the muffler hits the pavement) and grandma isn’t strong enough to carry the pails down that seep angle.  He’s been doing it for several weeks, but this week he refused.  He made my grandma do it.  He couldn’t drag his 28-year-old physically healthy butt out of the house for 5 freaking minutes to do that for her.

My grandma is always making excuses for him.  “He’s had such a hard life” or “He can’t help that he has emotional problems because every one has abandoned him”.  B.S.  Plain and simple.  My mother had a very rough childhood, but she turned out just fine.  But that’s because she looked at her life and decided that she didn’t want to live the rest of her life that way, and changed it.  It wasn’t easy, but she made up her mind, and she made a better life for herself.  She put herself through collage, she got a decent job, she had a family.  She changed because she wanted to.  D has no desire to change his life, and if everything isn’t given to him on a silver plater he complains that no one loves him.

I don’t know exactly what happened last night, but my grandma called saying that she and D got into a big fight, and that she was scared of him.  My mom and uncle rushed over there to see what was going on.  Eventually the police were called and he was thrown from the house and driven to the city limits.  He was told that he couldn’t come back unless he was accompanied by police officers.

I’m sad it came to this.  I don’t want him to feel like the rest of his family has abandoned him.  He’s made suicide attempts before.  I don’t want that to happen again.  But he needs to get his act together.  He’s 28 years old.  He should be able to get a job and do things for himself.  He’s to old for people to be taking care of him.  My mom and uncle were talking about having him committed to some mental health place.  I think it’s to late for that now.  I think they are beyond that.

The good thing about this is that it seems my grandma is no longer making excuses for him.  She seems to finally see that he can’t be helped unless he wants to change.

Show of hands, who thinks my family is weird?        *puts up hand*