Stuff 'n' Nonsense

First off, go read Steve's recent journal entry for a capsule summary of the reviews for Zero Hour. (You might also want to check out the latest video, which is little bits from the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Show.)

Then, if you are so inclined, you can go and read our 2009 Christmas Letter, that odious thing that I do every year, which includes very little, if anything, newsworthy to regular readers of this journal, but there it is, all in one place for you. Tom says he wishes there were more pictures of Bri (yes, he's being sarcastic). My favorite part is the doggie collage.

(larger size in the Christmas letter)

I feel like I've been living with all of these dogs this week because Snapfish was having a half off sale if you got your book in by December 2. Each year I put together a "Dogs of xxxx" book, which has pictures and brief memories of each dog we have fostered throughout the year.

Walt says that now that I've put together the "Dogs of 2009," we can't take any new fosters until 2010.

The way things are looking now, on December 1, we will still have Freddie and Dexter here by the end of the year. I love them both, but they are now becoming magnets. The only way I can get away from having them plastered to my body at all times is to come here into the office. As soon as I get up, they are following me and Lord help me if I want to sit down. I must have both of them in my lap. They are very happy, whether sleeping or mouth-wrestling. I am no longer a human being--I've become a big dog bed.

Walt weighed Freddie tonight and he's 28 lbs. He's really getting too big (and too squirmy) to sleep in my lap all night...but he sure tries. Last night I decided to sleep on the couch, hoping to get a few uninterrupted hours. Of course it's impossible to sneak down the hall without Freddie and Dexter immediately waking up and following me. I let them both up on the couch with me, but just sleeping on my feet, the way all puppies have always done, wasn't enough. Freddie needed to slither up my back and stretch out along my spine, with his nose in my hair. Dexter then crawled up on top of Freddie and the three of us slept there for a few hours, piled three-high. Strange that I woke up at 2 a.m. with a stiff neck.

Night times are so much fun these days!

But you have to laugh at the dogs. Freddie's newest obsession is grabbing towels and dragging them down the hall to the living room. This afternoon Dexter discovered that if he was quick, he could sit on the towel and get a ride.

Freddie has also learned how to come in the dog door from the back yard (Dexter hasn't yet), but hasn't figured out that the door goes both ways, so we still have to leave the siding glass door open for him to get out. Unfortunately he goes out to run, to pick up sticks and to play, but when it's time to relieve himself, he comes in to go to the living room.

That's OK. The rug is going to be torn up ASAP when the puppies finally find forever homes!

2 Dog Night

When I woke up this morning, it was nice and warm in the house. The weather has been so cold this week that I've been closing the sliding glass door in the family room at night when we go to sleep, rather than leaving it open a bit for the puppies to go out through the night. It was nice not to get up shivering.

But then I came into my office and it was like walking into a refrigerator.

The dog door is cut in the wall here. It has served countless dogs over the past couple of decades, but some time ago, the frame got ripped off by some obstreperous dogs. This means that the magnet-type strip that keeps the plastic flap closed when not in use has long since ceased to work.

Normally, I don't notice it, but when the temperatures drop into the 30s overnight, when there is a slight breeze, and when the heat vent has never worked in this office, the rest of the house could be in the 80s and I'd still freeze. For the past few days, I can only really stand to be working in here for about an hour, then I have to go out and run my hands under warm water...or find something extra warm to wrap up in while I'm working.

I had never thought of asking Walt is he could fix the dog door. I've just lived with it and unless you are actually in this office, you probably don't notice how cold it can get.

This morning I finally asked him if, now that the set he was building was finished, he could either put in a new dog door or find a way to replace the flap that is in there now. Hopefully as we head into the colder winter temperatures, we can get it fixed and I won't freeze trying to work in here.

I had told Peach I would go to her house today to see about helping her get an Etsy site set up for the Crafty Cuzzins (horrendously complicated for bizarre reasons). We worked on it for a couple of hours and she fixed lunch for me. As I left, Bob was in the recliner with their two dogs.

I commented on how little and puny his dogs were!

When I got home, the house was very cold because during the day I do leave the back door open for the dogs. I tried getting some work done in my office, but it was just too bloody cold.

I finally realized that Bob had the right idea for how to beat the cold...only I had a much better solution than he did.

It's MUCH warmer when you're under 60 lbs of dog! (Yes, Walt weighed Higgins tonight and he is just about 30 lbs, Freddie isn't all that much lighter--and Dexter is a little over 5 lbs. Of course you can't get much done this way, but I sure wasn't cold any more!!!

And Then There Were Two

Well, three, if you count Dexter.

Yes, Eliza got adopted today. I'm thrilled.

When I went up to Petco to pick the puppies up, I was very disheartened to see that all four were still in the pen. I had hoped to see SOMEONE finally being adopted. I also couldn't understand why Freddie, whose portrait on Petfinder, is the cutest of the three...

...hadn't had any inquiries at all.

I went off to do some shopping (really, just an excuse to listen to my audio book, which is only 3 hours from being finished!) and then came home to pick up the puppies. As I said, they were all still in the cage.

I sighed and got Higgins by the leash and started to leave when Ashley stopped me and asked me to wait a bit. She said a couple was trying to decide between Higgins and Eliza. So I sat there for about half an hour, having some of Ashley's birthday cake, and finally the decision had been made: Eliza.

I went to say goodbye to Eliza and meet her new family and it was the couple I had met with last week, who expressed an interest in both Eliza and Higgins. Eliza was snuggled comfortably in the woman's lap, looking like she had made the switch already, though I wonder how she's going to feel at bedtime tonight!

So I packed the other three up in the car and brought them home again. One of their siblings also got adopted today, so slowly but surely all twelve puppies are finding homes. Maybe next week we'll be lucky again. I want to be sure to get Higgins adopted before I have to saddle him in order to control him!

The Weaning Process

Though I had nursed Jeri, Ned and Paul, I never actually had to deal with weaning until Tom came along.

I had gone to La Leche League classes when Jeri was expected and had all these wonderful images in my mind of letting her wean, continuing to let her nurse well into her second year. But she was always the independent sort and decided on her own at 9 months of age that it was time to graduate to milk in a cup. I knew all the theory about how to gently wean a baby when Mom was read to stop nursing. I hadn't read anything about how to wean Mom when baby is ready to move on to the next step!

When Ned came along, I hoped he would nurse longer, and he did. But I still wasn't ready for him to decide to quit nursing on his first birthday. I had now gone through two pregnancies talking with mothers about the fun of nursing a toddler, but I seemed doomed to have toddlers who were determined not to cooperate.

Along came Paul and it was a repeat of Ned. Within a week of his first birthday, he, too, gave up nursing.

Nursing Tom was different. I don't know why, but it was. Perhaps it was because he was the first one who showed no sign of wanting to stop nursing when he turned one, and for the first time I had my own stories of nursing a toddler, as he grew older...the little all-boy boy who would run in, football under his arm, dirt on his face, and jump up to nurse for a couple of minutes before running outside again. The little kid who would sit up in my lap, fold his hands, close his eyes and say "God is great, God is good, let us bless us for this food. Today we're gonna have....nurse!"

Since David is dead and not likely to be following blogs from the other side, I can confess that I was very upset when I realized I was pregnant with him. We had four kids under five. I was already stretched to my emotional limits and the last thing I wanted was another baby. I remember the day I knew for certain I was pregnant and I sat down and cried.

One of the big reasons I was so upset was that I was having such a wonderful relationship with Tom and I just didn't want that to end. I made the decision to let Tom be the decider of when to stop nursing--and if he decided to nurse all the way through the pregnancy, La Leche League had lots of stories of "tandem nursing," where the older child continues to nurse after the younger one is born. It was a decision that to this day I regret.

Tom did nurse all the way through the pregnancy and when David came, he began nursing like a newborn so much so that he started having newborn-type diapers again. We never had the lovely nursing sessions that people talked about, where the older and the younger child would hold hands, smile, laugh, and enjoy the moment together. From the time David was old enough to realize that he had to share with Tom it was a constant battle, so much so that I had to start nursing them separately in order to keep peace (which, combined with the fact that I was also collecting breastmilk to donate to a sick baby in Kaiser hospital, meant I was pretty much nursing most of the day!).

I loved David on one level, but I still resented his just being here. In fact, I still remember the day when he was about six months old, playing in the "Johnny Jump-up" and being particularly adorable when I looked at him and realized that I really loved him. Really really loved him, not the sort of "I have to because he's my baby" sort of love.

But the older the kids got the more difficult it became because Tom would decide in the middle of the supermarket that he wanted to nurse NOW and throw horrible tantrums if I didn't open up right away. Even today people are uncomfortable seeing a woman nursing a tiny baby in public--the idea of nursing a toddler is something far too many find disgusting.

It changed things. I had to wean Tom and it was hard on both of us. To this day, I think it changed our relationship and it makes me very sad whenever I think of it.

The reason I'm thinking about weaning today is that I've been watching the puppies and thinking about how mother dogs wean their young and how they start acting almost mean to them as they continue to want to be around her all the time.

That's how I'm starting to feel about these guys, who must be on me whenever I am anywhere in a seated position and God forbid I should get into the recliner, when all four have to be on top of me. I'm not sure how much the puppies weigh--they have outgrown my baby scale--but surely their combined weight must be >40 lbs.

I find myself avoiding them these days, staying in my office, strictly to avoid being around them (even though it is always so much colder in here in the wintertime because of the dog door). I'm trying very hard to wean them, but only getting their own family is going to really wean them. But this Mama Dog is really, really ready for her babies to grow up and move away!!!

Old Friends, Hairy and Otherwise, Return

Two days ago, I optimistically reported that I thought that Higgins' "test placement" must be going very well, since I had heard nothing from the woman who took him.

Well. I spoke too soon.

I had a call from her over the weekend, saying that after a week, her dog still was not bonding with Higgins, that the dog still barked whenever Higgins got near. She herself loved Higgins and had even taken him to work with her, where he behaved very well, but her husband was now thinking he didn't really want a second dog, so she was going to be bringing him back.

We made arrangements to have her drop him off in the late afternoon because we had plans in the middle of the day.

Walt's old college buddy, Jim and his wife Ann were going to be driving through town on their way from Lake Tahoe to San Francisco, where they would be flying back to Maryland and had called to ask if we wanted to meet for brunch.

We had a delightful visit over pasta at Caffe Italia here in Davis, where we occupied a booth for about 2 hours, while patrons came and went and the wait staff climbed all over us taking down Halloween decorations.

We guessed that had been about ten years since Walt and Joe had seen each other (though I saw Joe and his wife a year ago, while they were in California for their son's ordination and Walt was in London). They are such lovely, gracious people and I always enjoy our brief meetings.

We stayed so long at the restaurant that the woman who was returning Higgins actually called as we were leaving. I didn't realize it was so late.

Walt dropped me off at home and went off to work on the set he's helping to build right now. I waited for Higgins, who arrived very shortly after I got home again.

The woman who dropped him off stayed for 20-30 minutes, playing with the dogs and watching Higgins reunite with his siblings again. There were some squabbles and some minor territorial challenges, but basically they all seemed happy to see each other again.

After she left, I took them all out to the back yard, where they exploded into a flurry of hairy masses chasing each other around and around and around.

Lizzie seemed to vacillate between wanting to being one of the gang and wanting to exert her superiority over the smaller guys. I just LOVE the look on Higgins' face in this picture:

For the moment, Higgins is back home again. I hesitate to be optimistic, but last night all three puppies slept all night cuddled up next to each other. Nobody demanded to be in my lap with Dexter, and even when I got up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, they sat up and looked at me, but immediately went back to sleep as soon as I returned. I hardly dare hope that this will be how things will go now that Higgins is back, but I sure appreciated the sleep last night!

Another Corner Heard From

I finally heard from the third of my three Compassion kids. I'm not sponsoring Fred, but his sponsor doesn't have time to write to him, so he needs someone to write to him and I volunteered.

Fred lives in the southern part of the island of Luzon, in the Philippines. According to the information that came with this letter, "Bicol is one of the major tourist destinations in the Philippines and is primarily known as the home of Mount Mayon, an active volcano with a perfectly shaped cone. It is the Philippines' most active volcano. It has an elevation of 2,462 meters (8,007 feet) with a base diameter of 20 km.

"Bicol is also famous for its rich and spicy dishes which are mostly cooked using "gata," or coconut milk and flavored with "siling labuyo," or chili. Well known Bicolano specialties are "bicol express," "inanaqat," "liang" and "kinunot." Must buys include "pili," nut-based delicacies, and handicrafts.

"Compassion has a total of 3,849 registered children in Bicol, coming from 30 projects as of March 2009."

The above is a picture of Mt. Mayon, the Philippines' most active volcano and considered to be the world's most perfectly formed volcano for its symmetrical cone. The name Mayon is derived from the Bicolano word "Magayon" which means "beautiful." (See how instructive this blogl can be?)

Many of the children come from non-English speaking countries, and so their letters need to be translated before they can be sent. However, Fred's mother, Lyra, wrote the letter for him, in English, which opens up all sorts of possibilities for sending him little books and things that require the ability to understand English, since the translators only translate the letters.

According to her letter, six year old Fred is the oldest of four children (this sounds like MY family!) and his younger siblings are all girls. The father is, according to Lyra, "a tricycle driver." But she doesn't say what he does on the tricycle, whether it is delivering stuff or something like a street taxi driver.

So I have now heard from all three of my Compassion children and already the letters to them are starting to be individualized -- up to this point, I was sending the identical letter to all three kids, but as I begin to learn about their likes and dislikes, and to answer their questions, they will start getting individually written letters.

The nice thing about Compassion is that you can either send a real letter or you can send an e-mail. I send little things like stickers or photos or things like that through the mail, but if I have nothing to send (or don't feel like getting something ready to send), then I can send an e-mail instead. And we all know I know how to send e-mail!

I am cautiously optimistic that Higgins has a new home. A woman picked him up the other day to take him home on a "trial run" to see how he got along with their dog, who has had problems with other dogs in the past. From all reports, though the two dogs have not yet bonded, Higgins seems to have little separation anxiety! The woman hasn't called yet to say she is going to be bringing him back.

Higgins on a day he went with her to her work

The other three have become adamant about being in my lap whenever my knees bend. Dexter has learned how to jump into my lap (but then he's the older puppy, by at least a month, even if he is much smaller). Eliza knows how to climb up the footrest of the recliner if I tilt it down for her a bit. Freddie has more trouble, but if he can get his front legs on the footrest, I can pick him up by my feet (it's difficult to pick up a big dog when you already have two other dogs in your lap!) Doing this at 3 a.m. is just so much fun!

There was no adoption at Petco this week, since it was Halloween and it's a bad idea to try to introduce a new pet into the family on a night with so much confusion going on, so it will be at least a week before we have our next shot at finding a new home for all the puppies.

Transitions

The period of transition has started around here.

Yesterday, Cayce, a local dog trainer, took Higgins to visit a family who is looking for a second dog. They need one who is gentle but who is going to be big (that certainly describes Higgins to a "T"). It was a test play date and she brought him back a couple of hours later saying it had been a great success. The family's other dog had been attacked by a big dog some time ago and is very afraid around dogs, but the two dogs seemed to get along well. She thinks this may be the perfect placement for Higgins. So we'll see where this goes.

The puppies are all getting so big. I know it's time for them to find forever homes. They've now been at Petco two Saturdays and it's only a matter of time before they all find new families.

This morning I took this picture. When I'm sleeping in the recliner they all sleep directly in front of me, on the dog bed. When they hear the sound of the footrest on the recliner click down three heads immediately pop up and they sit there staring at me for a few seconds before they come over to me for snuggles. I've been meaning to keep a camera directly next to me so I'm all ready to take a photo as soon as I sit up and today I finally got it.

Higgins, Eliza, Freddie

(Actually, it's not cuddles so much they want as that this is their "OK--you're finally awake...when are you going to feed us?" look!)

At the same time, Dexter has been to the vet's and been neutered. He was gone 3 days (because they go up to UCD and they keep the dogs for a few days to give the students an opportunity to work with them). I swear he doubled his fur while he was there.

Furry Dexter

As you can see, he's well on his way to looking like a real dog again (though extremely nervous being perched on top of my desk!) It won't be too much longer before he's ready to go up for adoption too.

This is always kind of the bittersweet time. It's nice to think of not having the piles of poop to clean up every day and as they start literally eating me out of house and home (Higgins will chew anything, though stops when you tell him to, thank goodness. He decided to chew a wall the other night.) it's nice to think of someone else taking on the task of training them not to chew, but yet these guys have been with me literally since birth, so it's always sad to think of them leaving.

I always say, as each group of puppies looks toward leaving, that these were the best puppies ever. And I always believe that every time. Maybe I just have really good puppies (though there were a couple of litters that I was very happy to see leave). But these guys definitely rank up there among the best. Maybe Tater and Tot were the best, but probably only becuase Tot/Lester has stayed in the family and I see how happy she has made Jeri and Phil.

But I will really always remember the My Fair Lady puppies fondly. Of course it's not like they're all leaving tomorrow. They may still be here for several weeks. But I can see the clock ticking and I know that it's only a matter of time--and someone else recognizing the sweetness that I see in all of them.

The Snake Pit

I remember seeing the movie The Snake Pit, made in 1948. It stars Olivia deHavilland as a woman who finds herself in an insane asylum and doesn't know how she got there. I don't really remember anything else about it except the final scene, which is an overhead shot of the women in the exercise yard and it looks like...a snake pit.

I thought about that today when I took the puppies up to Petco. They were all there today, all the puppies.

(See the video of the day to get a better feel for what it was like).

I packed our four up and stuck them in the car. They weren't sure what to make of it all.

Dexter (the hairy one with the big ears :)) came along, but wasn't going up for adoption. Instead, he was going to UCD to be neutered. I had to pack him and his medicine, since he's on a special blend that is helping him regrow all that fur. He looks like a dog, now, doesn't he!

The MFL puppies seemed to blend in ok with their siblings, but I noticed that whenever I looked at the cage, they seemed to be hanging out together. And at the end of the day there were fewer puppies--at least one was adopted and another family was filling out paperwork to adopt another, but all three of mine came home again, which I was happy about.

I do miss Dexter, though, and wonder how he's handling the trauma of being in a cage. He's been glued to my body ever since he came here and I know that he is definitely not a happy puppy tonight. I'll also miss having him sleep in my lap tonight.

---

So this evening I decided to be a good guy and we have, unfortunately, suffered the consequences. Several weeks ago, my editor forwarded a message from a guy who wanted The Enterprise to review a show. I thought, from his message, that this was a new theatre company starting up, and I was going to do a story about it and also review his show. (As it turns out, this company has been in existence for quite a long time, but it was the premiere of this musical.)

Well, I never did get around to the story and I actually forgot the opening performance and the second weekend I already had two shows to review and besides, Derrick was loaded with stuff and had no space to put a review. I apologized profusely to the guy and promised him that I would give plenty of space to their next production.

He was very sad because apparently no newspaper had shown any interest. He said that people had expressed sentiments like: "I expected community theater -- this is Broadway quality." and "This play should be running indefinitely in downtown Sacramento." He himself (the author) describes it as "This ambitious world premiere production of a big-cast, big-stage musical, by a local writing team with established reputations, would seem to merit a review, just to provide an assessment of the work." He also said he was 77 years old and probably this would be his very last play.

There was literally nothing I could do to get him reviewed in our paper, but I felt so bad about it all that I told him about my review blog and said that if it would make him feel better, I would review it for the blog. He was thrilled. It meant, of course, that I wasn't being paid to write the review. All I would get were tickets to the show, but at least my guilt would be assuaged. We went to the show tonight. It was held at a high school gymnasium and seats were hard back chairs that killed my back. That was just for starters.

Because I'm not being paid, I was sorely tempted to leave at intermission, but there were only 20 in the audience, and our absence would have been noted. I was also tempted to write and ask him if he's SURE he wants this review. I am reminded of a gawdawful play I saw years ago, written by the late Larry Linville, of M*A*S*H fame. He may have been a good actor, but he was a terrible playwright and not even the red carpet and the presence of his family and his friend Garry Berghoff in the audience could make it a good play.

This one isn't that bad, but let's just say that it's definitely not "Broadway quality"! Because it's amateur theatre, I will be kind in my review, but it may not be what he was hoping for.

And I'll never, ever, ever volunteer to do a freebee just to be a good guy again!

Neither Snow nor Sleet...

We don't actually get snow or sleet here, but apparently rain has defeated our mail carrier. It's the first storm of the season and yes, it's a big one, but we've had worse and still had our mail delivered. But it's 5 p.m. as I write this and there is no sign of our mail carrier. The mail usually arrives around noon here.

The rain has been a big surprise for the puppies. I saw Higgins go outside, look up quizically, wander out under a tree and then run back, shaking water off his back. Eliza just sits at the back door wondering what has turned her playground into a swimming pool.

But their day started out as a big surprise anyway. I have been sleeping in the recliner since I saw the nerve conduction doctor. She suggested keeping my arm straight as much as possible, including sleeping with my arm outstretched and that is much easier to do in the recliner than it is on the couch. It's too early to know if it's helping or not. If it doesn't help, no biggie, as long as the condition doesn't get worse, but I figure I'll give it a fighting chance.

Anyway, since we are one "pack," the puppies, who had started sleeping in the living room when I slept there, are now sleeping on the big dog bed which is right in front of the recliner. So when I woke up this morning, I could hear the quiet whimpering sounds of hungry puppies. When I sat up I was greeted with delighted wriggling bodies, tails wagging, tongues lapping and everybody telling me that I had slept so long that they were sure they were going to die of starvation.

I got up out of the chair, stood up and they went into a frenzy of excitement.

"She's Up! She's Up! She will feed us!!!" as the puppies all galloped off down the hall ahead of me.

When we got to the doorway into the kitchen, they took a sharp right and then came to a screetching stop when I kept on going down the hall into the bathroom. There are some things that have to take place before puppies get fed, but you could just see the "WFT?????" look on the face of all of them. "She's UP? And she's not FEEDING us????" They way they spun around and galloped down the hall following me was like something straight out of a Disney cartoon.

With all the rain, the puppies, who have been spending a lot of time outside, have, as Walt predicted, gone into "full poop mode," and I have "flushed the living room" several times throughout the day. I can't really complain about these guys because they have been doing a lot of their business -- well over half, I am assuming (based on how much I've cleaned up today) outside instead of inside. And who can blame them for not wanting to go poop outside when not even the mailman wants to walk the streets in the rain!

They've also discovered all sorts of wonderful new things to play with. It actually started last night when they somehow got hold of the earphones for my iPod and chewed off one of the buds.

And then today, it was full assault on The Wall.

Now, again in fairness to the puppies, this is a hole that Paul kicked in the wall in one of his angry outbursts some 20 years ago that we just never have gotten around to fixing. But the puppies discovered that it was something new to chew on and they ripped off part of the paint-covered wall and dug out some more of the insides of the wall as well. We may actually have to do something about finally getting the hole fixed, though by now it has become the "Paul Sykes Memorial Hole" and perhaps we'll just put up a plaque instead.

The puppies also continue to tear away at a strip in the middle of the living room rug. I'm of the feeling that this is a GREAT play toy for them because (a) they are having such fun working on it and (b) we will be tearing up the rug after they leave anyway, in preparation for eventually putting in the new floor and the the more time they spend tearing up the rug, the less time they are spending finding something else to tear up.

They are growing like weeds these days and eating me out of house and home. I got two medium size bags of large dog puppy kibble from the SPCA on Saturday and they have already finished over half of the first bag. They eat 2-3 times a day and take about 4 cups of kibble at a feeding...and scarf it down almost instantly (no wonder they are such pooping machines).

But the surprises for the boys will continue this week, as they are going to the vet on Thursday to be neutered. If my walk to the bathroom prompted a "WTF" look, you can just imagine what they are going to think when they wake from anesthesia with their barely formed manhood missing!

---

P.S. The mail was finally delivered at 6 p.m.

I'll Never Do THAT Again

I'm glad that I already decided this would be our last year to host the Neighborhood Night Out. Last year it had an OK attendance, but I thought that by having it in the afternoon this year and making it an ice cream social, more people might come. (So far I've had 3 RSVPs...nobody officially responded last year, I don't think, and about a dozen people showed up)

It really sounds like a nice, neighborly, sociable thing to do. There are more than 100 parties this year all around the city, a significant rise from last year (when there were 60-some parties). The city gives you lots of goodies, most of which will ultimately end up in the garbage, I'm sure, but they include refrigerator magnets with city phone numbers, booklets about fire safety, information on H1N1, balloons, glowsticks and a big sign to put on the lawn. Last year there were a couple dozen pens so people could sign a sign-up sheet, but this year they didn't include the pens, just gave us the sign-up sheets.

But packet also included a gift certificate to the Davis Food Co-op for $25 to help purchase supplies for the party. I think that was about what I spent last year, as I bought ingredients and made my own hors d'oeuvres and people also brought stuff.

Well...I've discovered that ice cream for a neighborhood ain't cheap (especially at the co-op, which has "good" stuff, not cheap stuff)! Just four large containers (48 oz) of ice cream alone is more than $25 (and I'm not sure if 4 containers is going to be enough--but it has to be). But add to that cups, cones, chocolate syrup, nuts, and whipped cream and we're getting into real money for people I don't even know at all.

The final tally -- and this included a few things for us, that won't be at the party, like dinner tonight and tomorrow night) was over $80. The gift certificate helped, but by no means did it begin to cover the cost. We still have go buy ice in the morning. I had intended to buy more ice cream somewhere else where I could get a vat cheaper, but we're going to have to go with what I have.

Now I did ask for this to be a pot luck, and it's entirely possible that people are going to bring ice cream to contribute. One person offered to bring ice cream and I told her to bring some sort of topping and maybe cookies to go with the ice cream.

But bottom line is it ain't cheap and while I knew going into this that I would be spending money on it, as I said earlier, I'm glad this is the last year we'll be hosting. Time for someone else to step up to the plate and have a turn.

Realizing that there was a very good possibility that Higgins and/or Freddie might be adopted today, I tried taking some better pictures. I wasn't able to corner Freddie, but I really like this one of Higgins.

At the appointed hour, we drove the boys up to Petco (finding out later that Ashley had misunderstood me and thought I was asking when the puppies were going to be neutered--the boys this week and Eliza next week. I thought she said she only wanted boys at Petco this week and I could bring Eliza next week...so we left Eliza home).

When we got there, all the other siblings were already in the cage--and what a sight it was!

I'm not sure how many were in the cage--but I think it was 8 or 9. There was, of course, no grand reunion. They could all care less about the two "strangers" added to the pile. We came on home and awaited news of our babies.

When we got back to PETCO at 3:30, none of the puppies had been adopted, so we were happy to bring them both back home again, none the worse for their experiences. So they're here again for at least another week.

I'm glad.

Counting Down the Days

Look! Look!

It's fur!!! It's real fur!!!!! I was running my hands along Dexter's back last night and realized I was no longer feeling scabs, but stubble. In the one spot on his body where he had a hint of fur when we first got him, there is actual visible FUR growing. Of course I needed a close up lens to take this picture, but he's really finally starting to grow fur! When I give him his medicine each day I say what my father used to say to me, "It will put hair on your chest." Only in his case, it actually does.

As for the other guys, the are just getting bigger and bigger, especially Higgins, who is almost too heavy to pick up these days.

I wrote to Ashley last night to find out how soon they would be going up for adoption. As I told her, it's not that I'm eager to be rid of them, but I knew that the time was fast approaching.

Faster approaching than I realized. The boys are now listed on Petfinder and will make their first trip to Petco on Saturday. Eliza will go up on Petfinder next week and go to Petco next Saturday.

There is, of course, no guarantee that they will be adopted right away. After all,there are a dozen of these cuties looking for homes, but naturally I think I have the cutest of them :) so am sure everyone will instantly fall in love with them before their siblings.

In the meantime, I continue to be "Mom" to these little guys. Wherever I am, they are.

When I come in here to my office to work while they are off sleeping somewhere, pretty soon, one will stagger in and flop down at my feet, then another, then another, until all four are here. When I get up quietly and move to another room, I begin to hear whimpering and pretty soon the four start straggling out of my office, looking still half asleep, and looking for me.

Dexter must be in my lap at all times, if I'm sitting down or not. Eliza is the next most demanding, with Freddie third. Higgins is pretty much a loner, though once in awhile he, too, demands his turn in my lap--but it doesn't last long. For one reason he's just too darn big.

Dexter will be here for a long time yet, waiting for his fur to grow out far enough to have him start looking like a real dog, but I suspect that I am spending my last days with the My Fair Lady puppies. This has been a real sweet group of puppies and once again, I am so glad that we have been a part of their lives.

Sunrise, Sunset

I looked down at the huge puppies lying on my family room floor ("huge" being a relative term) and thought "Are these the little guys I bottlefed? Are these the little guys who used to fit in the palm of my hand?"

"Sunrise, Sunset" goes a lot faster in the world of puppies. Higgins, who arrived here just 6 weeks ago weighing 10 oz now weighs a whopping 8 lbs and is getting too big to put on my baby scale. (Of course considering that he will probably be over 40 lbs when an adult, he's still "little" by a lot of people's standards...people who didn't see him at 10 oz!

It's also surprising how their personalities have developed. Higgins was always my favorite, but he has become very stand-offish. He still runs up to me, but he could care less about me. When I put him in my lap, he's more interested in biting my shirt (and occasionally the skin that's under it) than he is being cuddled. I'm just that big thing that gives him food. Freddie almost seems afraid when I reach out my hand to him, though when he's hungry he, too, comes running up to me. But he's not really interested in affection most of the time. All three want to sleep wherever I am, and curl up around my feet.

Oddly enough Eliza, who was the one that was my least favorite because she seemed so aggressive from birth, has become my little shadow. She follows me everywhere, sits or sleeps at my feet when I'm at the computer, and whines to be picked up. When I pick her up, she nestles on my shoulder and sighs a happy sigh. She has become a little love bug. Or big love bug, depending on your perspective.

(In fact this morning at 4 a.m., I was holding her, my head kind of resting on her back and I fell asleep. When I awoke at 7 a.m., it was with a sore neck from holding Eliza down...and then I remembered that I had put her on the floor before I went to sleep, but my head was still in the "cuddle puppy" position and the sore neck was real!)

I recently answered a question on That's My Answer, something to the effect of what would you do if you could quit your job and work as a volunteer. I answered that I was retired and that I had become a volunteer pooper scooper for the SPCA. Or, as I told Peggy, I'm on doody duty. All the time.

These guys, who created their own bathroom area when they were living in the playpen (the first litter of pups to do so), have again made their own bathroom area now that they have the run of the house. Unfortunately it seems to be the living room, so I am constantly picking up piles off the living room rug. As soon as they wake up, they waddle into the living room and do their business. I would be more upset about it and take greater pains to keep them out of the room, but since the rug is going to be replaced with Pergo (any. day. now.) eventually, I'm not really bothered about it. And since we seem to have cured that pesky worm problem, it's much more pleasant ("pleasant" also being a relative term!) than before.

They are also on a more or less predictable schedule, eating 3 times a day, waking for about 20 minutes of rough play and then sleeping for an hour or more. I think they sleep all night because I'm not aware of them waking up, but they probably are playing in the middle of the night. And now that they have started drinking water, that takes the place of needing to have something in a bowl when/if they wake up.

As for Dexter, he was in my lap yesterday and I realized that I could actually pet parts of his skin that didn't feel reptilian. His bloody scars seem to have healed and there is very, very, very fine fuzz on several parts of his body, especially around his eyes and on his muzzle. You can't really see "fur" yet, but his head is soft, where it was not before. It's "bald-soft," not "fur-soft" but much more inviting than he was originally. There is still a huge rough patch on his back, but I can see progress. I suspect that all the wrestling he's doing with the puppies is helping to brush off the dead skin.

He is also eating better. I used to put down puppy kibble for him and he'd take a few pieces, but didn't seem to eat much. However, when the puppies started on mash, he discovered he loved it and would chase the puppies away, so I've started fixing him his own bowl of "modified mash" and put him in the playpen to eat and now he's finishing off a bowl of food at a feeding.

We're going to start him on medication for his stuffy nose, which, so far, the puppies don't seem to have caught.

So we're kind of in a good place here, in the Puppy Palace. Things should remain static until the next big step for the puppies...that all important trip to the vet to make sure there will not be a next generation!

Sadie, Sadie, Pretty Lady

Stacey, the volunteer coordinator for the SPCA, contacted me yesterday to ask if I could come to Petco and take pictures of the dogs who didn't have pictures for the PetFinder web site. There is a guy who does it every week, and his photos are professional quality. I take snapshots, but I said that I would come.

I didn't get there until about 2 because Eliza had been whining and when I picked her up to cuddle her, she fell asleep in my arms. I was enjoying the puppy time and didn't want to wake her up.

When I got to Petco it turned out that there were only two dogs who needed photos. Peanut is a chihuahua who makes Dexter look like he went through an "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" machine!

The other dog who needed photos taken was Sadie, Stacey said. The name didn't immediately ring a bell, but one look at those teats and I knew instantly that this was the mother of our puppies.

Looking at Sadie makes me realize why the puppies, especially Higgins, are such behemoths.

She seemed like a really sweet dog (and look at the size of that tongue!). But....BIG. I think I'm just as glad that she and the other 9 puppies are in a different foster home!

The puppies are a little over 5 weeks old today and growing like weeds. I sometimes think if I watch closely I can actually see them growing.

They are completely off of the bottle and next week I will start cutting back the amount of formula that I mix with their solid food and within the next couple of weeks, they should be taking only puppy kibble.

And they are starting to play -- with each other and with toys. I don't remember other puppies who really took to toys like these guys. They are particularly fond of finding cloth on the floor and dragging it across the room, which is easy to do since the floor is covered with towels and rugs.

Dexter has moved right in as one of the guys.

Of course the difference is that Dexter is at least two months more mature than the puppies so he expects them to play the way he does and they are still just learning. Today he raced at top speed from one end of the house to the other and back again over and over again, crouching down each time and inviting the puppies to join him. "C'mon...this is FUN!" The puppies, who had just discovered the living room (thanks to Dexter), were too busy investigating the new smells--and they can't run like that anyway. The best they can manage is a fast waddle. It will be a week before they are up to "running."

But when it comes to wrestling, they are all in it together.

Dexter's favorite is Eliza, but if she's sleeping, he'll wrestle with the other two. He's smarter and more experienced than they are, but they are learning to hold their old against him. It won't be long before Higgins can take him as an hors d'oeuvre!

Despite the fact that the house is going to be in turmoil for at least another month and that picking up poop is once again my biggest activity, I really love this stage of puppy rearing, and watch them grow from those little lumps who came here in August into little personalities. I will leave watching them become as big as Sadie to someone else!

Animal Fries

Did you know In-and-Out Burger had a "secret menu"? I sure didn't.

I had a delightful guest this afternoon. My friend Catherine's daughter, who had moved into her dorm at UCD yesterday afternoon, was feeling the need for a "puppy fix" so I invited her to come over and meet the puppies.

She fell in love with all of them (who wouldn't?) and we spent a very pleasant hour playing with or watching the puppies. And we found out that now that Dexter is feeling comfortable around here, and not quite so intimidated by all the other dogs, that he is quite the lothario. There was a lot of pupophilia going on around here.

Higgins wasn't too happy about it, but Dexter wasn't going to give up without a struggle.

But tiny tho Dexter is, size is apparently no object (which explains those German Shephard / daschund combinations you see from time to time!)

He wasn't quite tall enough to really do a good job on Lizzie, but he did find her leg rather attractive.

After about an hour, the puppies were fading fast, so I offered to drive my guest back to her dorm. She asked if we could stop by In-and-Out so she could get some dinner, since she hadn't had any lunch. I heard her order something special--and I didn't think you got special stuff at In-and-Out, so when we sat down I asked her what she had ordered. Her "burger" was to come without meat (I can't remember what it's called), and instead of fries, she had something called "animal fries," which she described as something like a "heart attack in a bowl," but oh my word was it good...french fries covered with melted cheese, grilled onions, and "pink sauce" (which seemed to be similar to Thousand Island dressing). Naturally if it's like a "heart attack in a bowl," you know it's going to be something I'm going to find delicious.

I'm not a big In-and-Out Burger fan...but I may have to go back just to sound like I'm one of the "in crowd" and order off the secret menu!

Dog Day Afternoon

It really was a dog day afternoon.

At noon I packed up Barkley for what I hoped would be his last trip to Petco. Ashley had told me that there were 3 inquiries about him this week (possibly due to our changing the spelling of his name from "Barkley" to "Berkley.")

When I dropped him off, I asked Stacey about getting gift cards for Petco so I could buy some more Step 2 for the puppies. She gave me two cards, $20 each, so I bought the last can of Step 2 and a bag of the smallest size puppy kibble I could find, hoping to start adding that to the Step 2 before I run out of it.

From there I drove to the SPCA Thrift store to pick up another bag of Esbilac, puppy formula. I am not going to need much more of it, but I will need some more before these guys are completely off of it.

My car now had a sack of puppy kibble, a sack of puppy formula and a can of intermediate puppy food.

I drove home and alternately played with and cleaned up after puppies. I'd forgotten that this is the stage of puppy development when we have towels all over the floor all the time. Washing all the towels and their bedding took two loads of wash. I got them settled into the playpen for naps in clean bedding.

Additionally, the puppies have worms. Two years ago this would have grossed me out, but when I saw Eliza trying to expell this long string of what I at first thought was feces but which turned out to be a long white worm, I just grabbed it and pulled it out. Higgins also vomited once and possibly twice today, which I suspect is also part of the worm condition.

When I returned to Petco to get Barkley, someone was being interviewed about adopting him, so I decided to shop for food for our dogs. Ashley stopped me and said she had a sack of puppy kibble for me. I took it because you can never have too much puppy kibble, I have realized! I took that to the car and then went back to get some diet dog food for Lizzie and Sheila, using the last of the Petco Cards (since I figure it was retroactive food for Barkley, who had been sharing our dogs' food--and it only paid for half the bag of food anyway).

I ran into Kim, who was interviewing Barkley's new family and she said "have you seen your new dog?"

Oh. I forgot about the new dog.

I put the two sacks of new kibble in the car and went back to find the new dog. Pretty soon someone came out with this pile of towels out of which poked a tiny face.

Our new foster is another chihuahua with Demodex, like the Royal Puppies, except this one is going to have darker fur because his skin looks more black and purple than the Royal Puppies, who were quite pink.

He's also a lot more scabby than the Royal Puppies were.

Ashley loaded me up with medicine for Demodex and medicine for worms and promised to e-mail me with dosages and get me a needle to inject one of the Demodex meds.

They gave me the honor of naming the new pup (who is about 3 months old) and after first considering JoJo (for the character in Seussical, which I saw last night), I realized that since he has Demodex, I should name him Dexter. So we now have Dexter.

Dexter is a little overwhelmed with the house. He's about the height of the puppies, but they probably outweigh him by a lot. He doesn't know if he wants to be in my lap or on the floor, but he did sleep in my lap for a bit while I watched "The Secret Life of Bees," while everybody was napping.

The puppies found a quiet spot behind the playpen to sleep.

(Freddie's head is under the back end of the treadmill)

During the movie Walt called twice, once from Logan Airport in Boston and once from O'Hare in Chicago, where he was changing planes. I wonder if he's ready to be plunged back into the madness of this doghouse!

10,000 Mile Tune-Up

I feel like my tires have been rotated, my oil changed, and my chassis overhauled. In other words, I have had my physical. I arrived on the right day and at the right time. Yay me!

The first stop is always at the dreaded scale and I was surprised (and pleased) to see that I had lost about 10 lbs. I'm not sure how I did that, but it must be connected with all that exercise in France and Italy (and my body must not have paid attention to all the gelato).

Second surprise was that my blood pressure agreed with what BloodSource got when I donated blood a couple of weeks ago: 100/60. I expressed shock and astonishment. My blood pressure is never that low--and I hadn't been taking my blood pressure medication.

Because of my protests, the nurse decided to also check the pressure in my other arm and that was much more what I expected. I don't remember the numbers, but it was too high. I don't understand how you can have such a discrepancy in the same body in different arms.

The doctor finally came in and was pleased to see that I had gone for my mammogram yesterday. We had a long talk about what I'm doing and not doing. I'm developing a real liking of this doctor, who has been my doctor for several years, but I haven't seen her that often because of my avoidance of appointments. And she's so low key and soft spoken that you want to do what she suggests.

My one big concern is that I've developed numbness in 2 fingers over the past several months, but her tests didn't raise any immediate alarms...yet. I passed all of her tests with flying colors. She says she wants to see if it could possibly be related to ulnar nerve compression, which could happen with people who use a keyboard frequently (duh!) So she's ordered a nerve compression study. There is also a possibility this is diabetes related, but she says that with a return to taking my meds, this could possibly go away. This is a great relief, since I expected her to come in waving a saw and threatening to chop off my arm.

She re-took my blood pressure in both arms and also got the same discrepancy, so she ordered an EKG which showed a small, non worrisome inconsistency, so she's set up a stress test. (The "E" word was not mentioned, nor was the "W" word -- exercise and weight.)

So I have a whole bunch of health-related follow-ups to do, which include re-taking the classes on diabetes, the nerve conduction study, the stress test, followup labs to see how my new regimen is working (or not), and an appointment with my gynecologist. I ended the morning with a flu shot and left the building feeling much more relieved than I thought I would.

I'm not exacty the picture of glowing health, but I'm not falling apart either, and that's nice to know.

---

As of today, only Freddie is still taking a bottle. Overnight, Higgins and Eliza just stopped taking it. They hadn't been taking to the ground up puppy chow I'd mixed with formula, so I went and got some "Step 2," which looks just like formula, but which is actually a cereal type thing. They seem to like this. In fact, it so satisfies them that Higgins leaned up against my "Mama Teddy Bear" and then just kind of slid down into this position.

I'm so glad that we have Mama Bear back again. I just love taking pictures like this.

They have reached an age where they sleep hard and wake up bored, so I'm letting them out in the family room more. Like all puppies before them, their favorite place to be is under the playpen

They are now officially toddlers and this is such a fun stage in a puppy's growing up. Walt will be very surprised when he comes home tomorrow, since they didnt even have their eyes opened when he left!

Bring Back My Puppies!

They woke up earlier than anticipated this morning--maybe 3? or 4? It's all a blur. I stumbled out to the kitchen and started the normal routine.

These guys have gotten themselves into a regular routine the past week or so. It's really been quite nice. They wake up, with Higgins being the loudest, clamoring to eat. I fix him a bottle, which he downs in about 10 minutes -- 8 oz -- and then lies on my stomach until he gives a big puppy belch. While I'm feeding him. the other two are watching us. Eliza growls and bats at Freddie. Freddie either whines to eat or plays with Eliza.

Freddie is next to eat and has started eating more, downing either a full 8 oz, or at the least 4 oz.

While I feed Freddie, Eliza cuddles up with the freshly fed Higgins and goes back to sleep. When I put Freddie into the playpen, I give Eliza a skritch and her head pops up and she scrambles to get out from under Higgins. You can almost hear her thinking "My turn? Is it finally my turn??" She also takes nearly 8 oz of milk, fairly quickly.

They also established a potty area of the playpen. They sleep on one end and do their business on the other. This makes it much easier for me because I keep a towel on the potty end and change that usually after each feeding, which means I don't have to completely change the bedding more than once a day, because the rest of it stays pretty clean.

OK. That's the way it's been for about a week.

So when they woke up this morning I started feeding Higgins and he frantically sucked and chewed at the nipple and was finished after only 4 oz. Sometimes this happens if the nipple is blocked, but it was running clear. I decided that he'd been awakened by teething pain, not hunger and that the chewing was helping. I didn't really worry about it because he's such a horse anyway.

I put him back and picked up Eliza, who was crying the loudest and damned if she didn't do the same thing. Very little sucking, mostly chewing and she only took two ounces. Well...OK... I put her back in bed and took Freddie, who did eat, but less than usual. Among the three of them, they barely finished 8 oz--and they usually finish about 2-1/2 eight oz. bottles.

As I said, they had awakened early, so I didn't really worry about it. They woke up again 4 hours later and it was a repeat of the previous feeding. Only added with it this time, when I put Higgins back, he peed where he normally sleeps.

I've had trouble getting all three of them to take a bottle all day today. I finally put out some of the "Step 2" solid food (like puppy pablum) and they finished that all right, so I'm not really worried that they are not getting food...it's just that my sweet little predictable puppies are suddenly acting very strange and that bothers me.

the 3 puppies sleeping on what they
used to use as their bathroom.

My copy of Dan Brown's new book arrived yesterday and I decided to just give up doing anything optional today and have been engrossed in the book. I've finished about half of it and already predict an increase in tourism to Washington, D.C.!

I happened to have a brief chat with Steve, who is not only a big Dan Brown fan, but also a personal friend of Brown...and who is presently in Washington, DC while Jimmy performs Zero Hour. Surprisingly he doesn't have the book yet and I told him he needed to go out and buy it immediately, especially since they are staying near the Freemason Center!

I certainly am learning a lot about the Masons (how much I'm actually absorbing, however, is an entirely different subject!)

However, it's such an engrossing book that it was 2 p.m. before I thought about lunch and after 9 before I thought about dinner. Now that's engrossing!!!

Mash

First, a couple of days ago, I did an entry on my memories of the 50s, inspired by Jon's entry of the day before that. Well, he went me one better. Check out his entry, "What She Did, I Did Too."

Now, let's talk puppies.

This is how I see them most of the time, roly poly little bellies hanging out, puppies totally passed out. Sometimes they are separated like this, sometimes cuddled up close together.

And sometimes in their sleep, they find ways to get those sucking urges met.

They are now taking so much by bottle (8 oz for Higgins, 6 oz each for Eliza and Freddie) that I decided to start them on mash a few days ago, even though it was a bit early. You may remember the result!

Freddie was the only one who really ate anything, and he got more on himself than in himself, but Higgins did enjoy licking behind his ears after I gave Freddie his bath.

I decided to give them a few more days and today was the day I was going to try them on mash again. They still aren't really enthusiastic about it, especially Higgins, but they did do much better their second time out.

(They still took a bottle afterwards, because they didn't eat all that much mash...but it's a start. You can also get a really good idea of how much bigger Higgins is than Freddie!)

I just gave them mash at one meal and will offer it at one meal a day for the next few days and eventually get them off formula entirely, which is a good thing since I'm almost out of formula anyway.

My babies are growing up.