Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Where Have You Been?

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One of the big reasons I started this blog was for all the crazy, funny things my dogs do that bring a smile to my face or a laugh to my lips.

Sometimes it’s not easy to write a full blog post about it and sometimes I forget to share.

Some posts will be You Make Me Laugh and others will be You Make Me Smile, but they will all be the silly, sweet, funny things Sampson and Delilah do that help make crazy days just a little bit easier.

Sampson, when you wait up for the Mama to come home….

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you make me smile and feel oh so loved.

Friday night I had the pleasure of babysitting my grandchildren, Hubby had to work yesterday so he was in bed by the time I got home.

Delilah came sleepily out of the bedroom to greet me, but not Sampson.  I thought to myself, nice he doesn’t want to give up his spot on the bed.  Then I went into the living room.

There he was curled up on the couch waiting for me.  Hubby said he refused to go to bed without me.

God I love this dog!

Do your pets wait up for you when you’re out late?   Feel free to sound off in the comments.

Which Way Do We Go?

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Lately Sampson hasn’t been responding to me when we encounter people or other dogs on our walks.  This means his off-leash privileges have been revoked.  There are still some times and some days when I let him off leash a bit, but for the most part he’s on the long leash the same as Delilah.

I hear too many stories of dogs being lost or stolen and I’d rather not take the chance.  The kicker was the day he ran off, ignoring me completely and followed a couple of fellow hikers.

Sorry Sampson, that doesn’t fly with the Mama.

As those of you who walk more than one dog know, multiple dogs can prove to be challenging.  I’ve been searching for a leash coupler, but the places around me are out of stock on the 24″.  I have found it on-line, but the shipping options suck.  I think it’s ridiculous to pay $10 to ship a $5 leash, especially when I just shipped 95 calendars all for around $5 each.  One of my local stores is ordering a coupler for me but in the meantime, I walk two dogs and deal with the challenges.

What? You've never heard the tale of the two stubborn labs?

What? You’ve never heard the tale of the two stubborn labs?

 

At times (depending on my mood) this can be frustrating for me.  But not this day.  This day I chose to find the humor in it.  I took the photo and then I waited.  I waited to see who would move first.  And I thought, I can work with this.

Here’s where you come in.  Remember those Dogs of Blogville Calendars?

 

In order to get the cheapest price, I ordered a few extra.  So I thought, let’s do something fun and give one of those away.

Are you up for the challenge?

In the top photo, we have Sampson to the left side of the tree and Delilah to the right.  In the comments tell me who turned back to me first and which path we ended up taking.  Don’t worry, everyone who comments will go in the drawing for the calendar, you don’t need to have guessed correctly to win.

Random.org will choose the winner, which I’ll announce in next week’s Thanksgiving edition of This ‘N That Thursday. I’ll cut off entries Tuesday night at midnight EST.

Ready. Set. Which Way Do We Go?

My Ever Growing List…

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Saturday found me in the car driving for dog food and leaving a convoluted message on my vet’s voice-mail.

Yes, I’m adding one more thing to my ever growing list of things to have taken care of at Sampson’s dental cleaning.

For those of you keeping score at home that would be

  • One dental cleaning
  • Removal of one Sebaceous cyst
  • Removal of one fatty tumor
  • X-rays of his back legs and lower spine
  • And one secret procedure I will tell you about AFTER the cleaning

My crazy, incoherent message indicated I wanted x-rays of Sampson’s back end.

So right now you’re thinking, Jeez, she really is the crazy dog lady.   And truthfully, I think you might be justified in that thought.  I think.  You can call me paranoid, over-cautious, and behind my back you probably do call me that crazy dog lady, but guess what?

I’m okay with that.  I really am.  Because this dog literally saved me from an abyss these last few years and I’m going to do everything in my power to keep him healthy and happy as long as possible.

I know you’re probably wondering what tossed me off the deep end thinking Sampson needs x-rays.  I’ve been noticing for a while that his back legs shake sometimes.  And not just at one particular time.  Sometimes they shake when he’s standing, sometimes they shake when he’s squatting and sometimes they shake when he has them up in the air.

In and of itself I suppose it’s to be expected.  Except when I posted this picture

S and D Animal Couriers said, “Lovely shot – looks like Sampson is doing a ‘lazy’ sit as we call it.”

I started paying attention and I noticed that Sampson sits that way a LOT, always tucking his left side in under him.  Okay, maybe he is just lazy.

Then he fell/slipped.  At least four times in the last two weeks.  Every time it was that left side.

One time we were walking to the park and he was walking through some leaves, stopped to tinkle and slipped off the curb.  It could have been the leaves and him not knowing where the curb was.

One time he slipped and sort of fell on his side (again in leaves) as he was making a turn from the trail to the field.

Last week he was tearing around the house and turned a corner and it seemed like his legs kicked out from underneath him.

One time he attempted to jump on the bed and missed,  dropping back to the floor.

Sampson has always been a what I call a lazy jumper.  He’d just prefer not to jump.  For years getting him into the car entailed him putting his front paws up and waiting for us to lift him.  He’d do this when getting on the bed too.  And for a while we did lift him (sometimes we still do.)

But now when I’m thinking back, his back legs seem stiff when I lifted him and I’m wondering if I’ve been missing the signs all along?

The guilt is coming.  It’s that nagging voice that says, “You should have added the pieces up sooner, what if it’s something bad and you’ve been oblivious to it all along?”  “What if you could have been doing something to help him?”

I hate that voice.

Heart Like a Dog Lesson:

Sampson doesn’t hang on to guilt.  He feels whatever the occasion calls for and moves on to the next event, he doesn’t let emotion about an event he has not control over consume him.  As long as he has his humans by his side he’s happy.  I’ve got to learn to enjoy the time I have left, instead of letting guilt cloud our time together.

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