Thankful Thursday - For Easy - by Hailey

Dear handsomest Easy,

Thank you very much for the wonderful Easter gifts you sent from far away France. I was thrilled to receive them.

The gifts

Lady thought I should share the elephant toys with Phod.  I immediately took both from him, and left him sad on the floor.

Me with both

Sad Phod

While I am able to destroy things in record time, I enjoy the slow and methodical torture take them apart. As you can see I have been working on the bear from Valentine's Day.

I hope this note finds you well.

Love your gal Lee

Wordless Wednesday - The Things I Put Up With

Last Call!

It is the last call for pictures for Zaphod's birthday bash. Lady will be donating $1 for every picture and 50 cents for every comment on Friday, April 1st.

Send a picture of you "fooling around" to leeandphodATbellDOTnet ASAP to help take $ from the Lady.

Also, on Friday go to Abby's website to pick up a copy of one of her very talented mom's books. She will donate royalties that day to the Ontario SPCA. 

Mischief Monday - The Flu 1, The Lady 0

I spent the greater part of the long weekend fighting the flu. It started Thursday, in what seemed like a cold, but by 3 am Friday, I had a super high fever and aches. 

I spent all day Friday in bed. I missed our seeing my family and friends, who had totally arranged a lunch I could attend because I am on a very strict elimination diet to figure out what is upsetting my stomach. (I am not eating gluten, dairy, soy, sugar, corn, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, strawberries, peaches or chocolate. FYI: Eating super healthy and getting sick is not reinforcing). 

Saturday evening I felt a little better. I was hungry for the first time for food I could eat (being sick and on a very strict diet is extra, extra hard). I ate the wonderful Easter dinner my husband had prepared for us and Uncle Chris. 

After another rough night, Sunday morning I was not feeling well again, but some meds and more sleep made me semi-functional. I made the Man and Uncle Chris take the dogs out a lot before they left for a movie. I knew my strength was waning. 

I was well cared for while I was ill. 

Hailey

Phody

Cousin Emma on my chest

Let's hope I feel better today so I can enjoy one day of the long weekend! (Thankfully I took Monday off!)

Hoppy Easter

From our pack to yours, wishing you a very Happy Easter!

Zaphod, Cousin Emma and  Hailey

We had our first egg hunt! We all did well, but needed help opening the eggs!

Purple Day

We are joining our pals over at The Five Sibes for an Epilepsy awareness day. 

We are wearing our purple to raise awareness about this disease. 

Bacon's Show and Tell - Phod's Spot

Today is Bacon's show and tell. We are suppose to share an embarrassing picture. We have an embarrassing video today.

It is embarrassing for Phod as you will see and it is slightly embarrassing for Lady because you can see all the junk on her office floor and hear her talking to Phod (she is waiting for someone to build her a display at work . . .)

Don't forget to get your picture in for Phod's birthday bash which is one week away! Email us at leeandphodATbellDOTnet. The more who participate the more money we will raise to help end animal cruelty. 

I Thought Pets Relaxed You!

I had thought that having pets was suppose to have relaxing effect on you, but Zaphod proved that sometimes it doesn't.

The scene: A lovely Sunday morning. The sun was out, it wasn't too cold. It was nearing 11:30 but Lady was still in her pjs. The pups and I were in the driveway.

The antecedent: I am not sure what they original saw/heard, if it was the horses we haven't seen for months (and will be moving soon) or the car, but both wanted to be at the end of the driveway and Zaphod took off onto the road right toward the neighbour's car.

The behaviour: I started screaming like a crazy woman and I think waving my arms. I couldn't run after him, he had gone through the snow. I was sure my heart was going to burst or stop!

The consequence: The neighbour, who was driving very slowly, saw him and he was not hit. I mouthed sorry to him (it must have been frightening for him too). Phod ran after the car and came back. He was very happy. He thought he had protected us. Hailey was angry and him and let's just say I didn't look pretty. I yelled at him. I was shaking and scared and angry. Not that it had any effect, he still had a big smile on his face.

Let's hope this doesn't become a habit.

Wordless Wednesday - Hailey

Goof Off Day

According to Ranger's wacky holidays, today is Goof Off Day.  This seemed like the perfect holiday for us.

It is clear that spring has goofed off:

This was the first morning of spring . -10C=14F

Forecast for the week:

Notice the foot of snow expected Thursday

So we decided to take the day off!

Happy Goof Off Day! 

Mischief Monday - Hailey's Annual Check-up

Last week I got the reminder card that Hailey's check up was due. I called the clinic and it turned out that our vet was working on Saturday (he only works every fifth Saturday), so I took an appointment.

Hailey knew the car ride was not taking her to somewhere good. She whined the whole way. When we pulled up at the clinic she began to howl, however, she went right to the front door.

I don't want to be here! 

She got mostly on the scale right away. It took me about 4 tries to get all her paws on the scale. I wish I could have taken a picture of her, all four paws out trying not to stand on it. She weighs 17.3 kg or 38 lbs.

She was stressed in the waiting room.

She was stressed in the examining room.

Even though she is very stressed, she did a great job at cooperating with the vet. She loved all the treats he gave her and even danced for one. He said she looked great! Lately, Leelee has been eating so quickly she vomits, even with her one slow bowl. This has started since we started decreasing her meds. The vet said she has "gluttony"and if the slow bowl isn't working, we need to feed her smaller amounts at a time. I switched up her slow bowl last night and she didn't eat as fast.

She waited very, very impatiently after her exam (she paced, barked, tried to open the door), while the vet and I chatted. We have been friends for 22 years (I babysat his kids when I first moved to Ottawa), so it is always nice to catch up. It was good for him to see her highly anxious.

She was very nice to the clinic cat on the way out. I put her in the car so it would be possible for me to pay and pick up their heart worm and Phod's carsickness meds. When she went to get in she was so upset she misjudged the jump and bounced off the door frame. I admit I laughed. When I came out, she was laying peacefully on the backseat. However, she had someone got her harness twisted.

I tried to get out of the harness but failed

She was silent the whole ride home and thrilled to be home. I know it was very hard for her and I know she did her best. We won't have to do it again for a year!

Black and White Sunday - Project Hailey

Several weeks ago I spoke to the vet about taking Hailey off her anxiety medication, Prozac. It had always been our hope that this would be a temporary solution to her anxiety problem. Our vet said she needed to be on it for at least 6 months before we did anything.

Her 6 months on the drug coincided with our cruise so we decided not to make any medical changes while we were going to be away, and she was going to be at the kennel. We waited until we were back.

We are happy to report that we are now in the weening her off phase. She is taking a lower dosage every other day. We had a thunderstorm about a week and half ago (which is really weird because we still had like 5 feet of snow) and while she was nervous, she was able to hide. This is the best we had seen on the full dosage of meds.

She has another week every other day, then one pill a week for a few weeks. We will see how it goes. Wish her luck!

Sepia Saturday - Our New Trick

We are working on a new trick for both the pups, balancing things on their noses. They don't love this and often cheat, but we are more consistently getting 2 seconds of waiting. 

Often when Phod flips his off, Hailey steals it

Still needing a little support so she doesn't take it too early

Zaphod In The Beginning - Part 3

Phod came to join at our pack at a fairly chaotic time. We had just moved 5 days before. We were still getting settled in.

Our house is basically a loft style home, so it is very easy to call to another person and they would hear you where you are. As we were unpacking and doing things in different rooms we called a lot to each other, things like "Where is the . . . .?"  "Have you seen the . . . .?" and other unpacking phrases. Even in our loft house, we have to raise the volume of our voice so we can be heard. When we would raise our voices, our poor boy would shake and pee on the floor. He was clearly terrified. Raising your voice was paired with something scary. We never punished him for this behaviour, we would just clean up the pee and try and comfort him. It broke my heart. 

These days, he doesn't react the same to a raised voice. We can call each other in the house without a reaction. If we raise our voice directed at him (in the rare time he is misbehaving, usually if he is thinking about leaving the yard), he will push his ears back and give you sad eyes, but isn't as fearful. He has come a long way!


Here is a video of my boy trying to walk in the melting snow:)

Walking in the melting snow is hard! 

Don't forget to send us your pictures of you fooling around. Our email is leeandphodATbellDOTnet.  

Poor Cousin Lupul

My sister, aka Aunt C, has 2 cats, Panda and Lupul (named after a Toronto Maple Leafs player). Last week, in the chaos of the Man, Lupul also got to visit the emergency room. [It wasn't the best week for our family!]

Aunt C and Uncle D noticed blood on the floor. They followed it backward to the bathroom, which they describe as a "crime scene." It appears Lupul, aka, Loopy, jumped off the counter and landed on the metal furnace vent and cut his paw badly. He had to go to emerg. There his paw was "glued" back together, he was given antibiotics and pain meds and sent on his way. At the follow up, it appeared the cut was open a bit again (but healing), likely because he had been over licking it, so poor Loopy must spend the next 2 weeks wearing the cone of shame. Aunt C and Uncle D plan on replacing the metal vents with plastic ones so no one cuts themselves on one again.

He looks like he is planning his revenge

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Wordless Wednesday - Taking Care Of The Man

Surviving Last Week - Doggie Day Care

As mentioned, to help survive last week, I put the dogs in Doggie Day Camp and one night of boarding at PetSmart. I picked this place (over the place we have been using for boarding) because it was closer to where I work part-time and their drop off/pick up hours are more flexible.

On the drive in, Hailey managed to get out of her new car harness. I realized this, when driving down the highway at 100 km/62 miles per hour and she was standing on the consult between the front seats. She was then very anxious until we got past where we would go to the vet and then settled. She was excited/terrified when we pulled up at the centre. Signing them in was a nightmare as they were excited and other dogs were coming in . . . Leaving was as crazy because a puppy class was walking through the lobby to go back to the training room. 

Apparently they had a good time. The staff member who brought them out when I picked them up said they were wonderful and friendly. They mostly played together. He said that while he enjoyed them both, Zaphod had a special place in his heart because he would come over, put his head on his leg for love. He was very cuddly. Sometimes Hailey would come over and push him out of the way to get love too. That is what happens at home. I was sooooo thrilled to hear that Zaphod trusted these "strangers" enough to get love. He has come so far from the nervous guy who first walked through our door. 

The drive home, both slept. They actually slept the next 2 days, they were so tired. They were no worse for wear. I was able to spend a day without worrying about them at the hospital, and then work the next day without worrying about them. It worked out and I am not going to feel guilty about it any more. I only wish this was cheaper. I put them in day camp for 2 days, one night overnight, and 2 snack kongs, this was $142 Cdn/$108 US. Our regular boarding place would have been about $74 Cdn/$55 US for that time. 

Mischief Monday - Not As Much Fun As You Would Think

Several weekends ago (before the big sickness), I had the bright idea that I would take the 2 dogs alone snowshoeing. I did this before, but that is when we were trying Zaphod off leash (until he showed us we couldn't 100% trust him to stay with us, although he always came back). It was a nice day (-8C/17F   -15C/5F  with the windchill) and I thought it would be a good way for us all to get our exercise. The Man wasn't interested so I set off to try it (in the safety of our yard).

Problem one: I forgot to put Hailey in her harness meaning she was able to really pull.

Problem two: Hailey was so excited to be out there she just wanted to play with Phod and they kept getting tangled around me.

Problem three: When we actually started walking toward the deep snow, it became clear that neither of the dogs were thrilled with this choice of activity.

Problem four: While Hailey was pulling, Phod was trying to get out of the hard work of walking by walking behind me, which meant he kept standing on my snowshoe. It is hard to keep walking with a 70 lb dog on your "foot".

Problem five: They kept stopping in front of me to look around (and I think hope I would turn around) and I kept having to try and coax them to go forward.

Problem six: With all the stopping and starting and them going in front and behind, we kept getting tangled up. We spent more time untangling ourselves then walking.

Overall, none of us had a very good time. We were all thrilled to be back in the house 20 or so minutes later. We were all exhausted. The snow was deep and we did go up and down the hill. I know we will try this again, both on harness. We will likely stay in the yard (because I know we can get home from there). I will see this last adventure as a work in progress! Now that winter is fortunately all most over, it will be something to work on winter 2016-17.

The snow is starting to melt! Spring is on the way!

Black and White Sunday - Hailey

I am done with winter - Hailey

Well Hailey, it is almost over! - Lady

Sepia Saturday - Zaphod

Do we have to be done playing?

Man update: The colonoscopy appears to confirm the issues are all just because of the salmonella. Of course a biopsy was done, but the doctor was as certain as he can be without those results that with antibiotics the Man will heal. The Man believes he contracted this from a new breakfast place he tried on Thursday with his co-workers. He thinks it was the ham. None of his coworkers had the ham. Lady says that after 21.5 years she knows the Man a bit better because she got to see the pictures from the scope!

We greatly appreciate all the well wishes, POTP etc. etc. Blogville rocks!

We should slowly be getting back to routine in the next day or two, and look forward to catching up with everyone. We have missed you!

See Beautiful - Winter

First a little update on the Man. One of the tests came back and he has salmonella. He is still having his colonoscopy today, so wish him luck. 

The past few weeks I have really been struggling with winter. I have actually been counting down the years until I can leave a cold climate forever (it should be about 15 until retirement). However, sometimes in this dislike of the season, I see beautiful moments like this:

This are the moments that help me get through the cold, dark days. 

Zaphod - In The Beginning - Part 2

The Man had always wanted a dog to play frisbee with. Angels Loki and Gemini were not the types of dog to play fetch, and Hailey was always more into stealing then bringing back. From the first time we tried it, Zaphod has had a love of fetch of the frisbee and more importantly his ball Precious.

When we first got him, we had to be careful because he didn't know when to stop playing. He would play until he threw up or got really exhausted. He has since learned it is ok to stop, we will go back to play. 

Here he is one of the first time we played frisbee. He had been with us for about a month. You can see how skinny he still was. 

Now:

Look, we got Phod a new disc! Since the first time we took it out (he was very reluctant about it), he has loved the disc that actually flies!

Don't forget to submit your fooling around picture for:

Wordless Wednesday - Leap

Man and Weather Update

Thank you for all your wonderful comments yesterday Blogville, you rock! They were much appreciated as my day went like this:

Up at 5:30, walk the dogs, get ready, and the dogs and I are in the car by 6:40. Somewhere on the drive, Hailey gets out of her new harness and tries to get in the front seat with me. Finally arrive at day camp. To make my life a little less crazy, I made the decision to board the dogs for about 36 hours. It has kind of broken my heart to do it, but I know it is for the best. I arrive at work at 8:35. This is when Man calls to say his CT Scan is at 1, I need to come home. So I cancel with all my clients and drive the 62 km home. I had a little time to relax and pack our bag for the day (although I didn't pack enough food).

For this appointment : I had to drive him to hospital A (30 minutes away) to have the IV put in, to then drive another 25 minutes to hospital B to have the scan, then had to stop by Man's work and return the work pager as he shouldn't be the one on call this week, before driving back to hospital A to get the results. We waited 2.5 hours (after we were told the results were in) to be told he had colitis, unsure if viral or inflammatory bowel disease. At this point they order more blood work. 2.5 hours later, we are told the blood work is the same as Friday and Saturday, a colonoscopy has been ordered and should take place later this week, the IV is removed and we go home. We are now up to 20.5 hours of hospital time since Friday at 9:30 pm.  Because we get a days notice for this next test, I hopefully will actually get to work tomorrow and pick the pups up so my dog guilt stops.


People have asked how much snow we have left. Well as of Sunday, this was our back deck:

We haven't used the BBQ for awhile.  While it has been pretty darn cold in the mornings (close to -20C/4 F) the weather looks like it is going to start to warm up and the rain will help wash the snow away. (Temperatures are in Celsius)

Mischief Monday - I Can Almost See the Humour

We step outside our dog life, to the human life to share this story with you today.

The scene: Lady is heading out the door to go and pick the Man up from the hospital (more about that below). She locks and closes the door between the house and garage to realize her keys are sitting on the shelf inside.

Plan A: The next door neighbours have a key, go get it.

Plan A fails: Neighbours aren't home.

Plan B: Put her snowshoes on (the snow is still waste deep in places), go around to the back of the house and "break in" (or pray the sneaky way, which we won't share here, is open)

Lee ad the Man a few weeks ago

Plan B: Thank goodness it works.

Now plan A is to get a key to hid in the garage so this doesn't happen again.





Perhaps the real mischief is the Man. Not that it is his fault but . . . .Short story: Man became very, very ill (thing worse stomach bug ever) Friday and ended up in the emergency room. He was there for 5 hours, pumped full of gravol and morphine and sent home with a list of things to watch for. Saturday around 11 the Man tells the Lady one of those things has happened, so Lady gets us all organized and is back at the hospital by 12. 7.5 hours later (don't worry, Lady left for a bit and drove the 30 minutes back to take care of the dogs), it was determined the Man had a bowel infection and was sent home with a bunch of prescriptions and follow up testing.

What was confirmed this weekend: Although Lady is a master problem solver, when Lady said "in sickness and in health" 87 million years ago, she clearly didn't mean it. She completely lacks empathy when it impacts her life and has absolutely no patience for others being sick, and she is a horrible nurse. She wishes it wasn't that way, but alas. So please send some sympathy to the very sick Man for having to deal with her and some POTP that he gets better soon and maybe some patience for the Lady.

Bless those of you who take care of very sick people in your lives. You are true angels.

Please forgive us if we aren't around as much as usual this week. Lady is going to have to take over all the household chores, try and keep the Man alive and continue to work, so she won't have as much time free time.

Black and White Sunday - Hailey

Is winter over yet?

Sepia Saturday - Dig

Digging for his disc - Zaphod