Category Archives: Dog days

Dog days, Snapshots

Luka goes to the vet

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Yeah, you can imagine what that’s like!

Please note that sweet, handsome Dr. Heins is sitting on Luka in the corner. Need I say anything else?

This was the calmest moment of tonight’s visit, actually. We were in for Luka’s yearly exam and shots. He was weighed. He’s now on a diet. Blood was drawn. That required the in-the-corner-tackle by the vet. His ears were cleaned of their yeasty goop. There’s medicine for that.

Everyone survived.

We’re new to this vet practice, more or less, since Luka. I love Dr. Heins because he loves Labs and knows them inside and out. He takes his time with us and humors Luka’s goofyness. Plus, he’s extra generous with the cookies which makes Luka really really like him.

Anyone want to guess how much Luka weighs now?

Dog days

The parts of a dog

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The whiskey-colored eyes, full of impishness or warmth or wisdom or innocence.

The soft petal-shaped ears set high on that big head, keepers of many whispered secrets and dreams.

The formidable tongue, the big jowls so often rubbed in mud and stubble and then across the leg of your pants or the arm of your couch. And that nose, cold and wet, when (and where!) you least expect it.

Webbed like a duck, offered in exchange for cookies. Responsible for countless muddy footprints on the kitchen floor. Prone to leaping and darting like a fool.

At the very end of that stout body lies this weapon of destruction and infectious bringer of happiness.

I’m not sure which is my favorite part. Probably it has to do with the way he leans against me sometimes, or the weight of his head in my lap as he snores, or the sight of him across the dog park, wrestling and dancing with his canine friends, as he realizes I’ve wandered away and leaves his fun and runs to me to check that I’m okay.

Dog days

Top this

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So… I was done early with work yesterday afternoon and had wandered out into the yard to sort through some of the skippers that were flitting about the um… um… what’s this flower called again? Is it snakeroot? I think so. Anyway, it’s a bit weedy in the garden, but is a skipper magnet. I was only outside with the camera for twenty minutes or so and Luka is, after all, nearly grown, so I didn’t crate him and thought nothing of leaving him unsupervised for such a short period of time.

Bad idea! Maybe your dog is like Luka: you know, you spend money on toys and stuff for them and they just destroy whatever it is for them that you buy. Luka did that this week with the nice soft bed we bought for his crate. I was concerned with his elbows on the hard metal all day long, but he tore it to shreds on Monday morning. $40.00 wasted!

This time he decided to save us the trouble of that intermediate step of buying something with the money and then shredding the purchased item. Instead he just shredded the money straight away. How considerate! The DH had left an envelope of money and checks from FD t-shirt sales on the dresser and Luka grabbed it and spread it out across the kitchen floor. Thankfully, only one check and a ten dollar bill were actually shredded beyond repair.

At least I think so anyway.

Silly dog!

And then there was the chasing him through the house, laughing, camera in hand, for the sake of that Ben Franklin…

I’m not sure I want to imagine what he’ll do to top this.

Dog days

Parlor tricks

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Labs are nothing if not trainable…

Luka knows to sit, stay, wait, speak and shake hands on command. He can also do all those things with just a hand signal. He goes to his crate when we tell him to and will mostly stay there of his own accord. Down, off, leave it and drop it are things we’re still working at.

😉

Let’s face it though; these tricks are limited in their usefulness. It’s nice at dinnertime to be able to send him to his crate so he’s at least begging from a few feet away, nice when visitors come so he’ll be calm and not underfoot, helpful when I’m vacuuming so he’s not able to wrestle the hose out of my hand.

On walks, he knows to sit and wait at intersections before I tell him it’s okay to cross with me. He sits and waits to let me go out or come in the door before him. He sits and waits for his dinner. Good manners, I think, are important. Luka and I went to 16+ weeks of obedience school to learn the basics that I’ve since applied to our daily lives around here so that we can live together fairly nicely.

My husband teaches him parlor tricks.

We remove his collar whenever he goes into his crate for safety reasons. The DH taught him to retrieve the collar from the dining room table when he’s let out of the crate for his mid-afternoon walk. He reaches up, mostly without putting his feet on the table, grabs the collar and then carries it to the back door to sit and wait to go out.

Very convenient, right?

Only… he does it all the time now, whenever he wants attention. For example, this morning I was up late for work, had just stepped out of the shower and was sitting on the bed in a towel… and there he was in the bedroom doorway with that damn collar in his mouth, wagging his tail at me!

Pick up the phone and there he is with it, suddenly wanting to go out. Have your hands in a sink full of dishes? Luka’s rattling his collar at your feet.

He also likes to prance around with it and not give it up when you’re finally dressed enough to take him out. A great game when you’re already late for work, don’tcha know?

😉

Silly dog!

(Silly DH for teaching him that trick.)

Dog days, Remembering, Snapshots

A year later

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It’s the Spring of your life,
I laugh at your foolishness,
protect you from danger,
make sure you grow and glow with health,
practice and play until…

It’s the Summer of your life,
What a beauty you’ve become!
You’ve (almost) grown into yourself,
You live at full tilt, with a passion for life.

– – – – – – – – – – – –

It all started innocently enough. Heartbroken and dog-less for the first time in 12 years, we found this adorable pup to ease our lonesomeness. He’s brought joy and a good amount of laughter, but also a sense of déjà-vu; that we’d done this all before, that we know all the pitfalls, have fallen for these same tricks and devilment sometime in the past. There is no better way to forget, or remember, than a puppy.

I imagine I’ll always think of them linked this way; the leaving of one so close to the coming of the other. Today is Luka’s Gotcha-Day and this past Friday marked a year since Buddy passed away.

Dogs, especially old dogs, are a treasure. They are more than themselves, they are us. Part of us. They live our life, are the calendar of our joys and sorrows. We run our fingers through our past when we caress their broad chest and velvet ears.

– – – – – – – – – – – –

In the Autumn of your life,
you grew more sedate;
your troubles so far in the past,
I’d almost forgotten
the Spring of your life.
Your colors still vibrant, but
a tinge of silver frosted your muzzle
and foretold…

The Winter of your life,
your eyes as clouded as a December sky,
You passed as gently
as snow falling on frozen fields.
I weep now and remember all the seasons of your life
and the years of mine that you carried away with you.

*Poetry adapted from Pieces of My Heart by Jim Willis

Dog days, Snapshots, Wanderings, Whatever

A little Spencer love

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There’s a certain joy about dogs that I think maybe cat people don’t get, or not as fully as the rest of us. I look at this smiling pic of Spencer (our boot camp mascot from the Adirondacks trip) – wet and smelly from rolling around in the bog – and I can’t help but smile myself. He had a small army of admirers in us and was a good tonic during the quiet times or when some of us (me!) were feeling cranky. I like the company of a dog in the woods or a walk on the beach and I’ve missed the quiet, well-behaved sort of companionship that an older dog provides since Buddy died last summer. Luka is fun on walks, but he’s not quiet enough for birds yet and insists on being the center of any attention with his goofiness. His specialty so far is comic-relief. (He’s doing donuts on the bed as I type this!)

Anyway… it was fun to have Spencer along and he was properly spoiled by us all. Someone was always sneaking him a bite of lunch or quietly cajoling him into some mischief.

He made himself a favorite photographic subject of mine and would often follow my attention on a particular patch of wildflowers (here, bunchberries) with his own sort of joyful attention. Like a good dog, Spencer did a lot of rolling in stuff.

That rolling around and looking cute was a ploy of his and he used it to his advantage whenever possible. How can anyone resist a three-legged dog having so much fun?

Don’t let the doleful expression fool you – that’s another ploy! He’s just trying to get you close enough for a splash.

One of my favorite pics from the trip – I think Linda’s smile says it all. She’s a dog person, obviously. She gets it.

😉