Jumping on the bandwagon

Have you jumped on the Greek yogurt bandwagon? Greek yogurt is basically regular yogurt with much less sugar and much more protein.

I bought some at Kroger the other day because they were on sale and I wanted to know what all the fuss is about (I know, I'm so late to the game....). It's pretty good! It was even better when I sliced up some fresh strawberries and mixed it in.

You know who else is a big fan of Greek yogurt? Barney:

What about you? Are you a fan?

Learning the hard way

It was the first night of our mini-vacation in Michigan. We were all still in the living room at ten o'clock but we were thinking about heading to bed.

We decided to let our dog Barney out one more time to pee before bedtime. I opened the back door to the deck and he sprinted around the corner. It was pretty dark, and I followed, calling his name.

Just then I saw him out by the barn, jumping, leaping and frolicking with what seems to be a black cat with a white tail. As he heard me calling his name, though, he ran towards me.

And as he was running towards me, I realized a few things instantly:

1. Barney was blinking a lot.
2. He was trying to paw his own face.
3. An invisible cloud of powerful, concentrated stink was following him.

Poor doggy had just been sprayed in the FACE by a skunk! And in my panic at his distress, I foolishly picked him up and carried him toward the house. I cracked open the back door and yelled for help!

And if you're wondering, 1 quart peroxide mixed with 1 quarter cup baking soda and 1 spoonful of soap got most of the stink out of his fur.

Lesson(s) learned: Barney now knows that not every creature is friendly. And I now know not to pick up the dog when he's covered in overwhelming stink.

running with the big dogs

Our nice friends who took our dog Barney for two weeks over Christmas asked us if we would return the favor this weekend.

Sure! What's a couple of days with an extra couple of pets around? Never mind that they're huge...

So for four days we have three cats and three dogs. Here are my observations so far:

* Big dogs eat A LOT. They might even eat more than we do.

* When a big dog jumps up to greet you, he's looking right into your face!

* A big dog fart reeks just as much as a small dog fart.

* A big dog still wants to sit on your lap. He doesn't think he's that big.

* When you're on the couch and you lean over top of a big dog, he doesn't whimper like a small dog. In fact, he barely even notices. Want to use the big dog as an extra couch pillow? No problem!

* When Max and I plus the three dogs are sitting in front of the TV, our couch seems suspiciously small.

* The kitchen floor is practically flooded from all of the vigorous water lapping.

* When a big dog accidentally pees in the house, you don't need paper towels to clean it up. You need TOWELS!

* Two of our three cats are ready to murder everybody.

The owners will be coming by tonight to pick up their two dogs. Barney will probably be catching up on his sleep tomorrow and the cats will most likely be catching their breath!

fur baby

On Friday, we dropped in on my dad. That's actually a huge statement since my parents still live in France! But he was flying out for a quick visit to his mom/my grandma in California and on the way, he had a layover at a nearby airport.

So Max and I dropped by! It was fun to go to an airport just to see someone. All the fun, but no traveling hassles. Dad was happy to see us, of course, but wondered why we hadn't brought the dog? (No grandkids in our family yet, so they have to settle for grand-dogs...)

Since we didn't bring Barney, I thought I would share some recent pictures of our fur baby.

 

honey, there's nothing there to sniff...

Hands down, the worst part of my day is walking the dog when I come home from work.

I get home about an hour before Max does, so I'm the one who has to run/walk Barney around the block. I love him dearly, but three factors prevent me from enjoying this time:

1. It's sweltering hot here, and I hate to sweat.
2. I'm too tired.
3. I HATE HATE HATE running (and he does need to run to get all of that energy out).

So a few days ago, I had rounded the last corner of the block, next to this house with this mean looking German Shepherd. Let's call it Shep.

Shep is very scary. Every time it sees Barney, it creeps up and starts galloping toward us silently (I always note the lack of playful barking). Shep lives behind a chain link fence, and I always move a little faster when we go by.

Well this time, it was so intent on following Barney (TEETH BARED), it wormed itself under the chain link fence. So much for the barrier separating us from sure death.

Everything happened in slow motion. Its' head was under the fence, eyes bulging with the effort. Barney and I were frozen in place. Then its' whole body was out. Then I was screaming at the top of my lungs: "NO! NO! NO! STOP! DON'T EAT MY BABY!!!" Barney immediately threw his ears down and put his tail between his legs.

Suddenly, Shep was upon us........... and the worst it did was sniff Barney's butt.

I was still terrified though, and I pulled Barney around to the owner's front door. I pounded until the owners came out, and they helped greatly by restraining Shep's out-of-control butt-sniffing.

"You'll have to excuse 'Lil Bit', she's a little crazy right now 'cuz she's in heat."

m.i.a

I might be Missing in Action for the next little while.

Max and I (and the dog) drove over to Alabama to visit with the folks -- next we'll be driving up to Michigan to do some more visiting with folks.

We arrived at 3 AM in the morning because Max got inspired to go right after I got back from my professional development meeting yesterday. So far it's been great!

Our dog Barney is so excited, he's already thrown up five times on the carpet...

Next on the agenda, we might brave the 100 degree weather to go to the beach!

Mowgli speaking

Dear Diary,

Today marks Day 5 of Doggy Domination. It all started when the humans brought in a second monster dog. Maybe forever? It's too soon to tell. New-dog is gigantic. Perhaps a horse? Will need to look it up. New-dog barks loudly. It makes my fur stand up on end. It's also thirsty all the time. It gulps water down its' gullet so noisily and so sloppily that a stream of liquid trails in its' wake.

Per my observations, three days ago boy-human left. Maybe forever. Girl-human is here all day. She only says "No", "Go outside", and "Play nice".

Old-dog and New-dog run and crash around my couch, my rug, my kitchen, and my hallway. There are only two places that are safe (note to self: look for more safe places): 1. under the guest bed in the nice hole I dug under the box spring, and 2. on top of the refrigerator.

Fool-cat goes anywhere she pleases, even in the middle of the dogs. She doesn't know she will get eaten. Good riddance to her, I say.

Nice-fluffy-cat slinks low to the ground from one place to another. She claims she has safe places, but they're not really. I tried to tell her but she wouldn't listen. Poor soul.

What New-dog doesn't know is that I have a secret weapon. I've been sharpening my claws to razor sharp daggers for years now in anticipation of just such an emergency. The humans try to clip them, but their efforts are always fruitless! So if New-dog manages to get anywhere close to me, I will scratch the snot out of his gullet.

Consider this a warning.

This post was written for Word Up, Yo! This week's word of the week was "gullet". If you'd like to play along, you link up at Mommy of a Monster, A Belle, a Bean, and a Chicago dog, and Taming Insanity. Have fun!

Smooch your pooch

The sign on the local pizzeria read: "Smooch your pooch for a free large cheese pizza ... Wednesdays in April!"


What would YOU do for a free pizza?

A bit o' Barney

Instead of posting about some bully drama at school, I thought I'd share some pictures I took this afternoon. Looking at these makes me happy!


Now if I could just bottle up some of that energy and use it at school.....

Note to self: close all doors

Today was Day One of Barney's new living arrangements. Over the weekend, we furnished our guest room in preparation for my parents' arrival for Thanksgiving next week. That meant that it was no longer this nice empty space for Barney to roam around in during the work day (we put up a baby gate in the doorway since we don't have a door there yet).

So today we decided to let him loose in the house while we were gone for work. We still put up the baby gate so he couldn't get IN to the guest room, then we scattered his toys, bed, water dish, and pee towel across the living room.

Imagine my surprise when I got home from work, totally expecting to see an excited puppy greeting me at the door, and instead am mobbed by three hungry cats! "Barneeeey!". No answer. (Where did he go?). "BARNEEEEEY!!". And then I heard a whimper from the other side of the house.

I walked down the hall and sure enough, the doof had gotten himself shut into the office. I opened the office door to be greeted by a leaping dog, and I looked past him see the wreckage he had left in his wake: a river of pee flowing from a chewed up Intro Psych textbook, and a two-inch gash where he stripped the black bookshelf of its wood.

I have no idea how long he had been stuck in the office. I have no idea HOW he got himself stuck in the office. Was it for some alone time? Was he trying to preen in the full length mirror on the back of the door? Or was this some evil scheme on the cats' part?

I guess we'll never know....

This makes the school day TOO long!

Tonight is "Meet the teacher" night. So I took advantage of my twenty minute commute (which just seems insanely short compared to my one-hour commute in Michigan!) to come home and hang out before tonight's festivities. Also, I knew there was a puppy waiting for me at home who has been feeling quite under the weather lately and I wanted to make sure and check on him.

Well, he seems to have turned a corner because the second he heard me come in, he started whining excitedly. And then when he saw me? Oh boy. I think he must be feeling a little better because his tail was wagging so fast it was a blur. And then he kept jumping up and down in all of the excitement. Awwww... It will be sad when I have to put him back in his room behind the baby gate (don't quite trust the cats yet) for when I go back to school this evening--Max won't get home till after that.

I'll be interested to see exactly how many parents show up for this thing tonight. Once again I am teaching at a regional program for deaf students so most of them live quite far away. And I really won't be able to blame parents if they don't want to drive all that way just for a meet and greet. My prediction is that three or four sets of parents will come out of the fourteen that I have. We shall see!

The couch cushion covers are in the washing machine right now

On Wednesday, we brought home a puppy from the local animal shelter! He is half papillion and half toy fox terrier and his name is Barney. We actually had a difficult time naming him. We settled on Barney (actually short for Barnabas) because he reminds us of the Barnabas in the Bible who followed Paul around on all of his mission trips. Barney-the-puppy likes to follow us around wherever we go :). Also, Barnabas was an evangelist; and our little Barney is already making friends for us. Do you know how many strangers want to come up and talk to you when you are holding a darling puppy? Lots, as it turns out!

Anyways, you may be wondering how our three lovely cats have reacted to their new brother. I made sure to film their very first meeting (it's by no means thrilling, but I know some family members have asked!):



As of now, Mrs. Hufflepuff is the most tolerant of Barney, Mowgli is the most hissy and upset, and Gizmo.... Gizmo acts like she just wants to sniff him and get to know him but then she'll surprise us by biting down on his head or his tail very deliberately to see how he tastes. Naughty!

Right now Barney is not acting like himself. He's got "kennel cough" and he's feeling quite lethargic. Also, he's coughing, flinging snot everywhere, and puking. The good news is that the vet based at the animal shelter didn't charge us for all the medicine she gave us when I took him in yesterday. The bad news is that we're kind of sick of cleaning up his pee and his vomit!!

More pics when he's feeling better!