Wednesday, January 28, 2009

I'll Be So Happy When The Snow Melts


I like snow. I really do. I love to roll around in it, eat it and lay down on it. I'm not thrilled, however, with all the work I have to do to get my grass intake. A girl needs her fiber, you know. Unfortunately, we can't always get grass when we dig. Sometimes we'll end up eating things that may upset our tummies, like leaves, so Daddy and Aunt Pat don't like us to dig in the yard. They say we get enough fiber in the food they give us. I'm sure there is, but there's nothing like the taste of fresh lawn to brighten up a cold and dreary winter day. Aunt Pat has a garden for the same reason, so I don't see the problem.

Granted, the humans have been finding little spots of spit up around the house. Nothing major, just a little spot here and there. We're all eating just fine and we're not acting sick, but they are keeping a close eye on us. Daddy and Aunt Pat won't hesitate to take us to the Vet if we need to go.

Katie doesn't like the cold and snow at all. She'll stay out long enough to do her business; greet the neighbors even though they might be inside their houses looking out the window; or even have a little chat with Lucky or one of the other neighborhood dogs. Then, Daddy or Aunt Pat had better be by the back door, because Katie will run over to it to be let inside. If she doesn't get let in right away, she'll glare at the offending human and give a sharp "get over here now" bark. It's been rather cold lately, so Katie hasn't been at all patient.

We've really taken to staying in Aunt Pat's bedroom. There's a nice throw rug on the floor she made for the powder room that she brought upstairs. We've found that if we stay there and ignore her requests for us to leave, and if we stay put when she leaves the room, she'll break down and let us stay for the night. I haven't been able to get in the bed, so I split my time between her bedroom floor and the dog bed in Daddy's room. Chloe will jump up against the bed until Aunt Pat picks her up and puts her on top of the bed. Chloe's jumping jiggles the bed to the point where she'll get nauseated because of her vertigo and motion intolerance problems.

My running around the bed looking for a way up doesn't help Aunt Pat's nausea, but I'm too big for her to pick up. Darn it! Some day I'll get my chance.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Congratulations to Our New President

Bark, err, Barack Obama. We watched him get sworn in on Tuesday. We were all excited to watch history being made, even though the Chief Justice messed up the oath of office. We especially enjoyed the classical music interlude. As you can see, we found it very soothing.

Apparently, classical music is known to calm dogs down. We went out to play between the Swearing-In and the Inaugural Parade. Aunt Pat got out a new tennis ball for fetch. We've been playing fetch a little differently lately, which I'll blog about another day.

We were all thrilled to hear that our new President wants to adopt a dog! The President and our new First Lady have said that they'd like to get a shelter dog. However, their kids have allergies so they have to be careful about what breed of dog they get. Hopefully they can find one from a rescue group or from an animal shelter. The Vice President already adopted one dog, from a breeder. But, he plans to adopt a shelter dog too! We're all shelter dogs and we're so happy that our leaders are setting an example so that more people will adopt shelter dogs. We want every dog to be as lucky as we are to have humans that love us and take care of us.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Indoor Games



It's been very, very cold the past couple of days, and we've only been outside long enough to do our business and go in. Daddy and Aunt Pat don't want me to eat the snow or roll around in it like I love to do.

So, I've had to do some rolling around on the floor to get my scratching in. Granted, Daddy and Aunt Pat will scratch me behind my ears and give me many tummy rubs, but there's something about cold, wet, and scratchy that a girl can't resist.

We've been playing with our toys, and we've been playing a new game. It's called "Crowd the Human Off The Sofa." Chloe and I will hop onto the sofa at first, then Katie will come over and stare at the sofa, then look at Aunt Pat with her "help me" look. Aunt Pat will get off the sofa and pick Katie up. Then, Katie will lay down and Chloe and I will spread out so Aunt Pat won't have a place to sit. She tries to sit down, but will usually sit in the recliner because she doesn't want to disturb us because we look comfortable.

We did something similar in Aunt Pat's bedroom the other night. Chloe and I went in and wouldn't leave! Chloe scratched, whined and jumped at the side of the bed, and wouldn't quit until Aunt Pat picked her up and placed her on the bed. Chloe settled in for a long winter's nap while I flopped down onto the floor at the side of the bed. Aunt Pat left the room a couple of times. Normally, we'll follow her, but Chloe and I stayed put. Chloe stayed until she had to go outside around 3am. Then, she went into Daddy's room as usual. I went in and out, alternating between Aunt Pat's room and Daddy's room. I'd love to get up on the bed, but it's too high off the ground for me to jump onto, and I'm too big for Aunt Pat to lift. I've been sending signals for her to get some special pet stairs, but I don't think Aunt Pat's getting the hint.

We've been playing Indoor Fetch, Chew the Tennis Ball, and Chloe still loves to play Hide the Biskee, both indoors and outside. Daddy found one in the sofa this morning when he vacuumed it. Even though we've had a lot of snow, Chloe knows right where she left her biskee and will dig until she finds it.


Monday, January 12, 2009

Aunt Pat's Been Cleaning Again...


and we helped! Spring cleaning came early in our house. Maybe not so early, considering Spring Training starts in February. It's only 79 days until Baseball's Opening Day!! Anyway, Daddy organized the basement this weekend, while Aunt Pat started to clean her closet. Today, she cleaned my second favorite appliance, the fridge/ freezer! My favorite appliance is the can opener, of course-when I hear that, I know dinner's coming soon! I stayed on the kitchen floor and watched her as she took the food out. I sniffed with her-Aunt Pat has allergies and she doesn't smell so good. Ooops! I meant to say her sense of smell isn't too good some days. Sorry. I'm sure she'll still give me a biskee, though. All I have to do is bark and give her that cute look and we're enjoying our biskees!

I even taste-tested a few crumbs that dropped out of the cold cut drawer when she pulled that out to clean. Katie did too, but she stopped in after Aunt Pat was done to give the floor a final going over. Chloe wasn't too interested. She kept watch at her usual position at the living room window but she made sure Aunt Pat took a break.

Monday, January 5, 2009

Squirrel 1, Chloe 0



We hope everyone had a nice New Years! We were in bed early and slept through the big ball drop. Heck, I couldn't fetch it, so I wasn't interested. New Year's Day we watched the big hockey game and relaxed.


Chloe almost caught a squirrel on Saturday! We'd just gotten outside when Chloe spotted a squirrel before it'd spotted her! She charged after it, but it jumped onto a branch of the forsythia in the back corner of the yard.


Chloe was ready to climb in after it, but she got distracted by Aunt Pat's yelling. Aunt Pat didn't want Chloe to get too close in case the squirrel fell and attacked Chloe.

The squirrel jumped onto the back fence while Chloe wasn't looking. She spotted it right away though, and ran along side the fence until the squirrel jumped into the G's back yard. I know Chloe wouldn't have hurt the squirrel if she'd caught it. She's a very social girl, and would've invited it to play with us. She was so excited, she sniffed the length of the fence to see if she could find how it had gotten in!

Katie helped sniff things out, but I think she just wanted to be sure Chloe wasn't too upset about not catching the squirrel.