The First Snowfall of '09

I've experienced change this week. After several years of lackluster snowfall in Sevier County, we finally got some pretty white stuff. While we didn't get a lot of snow, it was still very pretty. And it's still laying around in a lot of shady places. There's an old saying here that snow that sticks around for a few days is just waiting for more snow.

Sofia, Tiger, and I had fun in it Monday.

Sofia wasn't sure whether or not she liked the strange white stuff. I threw her snowballs, but she got very upset when they disappeared on the ground. She tried to dig up the yard to find the balls, but luckily it snowed again and covered up her mess.

Tiger was much calmer about the whole situation.

Today, two days after the snowfall, there was plenty for Tig to lay in on the front porch.

Tig's preferred spot on the back porch. The end of the back porch is Tig's temporary home since his kennel was destroyed. He loves to stick his nose out and watch the snow land in his neighborhood.

A shot of the second round of Monday's snowfall from my cell phone.

A Sofia Sunday

Why I love Sofia:

Sofia is very talented, as you can tell. She's 11 months old now. She knows how to quench her thirst. She unscrews the cap by herself and gets the top of the bottle in her mouth. The challenge is currently getting more water into her mouth than she does on the floor. She doesn't really mind a big puddle of water on the floor because she can always lick it up.

Her new talent is standing upright on her hind legs with no support for about 10-15 seconds at a time. She loves to stand upright in her kennel with her front paws braced on the fencing. When she's inside and doesn't think I'm looking, she likes to brace the front paws up on the counter or table to see what's out to eat.

But this past week, she pulled herself upright to check out the counter without getting close enough to brace her paws on it. She did it on two separate occaisons. She stands there and looks around for 10-15 seconds. I've been giving her a bit too much people food. I think that's confusing her. She assumes that two-legged, upright creatures get to eat her favorites like corn bread and green beans and roast and chicken all the time, so she needs to be an upright creature inside too.

The other night I started Made of Honor with Patrick Dempsey while Sofia was in the house with me. It was just us girls and the tv. She was having fun rolling on the carpet and rubbing her side against the couch. Until Patrick Dempey's character, dressed as Bill Clinton, climbs into bed with an unsuspecting woman who was not the intended Monica Lewinsky. The unsuspecting woman screams in the movie. The unsuspecting Sofia jumped up growling. She barked and growled and ran around the house to the door. She demanded to be let outside. She sniffed the driveway a minute to assure herself that there was no threat. Then she came happily back inside. Now that's a guard dog.

A fellow lab lover

I enjoyed this sad article in today's Knoxville News Sentinel by fellow community columnist Stan Giles. It makes me want to beat up careless drivers who hit dogs and the stupid Chinese companies that poisoned America's pets. Stan had a nicer take on the issue.

Why do these things happen to me?

No, this isn't the aftermath of a tornado. Tiger's kennel didn't survive the torrential rains we've had lately. It seems like it has rained almost incessantly since Christmas.

As I was getting ready to leave for work this morning, my husband came and told me that Tiger, our unplanned pup, had a little problem. My husband said his kennel had fallen down. I figured he really meant that the tarp covering his kennel had fallen from all the rain. He came back a few minutes later and told me to go look outside because Tiger's kennel had really fallen in the rain. Well, he was right.

So before we could go to work, we had to extricate Tiger. I figured he had escaped and was prowling the neighborhood, but on closer inspection I saw that a bar had fallen on top of his house and blocked the entrance. Thankfully, Tiger was inside his house during the collapse and was protected from falling debris. My husband had to lift the kennel so I could pull his log cabin dog house out. We put his house under a tree and chained him to the tree so we could get to work.

What I really want to know is how Sofia, my chocolate lab, could have let him stay in there all night. If a squirrel moves too close to her kennel, she barks. If a deer dares to move in the woods, she barks. I'm not talking normal barks. Sofia goes into territorial defense mode. So why didn't she bark when Tiger's kennel fell on him?

I thought that was the end of the story. I got home from work this afternoon to find Tiger out in the pouring rain looking at me. The silly dog looked like a drowned rat. I had to let him in the house to dry him off. He was so happy, he decided to climb on my lap while I towel dried him.
He's currently trying to sleep as I type, but he keeps waking up every time my heating unit cuts on. (He's a bit of a 'fraidy cat, but that's okay after his traumatic night.) When the Mr. gets home, we have to go back out in the rain to arrange some kind of temporary shelter.

Why not just let him spend the night inside? I, the owner of two dogs, am allergic to dogs and cats. So once we get a shelter up, I'll have to vacuum the whole house so I don't wheeze all night.

But, I think Tig's worth it.

Marley and Me the Movie

The book-to-movie films of the last few months have really reinforced my preference for books over movies. I had high hopes for Marley and Me but the movie was kinda shallow. The benefit of books is that the author is able to express a depth of feeling and a wide arrange of emotions that actors can only "show" in so many ways.

If you haven't read the book but want to see the movie, I recommend seeing the movie first. It's kinda funny in certain parts, but the book is hilarious. The movie is kinda sad at the end, but the book is a tearjerker.

Marley makes my Sofia look like a little brown angel. Marley, as portrayed in the book, is probably the worst case scenario for potential lab owners.

The best actor award for this movie has to go to Dr. McSteamy from Grey's Anatomy as John Grogan's reporter friend. McSteamy's character wasn't in the book at all as far I recall, but that addition to the screenplay made the movie edition better.

High points of the Marley movie: cute dogs and McSteamy.

Marley and Me en espanol

Hace un rato vi un libro de un labrador travieso. Marley and Me esta escrito por el dueno del "peor perro del mundo" y un escritor estadounidense. John Grogan cuenta su relacion con Marley y como Marley estaba involucrado en cada paso de su matrimonio.

Como duena de Sofia, mi labradora chocolate, entiendo mucho de lo que escribe Grogan. Tambien estoy muy contenta de que mi Sofia no se porta tal mala. Pueda ser super-necia a veces, pero al menos no come el sofa como Marley.

Ya tengo planes de ir a ver la pelicula de Marley. Ojala sea mejor que otros libros que se convierten en peliculas.

Marley and Me

I just finished reading Marley and Me. I started it several weeks ago, but about halfway through I got sidetracked by Twilight. I had meant to read Marley for a while now, but the impending release of the movie provided me with motivation to read the book. I'm really hoping this is a better book to big screen adaptation than Twilight.

As the owner of a chocolate lab, I can identify with a lot of John Grogan's woes. Marley's antics make Sofia's stubborn spells seem like no big deal. So what she ran all over the yard with a dead blue bird in her mouth yesterday while I chased her in the freezing cold wind storm? At least I've never had to "search" for a necklace she swallowed.

I have a feeling movie theaters could really sell some tickets if they let dog owners take man's best friend to see this movie.

Proof Labs are the Smartest Dogs

I love this story. It's great that a story that could have ended in tragedy had a happy ending. The lab going back to save the other dog gave it a nice touch.

Sofia's Christmas Album

I am admitedly one of those loonies who thinks dogs are substitute children. I really wanted to make Christmas cards with a picture of my husband and I with Tiger and Sofia. I'm running out of time, so I've pretty much resigned myself to the fact that the family pic will have to wait till next year. But then tonight I got a brave moment and decided that maybe I could just put a cute pic of Sofia in front of the Christmas tree on the front of a card. I mean, wouldn't a pic of a beautiful chocolate lab be pretty cool?

Then my problem became getting her to sit in front of the Christmas tree. When I said sit, she sat wherever she was. I wish I had reinforced tree in her puppy vocabulary. The treat in my hand was more interesting, but at least she was in the general vicinity.

I think all the hard modeling work made her a little bit sleepy.

It really wasn't as hard as I thought it might be. She only grabbed one ornament, but it had already fallen off the tree. She triedto hide the evidence for the picture.

Bottom line: I think I'll skip a photo Christmas card this year. The glowing eyes look like they belong on a Halloween card instead. But at least I have an "album" of Sofia's first Christmas.

Thanksgiving for the Dogs

I found a new favorite store last weekend. The River Dog Bakery in West Knoxville had the coolest dog-friendly, turkey-shaped cookies. I just couldn't resist a special Thanksgiving treat for my pups. Tiger and Sofia loved them!

Snow in Late October

I found this in Tiger's kennel a couple weekends ago. I went outside and saw Tiger laying by the door of his kennel with his head on his new bed I bought him after his "surgery." (Since he was a puppy, Tiger has been OCD about having his towel or bed in his house during the daytime.) I wish I'd had my phone with me to take a picture of the adorable way he was sleeping with only his head and paws on the bed.

This is what I found in his kennel the next time I went outside. Tiger doesn't normally destroy things like this. That's Sofia's job. It's a good thing Tiger is a fur ball because I won't be buying him another bed at Target for quite a while.

The Best Seat in the House

Sofia and Tiger know that a trip inside the house is a rare specialty reserved for extenuating circumstances. Tiger came in some on rainy days in the summer before we bought his kennel. Sofia had been banned from the house until she hurt her hind leg jumping for a ball. Both dogs had their inside toys and towels for those occaisional trips inside. They never sat on furniture (that time I rocked Tiger during a storm doesn't count since he was on my lap), bothered the fish tanks, or messed with things that weren't "theirs."

I think Tiger and Sofia left those rules out of new dog orientation when they met their new cousin Cholo. Cholo must have been an inside dog before he met me. As soon as he gets in the house, which is rare, he heads straight for the couch. He lays down in the middle of the couch and takes up the best space in front of the television.

I found Cholo asleep in a deck chair on his first day with me.

Hypoallergenic Peruvian Hairless Dog for the Obamas?

Peruvian woman is offering a special Peruvian dog to the Obama family.

Cholo, My House Guest

I never would've thought I'd have one dog and be crazy about it. Then I got Sofia. Then I got Tiger. And now I'm dog-sitting Cholo, my brother-in-law's newly acquired pit bull. I was terrified of dogs growing up. Just the name "pit bull" is scary in itself. I don't think this dog realizes that he's a pit bull and the reputation that comes with it. He's one of the sweetest dogs I've ever seen. (Somedays he competes with Tiger for that title.) I let him in the house with me last week to watch Grey's Anatomy. He hopped up beside me on the couch and watched Meredith and Dr. McDreamy. I never woulda thought I'd be watching television with a pit bull.


Cholo is named after the song, Lean Like a Cholo, because of this weird limp he's got.

Beware of Puppy's First Toy

I think this first toy gave Sofia a subconscious message about her role as a hunter. She LOVED this duck. It's only fitting that a chocolate lab's first toy be a Remington duck, right? Sofia's parents are both duck hunters down in Southeast Tennessee. So I thought it only fitting to get this for her first toy.

Problem is, those hunter instincts have been going strong from the beginning. At nine months now, she has already engaged with a doe, almost engaged with a neighborhood cat, and tonight she chased a neighbor's baby goat around its yard (she's bigger than the baby goat). Plus she ate her first bite of deer meat last night, so I'm worried about what the rest of the winter holds for my little hunter.

Baby Tiger

This is why I welcomed Tiger into my life.

Baby Sofia

This is Sofia at about 7 weeks. The first few nights were kinda rough, but she only cried when she had to take a trip outside. Her house training days were easy. She went through a phase of biting toes and chewing on the table cloth. She soon moved outside.

Tiger

This is Tiger, the unplanned puppy. After spending a month or so with Sofia, my chocolate lab, my husband called me at work one day and asked if I wanted a little puppy who, along with his litter mates, had been abandoned in a co-worker's neighborhood. Some days I think he might be part beagle, but I'm pretty sure he's got some German shepherd in there somewhere. I'm positive that Tiger is the sweetest dog ever.

Sofia

Sofia is my chocolate lab. I brought her home from the breeder on my lap when she was 6 weeks old. She thinks she's a little person. She's now almost 9 months old. I think she's the smartest dog ever. Well, she might be the 2nd smartest dog ever behind my dad's black lab, Mr. T.