Jungle Trek

The strike is over.  The postal strike anyway.  Calgary city workers on the other hand... I'm not sure what they're doing but it sure as hell isn't mowing grass.

Give it a Shot

I had an eventful trip to the vet with Slone this week.  I have been putting off the annual vet trip because the vet sucks.  They play on your guilt and hurt your wallet.  They should just put dollar signs on the door because that's what it is.  Anyway, we went and got up to date on our vaccinations.  I dropped Slone off at home with Flash with explicit instructions to watch her, particularly her face.  I then went and did a Wal-mart trip that took about an hour and came home to find Flash asleep on the couch.  Slone was in hiding under my bed and when she finally came out I inspected her face to find that it was swelling up.  Frustrated and tired I took Slone back to the vet at 10:30pm for shots to counteract the swelling.  It's an allergic reaction to the vaccinations.  She had something similar happen during one of her original puppy shots but I thought that was a one time thing and since she'd had shots before I wouldn't have to worry about it.  Well turns out I did and after another lovely vet trip got home at midnight.  Awesome.

Our walks have been sporadic.  The weather has been rainy with a nice day peaking through here and there.  We went on a big walk the day after her vet trip in which Slone didn't not feel like walking.  Normally she is so excited to go for a walk that she pulls on her lease for the first third before settling in and walking normal.  This time I was practically pulling her along.  Finally as my frustration started to boil over I told myself she was still groggy from the vet, picked her up and carried her home.  Long walks are now necessary as the vet said she is at the uppermost part of the normal weight category.  Which is a nice way of saying that your dog is pretty much fat.  So we're cutting down on food and walking more because I will not have a fat dog.  He also told me she was developing tarter shit on her back teeth.  I have a toothbrush for her, but I rarely use it.  My vet brushes his dogs teeth every day.  Well aren't you the best fucking dog owner ever.  Who the fuck brushes their dogs teeth every day.  Pretty sure animals in the wild don't brush their god damn teeth.

We went to puppy play group today.  This was the first time we went to the new location and I liked it.  Big windows, mellow, calm place.  There's also a nice park just outside it that I didn't know existed.  We got a $5 nail trim and played with some puppies.  Usually Slone is a snob, but she played better this time.  More sniffed than played, but at least she was interacting.

I haven't even started trying tricks yet.  That's my goal for this upcoming week.

A Day at the Pet Store

Today bones and I spent our evening at the pet store.  I took my time, let bones look around, sniff some puppies.  We picked up a couple toys and after a frustrating search for harnesses (Slone is a weird in-between size) I finally let the sales guy help us pick.  He got one stuck on Slone's head, but Slone was so well behaved during the ordeal.  She didn't freak out, or whine.  We tried on one more harness that seemed to fit okay so I bought her some treats.

I found these turkeys to be highly disturbing.  Look at the gobbley ball sack under their beaks, and then the bikini... They are this weird native headdress wearing transvestite porn rooster.  AND it's $11.77!  Who on earth pays twelve dollars for this?

When old people wear diapers you think, oh they start in diapers they end in diapers, full circle.  But this?

Finally we looked at some fish, because everybody likes fish.  

Dog toys - $24.00
Harness - $12.00
Treats - $8.00
Dog Food - $18.00
Date night with man's best friend - Priceless

June - Dog

I'm dedicating this month to my dog, Slone, also known as Bones.  She's a big source of happiness in my life.  If I had kids I'd spend a month on being a better parent, but thankfully I don't got no monster children so I'll spend it on my monster dog.  All in all Slone is a great dog, she sleeps curled up against my stomach in the nook, rides in her kennel in the car like a pro, she's cuddly, loves love, likes people, likes most dogs is adorable and easy to take car of. 

Slone is a fairly low maintenance dog and because of that I can be neglectful towards her sometimes.  She's 8 pounds, so about the size of a newborn baby.  She's partially house trained.  She pees on these pads in the storage room which are basically what a diaper would look like if if was a flat square.  This is necessary as we live on the 12th floor of our apartment building and we all work 8-5 and can't come home during the day.  Slone goes out once a day when I get home from work. 

During the winter Slone doesn't get walked much.  She's small and has sensitive feet so she likes winter about as much as I do.  It's a quick zip out to do her business.  Even now that the weather is better I often feel drained when I get back from work and it's a quick trip around the block.  My goal is to take her for a big walk 5 times a week.  There are some days where I won't have an hour right after work so I'm being realistic.  I'd also like to go to some sort of fenced area/dog park once every weekend this month.

There are a lot of videos on YouTube about dog training.  I particularly like ones by kikopup because she uses clicker training and explains how to do most tricks in pretty good detail.  I plan on doing a marathon session of watching these videos and picking a select few to try and teach my dog.  I like to work on one trick a week.  It might just end up being one trick only if she doesn't pick them up quickly.


Slone is not a yappy dog, but she does bark when she hears things in the hallway outside our apartment.  Our apartment is right by the elevators so people often stand right by our door while waiting for the elevator.  Groups of people chatting, or moving furniture, or coming home drunk and making a ruckus all set the dog off.  She'll run to the door and bark.  I thought she'd get used to it and stop but she hasn't.  I need to figure out a way to stop this.  A girl moved in next door and she has this mid sized dog who is perfectly behaved.  Doesn't bark, doesn't react to other dogs, very calm and obedient.  She refers to my dog as the 'noisy one'.  I feel like the parent with the bad child who 'misbehaves' and no one likes.  So... yeah got to fix that, no one talks shit about my kid.