Dog Musings

After a prolonged autumn, winter has come to the Rocky Mountains. More often than not recently, it’s cold, snowing, and (worst of all) windy. Last Friday, I performed an accidental science experiment that pits 40-year-old writer who sits all day against wind chills well below zero. Perhaps the gusty conditions upset Lilly, which we learned last summer can freak out fearful dogs. Perhaps she’s already tired of being cooped up for winter. Either way, she was fussy — whining, squeaking, pacing. I finally relented, bundled up, and headed outside to play ball around 4 pm, just …

Fellow blogger Patty Khuly over at Dolittler garnered a slew of comments recently when she wrote about tail docking and ear cropping. Her post about an anti-tethering ordinance also got my attention. It made me realize that all of us dog lovers exist in a spectrum of good & better, bad & worse. Sometimes, it’s clear that even the well-educated, much-experienced among us have the occasional contradictory opinion. …

Keeping with the holiday tradition of people asking VERY personal things in a group setting, I thought we’d do a little experiment in true confessions. Entertain me (and others) with your answers to these dog care, dog training, and dog teasing questions. To get things started, I included my own answers: …

While on location doing research for an upcoming article in Natural Home magazine, I met a couple with a solo, young-ish puppy who is offering up some housetraining challenges. After my initial holy-cow, what-do-you-mean-he’s-still-peeing-in-the-house reaction, I realized that as a solo pup, he has no benefit of generational learning. …

So, remember our big media debut from early May, where Lilly and I got invited to be interviewed on videotape for a website promoting the benefits of pet ownership? Well … we went to all the trouble, all that worry, all that whatever for nothing. It’s been ages, and our video still isn’t being used on the site. I guess we didn’t make the cut.
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An alert Lilly is very pointy. A sleepy Lilly is quite round. But, reading her body language — in this case, her noggin — isn’t always this simple. …

Other than a little tip-tap of toenails on our solid-surface floors, Lilly often slides through life as my silent, attentive, loyal shadow. Our total connectivity has lessened since July through our “deference” work in her new behavior modification plan and thanks to her major anxiety meds. So, she spends large parts of most days no longer at my side, no longer needing my attention or constant contact, which is good, but also kind of sad. I think perhaps I’ve lost the ease of that much togetherness. Either that, or Ginko is a much more intrusive sidekick. …

Part of being Mommy McSlacker during Lilly’s recovery included letting her be outside after dinner, if she wanted to be. I also wasn’t very good about making sure the dogs had food toys to play with inside at night … mostly because I was so exhausted from worry and constant at-home medical care. Here’s the thing, though, we’re not having any trouble getting her to come in, and we’re not having any trouble with her hiding in the house at night. …