growing puppy

I know, not a new theme at all. This guy is amazing. In one week he has grown an inch in every direction, and now has those huge wrist joints that you look at and say, "He is going to be BIG!" But this is the really amazing thing, on these perfect little, paws, he clumps. I kid you not, I'll hear a funny clumping sound and think something has been knocked over--look around and discover that its Mikey walking across the floor.

Here's Mikey!!

Mikey

Tues July14, I brought home a Great Pyrenees puppy. On the Sunday before that I was out walking my dogs (4 cocker spaniels + tiger lily) when I discovered that a large camping trailer had been parked almost against my back fence, and 3 guys were standing outside the door watching me. The grass is so tall, they probably couldn't see the dogs. The first thing that crossed my mind was, "I need another big dog". Monday I looked on Craig's list at grown dogs. Tuesday I looked again and contacted a person who had this puppy. They'd only had him a short time, but their other dog was trying to kill him they said. So he was 11 weeks old, and was the same height as Caleb and Bailey... but that was last Tues. I noticed today (Mon July 20) that he is a full inch taller than they are. I've done some reading about Great Pyrenees the last few days and right now its funny. They are "serious, majestic..." And here's this puppy at 3 months of age falling down while he plays with the youngest cocker, they tumble and bat at each other with their big front feet; chase each other around and around; growl a lot, and then fall down on top of each other. I don't know how long that will be fun for the Cocker.

isn't hdtv wonderful?

You know, with all the hoopla for the last many months about the switch from analog to digital broadcast signals, explanations of how to get a converter box, how easy it is to hook it up, how much better everything will be when this happens, how many more channels we'll all enjoy...And then after the switch, with the box, its actually harder to watch tv because its so picky about the signal. And don't tell anybody, but I have fewer channels than before. Between Jan and June 12 I used the converter box a few times and had lots of channels. After June 12, about two thirds of the channels I had before were gone. I read an article that said they were also switching between UHF and VHF. I think that's interesting because I'd not heard that mentioned before. Anyway, I've been wanting to watch less tv? here it is. See all the snow on the screen? and the message says it can't find the signal, and I should try moving the antenna. Which doesn't help. I know, grumble, grumble...

weather and fleas, unfortunately

It has been so hot already for most of June, that there are wildflowers blooming that usually bloom in September. I'm not exaggerating either. So far three flowers that usually bloom in Aug and/or Sept are blooming. That's a little discouraging. I mean I know its been unusually hot, but when the plants confirm it that seems to make it feel worse somehow. That lovely wet spring we had that was so good for plants, has led to an incredible plague of fleas. They seem to be immune to almost everything. I'm bathing and dipping all five of my dogs every week, and by 48 hours later they're crawling with fleas again. I've put drops on them after their bath and dip. I've put new, expensive flea collars on them after their bath and dip. It doesn't seem to make any difference at all. Although, I feel better because this week I finally got the carpets treated. And they seem to not be scratching quite so much as before.

Tiger Lily has own blog

Tiger Lily is a big dog with her own blog. You can believe me or not. The google people have provided all kinds of things to put on your blog, including a profile of the person creating the blog. But you can't, apparently put a different profile on different blogs. I tried to put Tiger Lily's name, photo and profile on her blog, and it all showed up at the side of MY blog. That was a little bizarre. So I removed it from my blog while I think about what to do about that. But here is her photo after we went for a walk in the Trinity River Park in Fort Worth. She got to ride on the miniature train, and I was a dope and didn't take my camera with me. Right now I'm trying to plan another small excursion for an early morning ( before the HOT) and maybe this time Bailey can come too. But I will not promise her her own blog--she's too much of a chatterbox, it would be too much.