Christy’s Ramblings

I’ve been chasing a pair of Red Shouldered Hawks that live down by the pond at work for a couple of months now trying to get some decent shots. Today as I was getting in my truck I noticed one of them in the tree by the pond. One had a rabbit and was perched on top of the light post in the parking lot and the other joined him. As I was changing my focus one of them swooped down and dive bombed me. I literally had to duck to my knees to keep from getting clocked. I just wish I’d have had my focus ready when s/he was swooping straight for me! It was quite exciting!

Yesterday was such a beautiful day that Jason and I spent most of the afternoon on the screened porch with the pups.  I got all the boys’ photos.  Lois Lane wouldn’t sit still (go figure).

Every day at 5:30 Buddy knows it’s time for dinner. If you dare stand up, this is what happens until you feed the Giant Dawg and his three side-kicks.

In other news:

I found out a couple of weeks ago that I have gall stones.  In fact, one third of my gall bladder is full of stones.  So I had a consultation with a general surgeon this morning and the gall bladder is coming out.  On March 11 I can say good riddance to that worthless organ and resume my beer and wing eating habit.  Until then I have to watch the fat intake else I end up writhing around in misery, so it’s a good thing to have yanked out.  Odd to think that up until 6 months ago I’d never been in the hospital for anything and now I’m going in for my second organ removal.  I hope this isn’t some new trend because I’m not digging it.

And - it’s Friday!  Going to hang with friends tonight, seeing Shutter Island tomorrow afternoon and hanging with friends again tomorrow night.  Gonna be a great, relaxing weekend!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine’s Day! 

If a dog’s prayers were answered, bones would rain from the sky.

This is my old man, Hardy.  He turned 16 on Christmas Day.  Buddy was nuzzling on his ear and wouldn’t leave him alone for me to get a shot of just Hardy, so here is Buddy’s large snout.  Hardy is more gray than black now, can’t hear worth a darn and due to having vestibular disease ( loss of ability to orient himself and becomes somewhat tipsy ) he doesn’t see all that well either, but he’s still feisty and enjoying life!

I warned you that you’d see lots of my pooches during this project!  ;)  Lois Lane is next…

Buddy was out playing in the snow today and I snagged this profile shot of him.  I had a texture that I knew would go perfectly to make a portrait and it turned out just as I’d hoped.  I love my Giant Dawg!  And boy does he love the snow.

In other news, Blue is getting worse. He went back to the vet today and they determined that it is not a pulled muscle, but a spine problem.  We’re not sure if it stems from his previous back injury or if it’s something else.  The vet put him on a steroid medication and we’re praying that helps.  If not, surgery is the only option and I don’t know that we should (or could) put him through another major back surgery.  He’ll be 9 next month and had a 6 week recovery of the previous surgery and even then he’s never been quite the same, not near as active.  So we just hope that the medication and cage rest work for him.  *fingers crossed*

Today was Furminator day for Buddy. Giant, hairy dogs, Furminators and winter time static do not go well together, thus I got a smaller pile of hair off of him than usual. Giant Dawg loves to be brushed, but Giant Dawg doesn’t dig static.  (As a heads up, you can expect to see quite a few dog shots during this project.  ;) )

Almost as quickly as it starts, Christmas is over and done with.  It was a great holiday spent with family and friends.  We had four family gatherings over the last week and several impromptu friend gatherings.  And to top it off, I’m on vacation until January 4th!  New Year’s is next on the agenda, which means it’s time to start cleaning my house so it’s in decent shape for New Year’s Eve.  We’re having a few friends out and New Year’s always ends up being a fantastic time!  This year Jason is making his yummilicious Guinness chili to add to the festivities.  I’m sure lots of photos will come of that night!  But for now, here are some family photos from some of our various gatherings  (sadly there were a few where I took my camera but failed to take any photos).

Buddy’s first Christmas present

Lois Lane with her new stuffy (which already has missing appendages)

My niece Taylor all snuggled up

Momma

Jeremy & Amanda (my brother and sis-in-law)

Mama Rosie & Melvin

Cousin Adam, Aunt Cindy & Melvin

Portia

Dad & Mom

Cousin Matt & Abby

Grandma Parson

Abby kicking of the annual Dirty Santa game

Dad & Taylor

Jason & Taylor “wrastling”

As mentioned before, when we first took in Buddy, our Great Pyrenees/Golden Retriever, from the horrid conditions he was in, there was also a female Pyr with a litter of puppies…Buddy’s puppies.  At the time they were just tiny (well as tiny as a Pyr can be) little nursing furballs, maybe a month old at the time.  This puts them at almost 5 months old now.  I’ve been able to keep up with some of the puppies since this site URL is sometimes given to the new owners so they can see what “dad” looks like.

The other day I had a nice comment from Lesley on The Critters page saying she had adopted one of Buddy’s sons.  His name is Henry and he is just the cutest, fuzzy headed little thing!  He looks a lot like Buddy and he’s a very lucky boy!  He gets to go to work with Lesley every day and everyone around town knows who Henry is.  At almost 5 months old he already weighs over 40 pounds, barely under what full grown Buddy was when he first came to us.  (Now Buddy is around the 85 pound range - I need to go get him weighed again).

Lesley was kind enough to send me photos of Henry and says she’ll continue to send them so we can watch him grow up - how cool is that!

Here is sweet Henry - check out that fuzzy head!

And Henry in his Halloween getup. Look how happy he is - ha!

And as reference, a photo of Buddy, the proud Papa!