Farm Dogs

are too poor for real toys.


They have to make do with old milk jugs, and sticks.


Which they may or may not find whilst digging up the horse paddock


OMG! Are we poor?


Yes Dexter, we are very poor! And we almost got a lot poorer recently too.

The other day, we thought Piper had blown a cruciate. Eep. She hunkered down in Dexter's crate and wouldn't come out, and when I did lure her out she was limping badly on one hind leg and didn't want to walk on the laminate.

Well, it hurt. What did you want from me?


I immediately blamed Dexter.

It's not my fault. And you can't see me anyway.


Because SOMEBODY has a nasty habit of trying to squash her while she's bouncing up and down waiting for her ball.

What, you mean when I do this?


And the heavier he gets, the more he impedes her insane devil spins and interferes with her take-off.

So we trundled off to the vet clinic for a check up.

Piper has the most intense sense of self preservation of any dog I have ever met. She refuses to show pain in front of anyone but me. If *you* cut off her legs with a rusty hacksaw, she would just stare at a spot on the wall behind you and pretend it was not happening, and that she was fine, but if *I* pinch her toe she screams just as if I'd said "all the world's tennis balls are gone and you'll never play fetch again."

So of course the vet couldn't get her to show an ounce of pain. She was so tensed up the vet couldn't tell anything at all! She did step out of the room and I grabbed Piper's knee and she shrieked but as soon as the vet stepped back in the room she stopped (mid-shriek) and went back to her happy (mad) place.

In the end, the vet said that given Piper's size and general FANTASTIC body condition, and a few other factors, she didn't present as a cruciate injury, but possibly a muscle strain. We decided on a conservative approach of rest (no agility, no fetch) for a couple of weeks to see if she improves on her own. She is no longer limping, but I'm playing it very safe. She gets a two week break from agility class, and I scratched her from the trial this weekend too.

There's a good chance I'm going to lose my shit, thanks to this regime.


I didn't want to trundle all the way to agility class with just Tweed, who is too old for two hours of class anyway.

No I'm not! I can do it!




Yes, you are. And no, you can't.

I hate you, and you'll pay for this. Good luck falling asleep at night.



So for a lark, I threw Mr. Woo into Piper's spot.

Mr. Woo has learned all the equipment in sporadic practices, except the chute, and for fun I have taught him both threadles and serpentines, but really Wootie has been on equipment maybe 6 times in his life. Since this is a mostly Masters level class, I apologized profusely to my classmates for the time-waste they were about to watch ... and damned if the little fat couch didn't run almost a whole 20 obstacle course.

WTF?

A "natural jumper" The Sadist calls him.

That was fun. Let's hook up next Thursday, and I'll show you up once again. XOXO


Since Piper's on a break, there was no fetch today.

Just some rock climbing:


I think I lost my ears in this pile of rocks ...


And exploring for weird things. Weird things like this:


What is it, fish roe? I am sure there are fish in the dikes (which are now, like, rivers) and I know there are lots of birds of prey flying around, as I see them every day, so I assume these were the remnants of a fish supper.

I also saw a dead headless duck, but decided not to photograph for you all :)

Call me old *grumble* Why don't you step in here with me, Food Lady?