Moxie on Mutts Day

Today is Mutts day. In honor of this prestigious occasion, my dear friend Labcablady held a photo contest on the best dog forum in the world, Ruffdogs! It was an open call to all mutts on board and my own dear Moxie mutt won the contest.

This is the winning pic.


She is well pleased with herself. She is getting a gift certificate to petsmart so we get to go shopping for a present for her. I promise to get her something fun, after initially threatening to get something practical like cat litter. I tried to explain to her what my being unemployed meant in regards to her lavish lifestyle, but she just kept throwing her squeaky toy in my lap and looking at me adoringly. Thats the wonderful thing about dogs, they don't care if you are working or not. They just love you.

So go on over and visit Moxie at It's the Dogs life.

Happy Birthday Moxie

Today is Moxie's 9th birthday.

8 years ago today, I made the best snap decision of my life, and brought a skinny, mangy, sickly dog home with me. I've never looked back.

Moxie is my best friend, my constant companion, my confidant, my partner, my love. I have never been so richly blessed in life before Moxie, and will never know a love like this again. She is my soul dog.

So I raise my glass in a toast to Moxie. The best dog ever. May we have many more happy years together.

So far we have celebrated with Birthday cookies (from me and her grandmama) and a pup cup ice cream treat. Lots of pets and cuddles of course, and some indoor romping and playing (its 104 degrees outside today) I'll probably take her to the lake to play on Monday when its less crowded. Then a bath, then a therapy visit Tuesday morning.

I do plan on getting Moxie her Swamp cooler and a custom made new collar for her birthday. Those may have to wait though, until I start getting regular paychecks again.

Dog Days of Summer

It's hot. Too hot to hang outside for very long. As a result, Moxie is very bored. GTDOG is on summer hiatus, so no obedience classes and it's been far too hot for agility. I tried some tunnel to weave pole entry the other day and Moxie did it, but would run to the shade up by the garage with her toy at the end. It was just too hot.So other than doggy daycare on Thursdays and the odd therapy visit, poor Mox just has nothing to do.

I'm thinking of investing in a Swamp Cooler from Ruffwear. Maybe with something like that, we could at least go hiking during the summer instead of staying inside and training in the living room.

Moxie's birthday is coming up. I'm thinking of having another party for her. I was hoping we could rent out the doggy daycare for the evening to let the dogs play in the air conditioning, but I'm not sure how that will work out. The backup plan is the Denton Dog Park. Last year was fun. I'll bring a cooler full of ice to help keep the pups cool. I don't know what to get her for a present though. What do you get the dog that has everything? Maybe her swamp cooler could be her birthday present.

Can you believe my baby girl is nine years old! I hope to have at least another nine years with her. I hate to think of my puppy getting older. But to look at her, you'd never know she was nine. She acts like a puppy, people are always surprised when I tell them her age.

This week, Kobie is getting his teeth cleaned (More teeth pictures!) and Moxie is getting her second Lepto vaccine. I've never vaccinated for Lepto, and in fact, had only seen one or two cases ever in my years in veterinary medicine. There's more controversy over that vaccine than most others. But my vet said she's seen near a dozen cases of lepto this year, in city dogs too. I take Moxie to lakes and other water sources all the time so I figure I can't be too careful. So I started the vaccine series. I trust my vet to recommend whats best for my dog. This is a good practice too vaccine wise. They have actually adjusted their vaccine protocols to match the AVMA and AAHA three year protocol that came out several years ago. A lesser practice will still insist on yearly boosters despite the fact that its been proven unnecessary. Sad fact really. You really have to be your own dogs advocate.

Anyway, happy summer.

Auditions

Well auditions yesterday were fun. Sully did pretty well I think under the circumstances. It must have been pretty strange for him and he must have been pretty weirded out about the whole thing. He was scared. Not completely freaked out, but not his normal confident outgoing self that he usually is.

For this reason, I don't think we'll be selected. But if we are, we probably won't go. I don't want to risk stressing him out so bad his IBD flares up again. We would be talking 4 days of non-stop stress for him, I think thats too much to ask. Besides, I wanted this to be something fun we could do together. If he isn't enjoying himself, then it defeats the purpose.

Dawn's kitty Kiki did really well. He was very relaxed and composed, I think he stands a good chance. Also Hali's kitty Cassiopea auditioned today and also did well. I hope one of my team mates gets selected. How wonderful would that be! They are picking 1 team from each city where they audition, plus two back ups from each city. There were only maybe a hundred people there yesterday, maybe, if that many, so odds are pretty decent!

Good luck everyone!

Big Day for Moxie

This morning Moxie and I and a friend went hiking at the clear creek nature preserve in Denton.

Camo dog.




Happy dog. Look at those pearly whites. I've been brushing her teeth. They look fabulous!




Moxie looking longingly at the not so clear creek waters I wouldn't let her swim in.


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Moxie in the shade




Silly dog


The many faces of Moxie. The preserve was beautiful, but the trails were a bit overgrown in the north part of the park. Moxie and I were covered in burrs.

I realized she would need a bath, so I decided to let her have a bit of fun first so we headed out to the lake and spent an hour swimming. I didn't take any pictures.

After the lake I decided to try out this new place in Flower Mound called the "Blissful Bark" Dog wash. It was great! The tubs were clean with no slip matts and drains that didn't clog up with hair. The water was temperature control and the wash nozzle had different settings. They provided everything, the shampoo, conditioner, ear cleaner, towels, everything. The best part was the forced air dryer. Moxie really NEEDS to be blown out after a bath or she mats up really badly. The whole process took about an hour and only cost $15. Well worth it for me to bath my dog in air conditioned comfort with no mess to clean up afterward.

So now I'm off to try to get some AKC worthy shots of her before we lose the light of the day.

Some parting shots of Kobie






EDITED TO ADD: Moxie's AKC pics

Front:


Right Side:


Left Side:


SO what do you think. I'm thinking Border collie. Any suggestions?

Game Show n' Go

Well tonight was the last class at GTDOG before we break for the summer. So we went out with a bang. Moxie was fabulous. The more I work with this dog the more I realize just how incredible and special she really is. She is so smart and this dance that we do trying to communicate with each other is so intricate and beautiful.

Tonight, we had a breakthrough in agility class. Moxie loves agility. She likes to tell me how much fun she's having while we work, which is fine with me. I'm all for the dog expressing her joy. Doesn't bother me a bit. Now what does bother me, and it another thing all together, is the herding barking that she also does.

The difference between her gleeful yapping and her demanding yodeling are subtle, but I can tell. One minute she is listening to me and watching my signals and following my lead, the next she's trying the call the shots herself. Finally, my instructor offered a simple solution. "She's trying to control you, remind her that you are in control. Tell her to down" So when she starting the herding, I firmly told her to down. She did, and that was the end of it for the night. No more herding the rest of the evening. Brilliant! A communication breakthrough. Now whether or not it will last to the next session remains to be seen, but at least I've found an affective way of communicating with when she goes into herding dog mode.

I've started the process of joining this new club, TWANG. I'll start by stewarding at the Labor Day Trial. I think I'll just enter Moxie in jumpers that weekend, and spend the rest of the time just soaking it all in and learning the ropes.

I've also decided to bite the bullet and try to get Moxie her ILP (or rather PAL as they are now calling it) for AKC. I'll take some photos tomorrow and post them up here and let YOU decide which ones to send in, and whether I should try to pass her off as a Border Collie, or a Sheltie. I got one vote for each tonight. I need a tie breaker. I'm personally leaning towards Border Collie. I have never seen a sheltie Moxie's color, but I HAVE seen border collies overly speckled and frosted like Moxie. So I'm leaning towards Border Collie. I'll post the pics and let you weigh in.

In other news, I'm trying out for a game show this weekend. Fun, yes! Its a show sponsored by Meow Mix called "Think Like a Cat" and it pits 8 teams of cats and their owners against each other in a series of games, everything from a jeopardy style quiz game to a "how well do you know your cat" challenge. It sounds like tons of fun and the grand prize is a million dollars! And who couldn't use a million dollars! So anyway, tryouts in Dallas are this weekend and I'll be taking my sweet Sully and giving it a go. I figure, the worst thing that could happen is Sully freaks out, and we have to leave. But if he keeps his cool, we have a hollywood style screen test, a multiple choice cat quiz, and a taped interview to complete. I'm excited. Full details about the Game show and auditions can be found here.

Wish us luck!