My dog looooooves visiting my parents . . .
Tag Archives: dog
Interpreting the Amazon oracle
For some reason, the Amazon sales rank of Outwitting Dogs
Since it fluctuates hourly your results may vary, but as I write this, it’s hit 2,357 which is damn near champagne-worthy. Not that my champagne standards are all that stringent. Okay, okay, it’s not even close to champagne-worthy, it’s 11:00 on a Sunday night already, sheesh.
But still. What in Tarnation is Going On?
Has there been a print review somewhere that hasn’t been picked up by Google’s crawler yet?
Anyone have any idea?
This kind of thing doesn’t just happen. This book
(Actually, it’s already made one list. The Dogwise Top 10 for 2005, but I didn’t find that out until the day before yesterday.) (So I didn’t even get a chance to wonder whether that was champagne-worthy.)
Seriously, if anyone reading this has an idea of what might have raised the book’s profile in the last few days, drop me a comment or an email! Thanks!
Closer to Vivi?
Champion Bohem C’est La, aka Vivi, the whippet that escaped from her crate at the JFK airport right after the Westminster dog show, has been spotted in Flushing. More than once.
There’s now a Newsday blog dedicated to all things Vivi. It’s got some interesting information, including why they can’t use a tranquilizer gun to catch her (low stores of body fat on this breed make her potentially too sensitive to barbiturates — unlike coyotes!) and why a sight hound on the run may be harder to catch than a dog of another breed.
Shoe! Shoe!
I’m working on a new trick with my dog. It’s a complex one, which is good — it stretches my training skills.
Ultimately, what I hope my dog will be able to do is to hunt for an object I’ve hidden somewhere in the house and bring it to me. I bought three toys specifically for this trick with the idea that she will need to retrieve only the toy I name.
To train it, I’m breaking the behavior down into pieces, one of which is “fetch.” We’re making progress. A big hurdle: the toy sneaker has a squeaker in it, and the noise seems to worry my dog terribly. I’m trying to figure out if it’s related to her impeccable fashion sense or whether the squeak has an encoded message about obeying cats.
[tags] dog [/tags]
Things were quiet. Too quiet.
Some time after taking my dog out for her morning toilette, I realized I hadn’t seen her in quite a while.
So I hunted her down, and found her in the downstairs powder room.
What is she doing standing there, you ask?
I’ll tell you. She is stuck. Behind. The Boots. The awful, awful Boots.
I moved them. She’s free, now.
Happy dog year
Tomorrow kicks off the Chinese year of the dog, which may explain why Google’s tail is wagging.
Blogging will be light today. I’ve realized that I’m way behind in planning for this event. Anyone know a good source for novelty cocktail stirrers? Something with a Corgi theme would be perfect!
That’s my dog
The one eating apples.
She doesn’t have a terrible solid “leave it” on cue. Yeah, I know, I have nobody to blame but myself. Sigh.
I took the pic yesterday. She’s spent today, of course, doing the too-much-roughage-tapdance at the back door.
Dog food recall
Aflatoxin is a toxic contaminant that shows up in commercial dog food from time to time. It can be deadly to dogs.
Some 19 brands of Diamond, Country Value and Professional dog food are now being recalled because of this contaminant. Symptoms of aflatoxin poisoning, according to the article, arise over days and weeks:
Early signs include lethargy, loss of appetite and vomiting. Later, look for orange-colored urine and jaundice, which is a yellowing of the eyes and gums. Severely affected dogs produce a blood-tinged vomit and bloody or blackened stools.
Apparently, some peoples’ dogs are also refusing to eat the contaminated food — so if your dog is turning up his nose at his kibble, think twice before dosing it up with gravy or something to get him to eat it.
Squirrel Patrol
The bent nose doesn’t seem to bother her . . .
Dog photos
For the book I’ve got coming out this spring, 101 Dog Training Tips, I needed to take photos — lots of photos. I have most of them now, but I spent another few hours today at a local park where people bring their dogs to romp off-leash.
Here’s one I took today. It isn’t for the book, but I think it’s kind of cool — Golden in Motion. :-)
