Dog Update
So we've had Hamlet for about nearly four weeks now and things are slowly starting to fall into a routine. During the first week we were concerned because Tulip seemed very uninterested in him and mostly ignored him. Then we realized that it was because she was in ridiculous amounts of pain. She had broken one of her dewclaws in such a way that it was only being held on by her skin, but that it wasn't immediately obvious there was a problem.
We finally figured out that she was favoring that paw and licking it a lot so we took her to the vet the on the 17th. She'd done this before earlier this year, and that was a relatively simple procedure where they numbed the flesh with a topical anesthetic and then clipped the claw; she didn't like it but it was over quick and was cheap to boot. With that past history we weren't too concerned this time around. However, it turns out that this time she broke her claw sufficiently high up that this wasn't an option. Instead they had to knock her out so they could cut into her paw, remove the broken claw, and then sew her back up. Fortunately all went well; she bounced right back from the anesthetic and went home with a bottle of antibiotics to combat the infection. A few days later she was back to normal, but that's how we ended up spending more money on Tulip's vet bills than Hamlet's the week he was adopted.
In any event, once Tulip stopped being in excruciating pain she started liking Hamlet a lot better. There's a lot of doggy wrestling going on at our house most days. Tulip has figured out that she can grab Hamlet's harness in her teeth and use it to throw him around. xhollydayx has even seen her grab the scruff of Hamlet's neck and toss him around that way. When it's not too hot we take them in the yard, close the gate and let them run rampant. They seem to have a good time, and when they get tired out they cuddle up together on the bed.
Of course, that's when it's not too hot. Since the first three weeks we had Hamlet coincided with possibly the worst stretch of heat and humidity in the 14 years since I came to Cleveland, there's been of sitting in the air conditioned bedroom. They wrestle nicely there too.
The heat's curtailed extensive walks for both dogs. Tulip like the heat (she sunbathes) but even she doesn't like going her customary 1.5+ miles in it. As a pug, Hamlet is obviously not built for the heat and we've been real careful to not overdo it with him. Now that's it is cooling off some he's been on several long (for him) walks, and while I don't think he'll ever match Tulip's epic 90 minute Saturday morning walks, he isn't going to get fat. Or at least not fatter than he's supposed to get; he's up to 14 pounds and should top out around 20 once full grown.
In fact, there's only two real problems. The first of these is relatively minor: Hamlet keeps eating Tulip's food and vice versa. Now the former isn't too bad, because Hamlet is small, has a small mouth and can't eat too much of her food even if he's given free reign. Tulip's love for puppy chow is more of a problem, so we try to feed him while she's on walks, or outside, or distracted by something. More worrisome is Hamlet's tendency to try and knock any treat out of Tulip's mouth. Despite her 45 pound weight advantage, she usually drops her treat when he does this. The only exception is her dental chewies, which she guards zealously. If we give them both treats at the same time it's less of an issue, but when we were giving Tulip her peanut butter covered antibiotics we had to restrain him until she swallowed it.
The big problem is Hamlet still isn't fully housebroken. On the plus side, he's more or less grasped that he should piss outside and has figured out how to tell us that. The worst incident thus far was when we were changing the sheets on the bed and he took the 3 minute window afforded him to piss on the down comforter while it was on the floor. Fabulous.
As far as feces goes Hamlet still drops it in the house way too damn often. This is annoying, to say the least. To be fair, he's gotten much better, but then he had a bout of diarrhea which led to several incidents in short order. Fortunately, most of them were on tile. He's got until the end of August to get it together; at that point xhollydayx resumes class and he'll be alone a lot longer on at least a few days of the week.
The diarrhea was probably caused by his obsessive love of sticks. He's a puppy, and he's teething, and he likes to chew on things. That's all well and good; so far he's limited it to toys except for one incident where he got 5 minutes with the molding in the upstairs hallway (I hope the paint wasn't leaded). But he picks up every stick he passes, and apparently he swallowed most of one, as xhollydayx had to pull it out of his ass, which I'm sure was exciting for both of them. So now sticks are verboten.
He's also made a bunch of messes in his crate. At first, if we woke up even a little late he made a mess, but now he's figured out that we'll come get him and he should wait, so the fabulous "wash out the crate before I go to work" mornings are much rarer now. Feh.
One interesting side effect of having two dogs is that our everyday purchases didn't supply enough extra plastic bags to pick up after both of them, so we had to buy the little bag dispensers that clip to the leashes. I have to work pretty hard to open the bags, so I'm not sure how those will work in the winter when I have gloves on, but for now it's fine.
In happier news, Hamlet has been socialized quite a bit. On the 17th he went with us to Carol & John's for Supper Club (it was outside) and played very nicely with small children for several hours; then he went to sherris17's house for her birthday where he slept peacefully for a while. He's also been to bec76's house for Rock Band night, where he looked nervously at the resident hounds Jax and Ditko. infowidget brought over her pug Bella one day so they could run around in the yard. And he's played with most area dogs and neighbors, several of whom (the neighbors, that is) love him to death.
So yeah, things are going well, dog-wise anyway.
We finally figured out that she was favoring that paw and licking it a lot so we took her to the vet the on the 17th. She'd done this before earlier this year, and that was a relatively simple procedure where they numbed the flesh with a topical anesthetic and then clipped the claw; she didn't like it but it was over quick and was cheap to boot. With that past history we weren't too concerned this time around. However, it turns out that this time she broke her claw sufficiently high up that this wasn't an option. Instead they had to knock her out so they could cut into her paw, remove the broken claw, and then sew her back up. Fortunately all went well; she bounced right back from the anesthetic and went home with a bottle of antibiotics to combat the infection. A few days later she was back to normal, but that's how we ended up spending more money on Tulip's vet bills than Hamlet's the week he was adopted.
In any event, once Tulip stopped being in excruciating pain she started liking Hamlet a lot better. There's a lot of doggy wrestling going on at our house most days. Tulip has figured out that she can grab Hamlet's harness in her teeth and use it to throw him around. xhollydayx has even seen her grab the scruff of Hamlet's neck and toss him around that way. When it's not too hot we take them in the yard, close the gate and let them run rampant. They seem to have a good time, and when they get tired out they cuddle up together on the bed.
Of course, that's when it's not too hot. Since the first three weeks we had Hamlet coincided with possibly the worst stretch of heat and humidity in the 14 years since I came to Cleveland, there's been of sitting in the air conditioned bedroom. They wrestle nicely there too.
The heat's curtailed extensive walks for both dogs. Tulip like the heat (she sunbathes) but even she doesn't like going her customary 1.5+ miles in it. As a pug, Hamlet is obviously not built for the heat and we've been real careful to not overdo it with him. Now that's it is cooling off some he's been on several long (for him) walks, and while I don't think he'll ever match Tulip's epic 90 minute Saturday morning walks, he isn't going to get fat. Or at least not fatter than he's supposed to get; he's up to 14 pounds and should top out around 20 once full grown.
In fact, there's only two real problems. The first of these is relatively minor: Hamlet keeps eating Tulip's food and vice versa. Now the former isn't too bad, because Hamlet is small, has a small mouth and can't eat too much of her food even if he's given free reign. Tulip's love for puppy chow is more of a problem, so we try to feed him while she's on walks, or outside, or distracted by something. More worrisome is Hamlet's tendency to try and knock any treat out of Tulip's mouth. Despite her 45 pound weight advantage, she usually drops her treat when he does this. The only exception is her dental chewies, which she guards zealously. If we give them both treats at the same time it's less of an issue, but when we were giving Tulip her peanut butter covered antibiotics we had to restrain him until she swallowed it.
The big problem is Hamlet still isn't fully housebroken. On the plus side, he's more or less grasped that he should piss outside and has figured out how to tell us that. The worst incident thus far was when we were changing the sheets on the bed and he took the 3 minute window afforded him to piss on the down comforter while it was on the floor. Fabulous.
As far as feces goes Hamlet still drops it in the house way too damn often. This is annoying, to say the least. To be fair, he's gotten much better, but then he had a bout of diarrhea which led to several incidents in short order. Fortunately, most of them were on tile. He's got until the end of August to get it together; at that point xhollydayx resumes class and he'll be alone a lot longer on at least a few days of the week.
The diarrhea was probably caused by his obsessive love of sticks. He's a puppy, and he's teething, and he likes to chew on things. That's all well and good; so far he's limited it to toys except for one incident where he got 5 minutes with the molding in the upstairs hallway (I hope the paint wasn't leaded). But he picks up every stick he passes, and apparently he swallowed most of one, as xhollydayx had to pull it out of his ass, which I'm sure was exciting for both of them. So now sticks are verboten.
He's also made a bunch of messes in his crate. At first, if we woke up even a little late he made a mess, but now he's figured out that we'll come get him and he should wait, so the fabulous "wash out the crate before I go to work" mornings are much rarer now. Feh.
One interesting side effect of having two dogs is that our everyday purchases didn't supply enough extra plastic bags to pick up after both of them, so we had to buy the little bag dispensers that clip to the leashes. I have to work pretty hard to open the bags, so I'm not sure how those will work in the winter when I have gloves on, but for now it's fine.
In happier news, Hamlet has been socialized quite a bit. On the 17th he went with us to Carol & John's for Supper Club (it was outside) and played very nicely with small children for several hours; then he went to sherris17's house for her birthday where he slept peacefully for a while. He's also been to bec76's house for Rock Band night, where he looked nervously at the resident hounds Jax and Ditko. infowidget brought over her pug Bella one day so they could run around in the yard. And he's played with most area dogs and neighbors, several of whom (the neighbors, that is) love him to death.
So yeah, things are going well, dog-wise anyway.