Look at our dogs

I know you've been desperate to see what's up with the animals at Case de ChemGuy, so here you are.

Our first pet was Aylah, a white cat who was with The Girl in college and moved with us to Cincinnati, Aylah passed away last summer on the morning of July Fourth after fighting cancer and eventually having her leg amputated.

We also had two more cat, Piddiddle (rescued from a friend of The Girl's who was going through a nasty divorce) and Minnie (rescued from The Girl's mother who happened to have life-threatening cat allergies.) Apparently we took one digital photo of Minnie and none of Piddidle, though.

The first of our dogs was LeRoy, a mutt who was loved terribly by Aylah and by us. I still can't write about LeRoy without getting a bit of dust in my eye. He was a spectacular dog and the one pet who was closer to me than to The Girl.

About a year later, Harlan came into our lives thanks to the Save the Animals Foundation over on Red Bank Road. Harlan, LeRoy, and Aylah were a trio with us for nearly a decade, and Harlan and Aylah passed away within a few days of each other last summer.

We were a one-dog, one-cat family for a short while after LeRoy passed away, and The Girl went hunting for a young dog to bring in and keep Harlan company, maybe to be able to pass some of his spectacular personality on to. That's when we got Clementine, a loveable pit bull who came to us pudgy, quickly got fat, and now is a gorgeous, lumbering dog.

Hollis is the last dog to permanently join our home, and he also came - as did Clementine - from the Adore-a-Bull rescue group. He's energetic, loving, desperate to lick everyone incessantly, and a great addition to the family.

We've also taken to housing foster dogs for the Adore-a-Bull group, having had Hattie for a couple of months...



...Walker for a couple of months...

...and now Dot for less than a week so far.

Pepper - a friend's dog - has also visited on a few occasions...

A touching moment

This song came on the radio on Saturday as The Girl and I were in the car. She mentioned that this was a song that she played in the car for our foster dogs each time she was taking them to be adopted.

Her cassette player is broken. There isn't a cd player. So she calls the video up on her phone on YouTube before she takes them to their new family.

I didn't know that.

I was - and am - incredibly touched by that. Heck, I'm welling up a little just typing it.

Their adoption day is going to be the best day of their lives.

There's a little dust in here. I'm gonna go now...

But, does anybody wanna meet a giant (90-lb), sweet, easy going, not terribly active dog that's available for adoption right now? Mordecai is incredibly sweet...

So, pit bulls

I am the proud owner of two pit bulls and the foster father to one more at the moment (and two more in the past year or so).

Yeah, I said pit bulls.

Here they are...

I know, I chose the dopeiest picture of the two (Hollis is the white one on the left, Clementine is the blue- that means this for dogs - brindle on the right), but I could've chosen a bunch of other goofy pics of the two...

They're spectacular, loving, kind, gentle dogs. They're the kind of dogs about which friends of ours have said after meeting them, "they didn't seem like pit bulls at all."

And it's that last part that's the kernel of today's post.

People think pit bulls are mean, vicious, terrifying, killer dogs. People look to ban pit bulls from their city. People read that pit bulls attack little children.

And I still own pit bulls.

And I foster pit bulls.

Because I've known a number of spectacular, gentle, loving pit bulls in my lifetime. My parents' first dog, the first dog in my home when I was born was a pit bull, a gorgeous, even-tempered, mostly black Staffordshire Terrier (a related if not identical breed to pit bulls) named Shebie.

I've been educated in the history of the pit bull breed (a bit of a misnomer as pit bull is a group of dogs, not a specific breed), and I know that the dogs that many people think are pit bulls aren't really pit bulls. Take this quick quiz to check your knowledge.

They can be trained to be vicious dogs, true. So can chihuahuas. So can German shepherds. So can miniature pinschers.

They can also be trained to be wonderful family dogs, loyal and protective, gentle with children and wonderfully intelligent.

Pit bulls can save lives. They can be police dogs.

No one should go into dog ownership - or pet ownership, really - blind, and if you're at all interested in learning more about pitties, do your research first and feel free to stop by one of the Adore-A-Bull adoption events.

And check out a recent Esquire article about The State of the American Dog. Good read...

A photo retrospective of our pets...so far...

This post is very photo-heavy, so I'm putting in a jump after the first pic of Aylah. Consider yourself warned.

I know you've been desperate to see what's up with the animals at Case de ChemGuy, so here you are.

Our first pet was Aylah, a white cat who was with The Girl in college and moved with us to Cincinnati, Aylah passed away last summer on the morning of July Fourth after fighting cancer and eventually having her leg amputated.

The Dogs are Alright

This story is a year and a half old at this point, but I haven't heard a better update on the dogs that Michael Vick had faught.

Watch The Dogs Are Alright on PBS. See more from Need To Know.

As a proud and loving owner of a wonderful pit bull, myself, I am thrilled to know that nearly all of the dogs turned out okay.

Update: Harlan's new sister

The new girl, Clementine, has been a bit of a handful at times.

She's cost us a couple hundred dollars in new baby gates...

We can, at this point, heartily endorse Safety 1st's lift & lock safety gates.

She's also destroyed a couch pillow, three (I think) dog beds, two tennis balls, a wicker storage cube/basket thing (the tan one on the bottom shelf, second from the right has nibble marks and is without its matching neighbor that was next door)...

...a library DVD case (thankfully not the DVD itself), a dog electric blanket (shut up, we had an old dog who liked to be warm), pair of The Girl's slippers, and two kitchen towels. She's still well behind LeRoy's early time with us when he ate three pairs of glasses, numerous pants and sheets, and a heck of a lot more.

She is, however, wonderfully affectionate and fairly obedient (can sit, heel, stay, can kinda 'get down' - not so much with the lie down or the sit while out on a walk). She's mostly housebroken - though there have been a few accidents inside the house during the day - one non-solid but definitively poopy incident that inadvertently lead to the shattering of my cell phone.

All in all, she's been a good addition to the household.

Harlen's new sister

Looks like we'll be getting a new dog next week...

Say hiya to Clementine...

Thanks, Adore-a-Bulls.

The fall...just the tough parts

It's been a rough fall to be a pet around Casa de Chemguy.

Late last year the vet found a lump inside LeRoy's mouth. A few weeks later we had the lump surgically removed and sent away for biopsy. The results came back saying that the lump was malignant melanoma, something that could be particularly aggressive when found in dogs' mouths. We headed onward, at our vet's recommendation, to see a local veterinary oncologist and began a series of vaccine shots - three or four over a course of a couple of months - that would effectively prevent the melanoma from returning.

At the first examination with Dr Harris - the oncologist - an x-ray also revealed that LeRoy had a lung tumor. We decided to treat the typically more aggressive melanoma first and then begin treatments toward the lung tumor after getting the melanoma under control. At LeRoy's three-month check-up from the final melanoma vaccine, we began chemotherapy treatment for the lung tumor. A week or so after that treatment, LeRoy began declining food. Two weeks later we returned for his second chemotherapy shot and told Dr Harris about the food issue. She saw that LeRoy was showing hunger - he took dog treats at the vet, something he rarely ever did - and suggested changing food. We were growing concerned and started trying him on a rice and hamburger diet with little success.

We took LeRoy to the vet a few times over those last three or so weeks, and each time they offered us a series of attempts at remedies - treating diarrhea, nausea, stomach upset. LeRoy - my first dog, my loving boy - finally passed away on his own on the morning of August 16, my first student day back at school this year.

...

About two weeks ago, then, Ayla - our cat - began to have some problems jumping up onto our dining room chairs and then onto the table. She was also holding her back left leg out oddly and limping around. We took her to the vet and got the diagnosis of cancer a day later. That was a Wednesday, and we had her on a chemotherapy drug by Friday. By Friday evening she was jumping back onto a chair and onto the table to eat her evening treat of moist cat food. That Saturday morning, though, she was unable to walk, unable to put any weight on her leg, and we took her back to the vet.

The tumor had weakened her femur badly enough that the bone had broken overnight. The only treatment available was to amputate her leg, so after some tears, The Girl and I left her with the vet for a hopeful Saturday surgery. The surgery was a few days later as they wanted to run fluids through her and make sure her kidneys were fully functioning before beginning her on anesthetic. On Tuesday evening, then, The Girl picked up our now three-legged cat.

Saturday morning - two days ago now - we took the cat back to the vet for a checkup. She still has another week before the stitches can be removed, but her missing leg is healing well, the wound fully sealed up now. On Saturday then she even stood up on her one back leg and pawed at the gate - we have her locked in the bathroom, held back by baby gate for the first couple of weeks of her rehab - trying to get out to us.

All signs are encouraging, and we can sure use some encouraging pet news around here.

Sheesh...

The week that was...

It's never boring 'round here...

For the past couple of weeks, LeRoy - our elder dog, somewhere around a dozen years old now - has been desperate to head down to our lower level rather than to stay upstairs where we've been locking him for the past few years.  It's not like we trap him in a cage; he gets the run of three rooms - with a couch, water, toys, two big windows that he can see out without even jumping.  But that's not been good enough for him for the past couple of weeks - no idea why.

He's been knocking down the baby gate that we use to trap him and heading downstairs to lie on the couch and the carpet - rather than the laminate floors upstairs.  No idea why.  Maybe it's the warmer temperatures - it is cooler downstairs, after all, and he is getting older by the day.

On Monday we'd headed to Home Depot to order a new water heater - hoping to qualify for the Ohio Energy Efficient Appliance Rebate program.  That meant we'd have to switch from our 80-gallon electric hot water heater (which has been slowly leaking for the past year or so while we hoped to avoid catastrophic failure through sheer blind faith) to a smaller 50-gallon gas model, something more in line with our two-person household.


We got to Home Depot, answered the needed questions, scheduled the delivery and installation for Tuesday morning while The Girl was home, and dropped a few bucks for an extended warranty meaning we'd not have to buy another water heater for a long time.


As I headed back to school on Tuesday after Spring Break, The Girl began her break by stinking up the house with paint and primer - the kitchen walls and trim on Tuesday before tackling the bedroom trim and doors for the next few days.  She'd used up the sage green for the kitchen walls and headed to Sherwin Williams for a quick resupply.

She left the dogs upstairs.

I called to check in on the way home and found out that the conversion of our electric to the new gas hot water heater would take an extra six or seven hundred dollars - new piping, new venting, an expansion tank, a pressure release valve, a flux capacitor - and that we'd actually be better off to just buy a new, same-sized electric tank - both in the short run and the long run.  Lucky us.  So we needed to head back to Home Depot and change our order.

As I drove home through the neighborhood - our suburban, uneventful, white-bred niehgborhood - three police cars - one undercover - rolled to a stop, and the police ran out, chasing someone down the street.  I've no idea who, no idea why.  Just a little excitement to start the week.

When I got home, I found that LeRoy had broken into the barricaded kitchen, gotten into the wrapped up paint tray and tracked paint across the laminate floor after apparently trying to eat the plastic paint tray while The Girl was restocking and I was hearing the sirens.  The Girl took the floor cleanup.  I took the dog cleanup and hopped into the shower to scrub his feet and mouth.

Once everything was under control and as cleaned up as we could imagine, we headed to Home Depot to switch our gas for an electric hot water heater, our 50-gallon, energy efficient tank for an 80-gallon energy monster.  No worries, they said, since we'd never actually gotten the gas model in the first place.  All we had to do was call the installers back and tell them to change what they were bringing our way.

So homeward we headed.

To a dog that had been trapped upstairs.  And who had ruined our upstairs couch.

He'd apparently gotten freaked out and peed all over the thing, urine dripping into places that we would never be able to clean.  Admittedly, the couch had been through the wars, having been with us for a week longer than LeRoy had been.  The cushions were ripped in various spots, and we'd extended its life by covering it in a rotating pair of king-sized sheets so the dogs and The Girl could still enjoy it.

So, out to the garage the couch went, replaced with what The Girl spent the next three days referring to as our doggy opium den, three separate palates of dog beds, piled so that the two dogs and the aged cat could enjoy them.  Heck of a start to the week.

Thursday, more painting by The Girl.  LeRoy again broke free to downstairs but without incident.

Friday, more painting and the installation of the $600, 80-gallon hot water heater - which, of course, cost $1200 after still-needed expansion tank and pressure release valve.

Friday evening then was a trip to Ikea to see the couch that The Girl wanted to replace the destroyed couch with.  She'd sat down in every couch in the store and chosen the one that felt best and was also washable and relatively inexpensive - for a couch, anyway.  I wasn't immediately sold on the couch but didn't see any better options at Ikea, so we headed onward to Ashley Furniture, Costco, and Value City Furnitue to see if there were any better options.

There weren't of course, so we headed back to Ikea to pick up the last Klippan four-seat sofa in the building along with two washable covers and head home with the flatpacked couch hanging a foot out of the back of the station wagon.  An hour later, we were sitting on our new couch, long enough for both of us to lounge at the same time.

If LeRoy pees on this one, we might have a dog to offer around.

He did, of course, greet us when we got home with the couch with a thoroughly destroyed book that I'd borrowed from my principal.  $38 plus $10 shipping to replace that one.

It's never boring to be a home owner.

Never...

In an only vaguely related note, we got our taxes finished this week and owe like $2500.

Yay!