Fort Doberdale’s Resident Night Owl

Posted on by

I’ve been trying to get a good picture of our night owl for years. She is magnificent. Every night I know she is out there by the lulling sound she makes. Lulling to me, and maybe to her prey it means something else like “Come here little animal, so I can eat you. Bahahahahaha!”

Well, last night, I happened to be in the right place at the right time.  I saw movement and watched the owl swoop out of the sky and swipe something from the tree trunk. I was hoping it was a rat, but she took it to the branch of the the tree, and ate it. There were no pieces hanging out of the beak resembling a rat. There were no pieces resembling anything, so I am going to assume it was a lizard. K?

After eating, she sat on her perch singing, and I snapped pictures. I couldn’t get to my ladder, and had to hold the camera. This was one of the better pictures. Isn’t she magnificent?

I wonder where she sleeps during the day. She keeps the hours of vampires.

Helen

Marley And Us

Posted on by

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

“Congratulations! You and your dog have been chosen for the obedience class scene … for the movie being filmed in Miami; Marley and Me.”

It’s true. This was a small part of a big and exciting e-mail Fort Doberdale received late Wednesday afternoon while the bread winner (also the blog writer) was at work.

Did I mention EXCITING? I almost yelped, but the fact is, I want to keep this a secret, and yes, I consider this outlet still keeping a secret as I’m not telling anyone, really. Whoever happens to read this, though, that’s fate.

Back at work, I stood up and held both fists against my lips and took a couple laps around the small area by my desk, to let off some energy immediately upon reading the subject heading of the e-mail. That one of my coworkers could see me was a risk, but this was one time I was happy he is a Mr. Spock clone. Had he asked me, “Is something on your mind?” I know I would have spilled the beans. But once I got over that initial thrill, I found an inner happy peace, and maintained myself.

That is until my boss came back from a meeting he’d been in the whole time I was getting riled up. I had to think about how to approach the subject of time off. Mostly, I’ll need to take some days off next week. The rehearsal is not a problem as it’s on the weekend. So I had to tell him the truth because that would make the day-by-day way I’ll be going about taking time off next week fair for him and me.

They say the filming is on one day, a 12-hour day that starts way before the crack of dawn, and should be done that day. However, if it’s not, we will need to go back the next day. Either way, I will need the day after to recuperate, so it’s going to be a day-by-day exciting adventure in both the movies and in scheduling days off.

You might be wondering how the FDSP got to this point. Fate. I think that was it. An e-mail came to me from someone I really don’t know. Really. Mine was in the “to” line with just a few other e-mail addresses I didn’t recognize, and I had to let that e-mail sink in. And when it did, I got together with Luigi and we took pictures as the e-mail instructed and sent them off.

Then we considered many things after we hit the send button. We were too late. It was a hoax e-mail. This was a really good gig, and well, South Florida is rather incestuous when it comes to good gigs, so did we even have a chance? But this patter of pessimistic thinking proved to be a grand waste of fretting energy.

After we got the “you and your dog were selected” e-mail, I called the contact number to find out who they wanted as the dog portion of the team of “you and your dog.” I was sure it would be Luigi, the handsomest of handsome, but much to my surprise, the answer was, “A female. He wants a female. Any female, natural or cropped, but a female.”

That pretty much left out the Hercules of my Doberworld out. Luigi could never pass as a female. I considered the reason why, and it didn’t take me long to figure out that there are going to be a herd of Marleys, and I am going to assume they are males. I figure the star calls the shots, and he wants to be surrounded by gorgeous doggy babes where possible.

My next consideration was who among the girls should go? The DoberDiva was first to enter my mind. Shortly thereafter, the DoberDiva shot out of my mind as a BAD IDEA. You may gather why. She IS the DoberDiva. What Diva have you ever met wants to be second fiddle?

Baby, the Queen Mother, made a spectacle of herself on Monday night when she chopped so hard to get treats, that her teeth nearly flew out of her snout. To top off this theatrical Baby drama, when I fed her the treats, Liver Biscotti, she made sure she crunched each little piece as loudly as possible. Why? This is so the other dogs – not only the dogs in our drill class but all those in the rodeo arena and its outskirts plus the ones living in the mobile home park behind the arena – would hear her. It’s true. Stacy, the drill class leader even mentioned, with laughter, at how she had never met a dog that cruched a treat THAT LOUD. Have you ever seen Liver Biscotti? It is the size of a short pinky fingernail.

So this is why I came to the heart-breaking conclusion that Baby Puss DoberDiva would not be the one to go.

OK, and the fact that she is almost 11 years old and has arthritis in her back and may not have the stamina for a 12+ hour day (heck, will I?) also convinced me. I even took a stab at calling a doggy acupuncturist which I happened to get the name of from Stacy on that very Monday night class, to see if we could get into see her. The voice mail today was, “The vet has an opening on Monday.” Well, I’m not sure if the acupuncture will work that fast and all the Diva stuff is still quite prevalent in my mind. The bottom line is, Baby is my baby, and I would dearly love her to be part of this. But Baby is a social butterfly and a scene stealer, and I would more dearly love to see this project through.

So that’s why I had to choose Leissl.

Not that Pippin was out of the running that fast, but Pippin has a bum front elbow that doesn’t keep going all day – except if she’s hunting lizards – and she is the Pippinator.

Pippin is very rugged, as feisty as they come, but very obedient. She is a gem. So when I figured that Leissl is the second Dobergirl in order of adoption, well my conscience felt most comfortable with Leissl as a choice.

Now that Leissl has been picked, she has a lick spot on her hind quarters, which I fretted about all night. I thought there was black chalk or black skin paint or something to cover it up. I just couldn’t find a consoling advertisement that would say, “Yes! If you spend your money and the inordinant amount of dollars for the overnight shipping costs, this product will do what you need it to do.” So I e-mailed a friend who is a breeder, about this dilemma. She said to use magic marker. Er…probably I won’t.

So to be up front about the hot spot, I called the contact for a second time and explained Leissl’s dilemma. She told me black chalk for the un-dry hot spot and (get this) head spray paint for bald men if the hot spot is dry. She also told me to get something for athlete’s foot and put that on the hot spot. It will dry the spot up fast!

Ewwkay. So at lunch, I mosied out to Walgreens. Have you ever heard of paint for bald heads? Frankly, I hadn’t, so asking for it was a thrill. Luckily, in this day and age, most clerks have heard much more absurd requests than that. So the clerk took me over to the hair dye section, and as we looked, and discussed this, a co-worker of mine came down the aisle. Might I add that there are a few people in life that have the skills to spread information around as fast as this co-worker? That I was thrilled about this encounter was an understatement.

You see, I am a person who doesn’t dye my hair, but am willing to spray paint my dog with bald men head spray for a part as an extra in a movie, and I don’t wear make-up. I used to do all that stuff, but my dogs said, “Why you do that? It’s not good to put chemicals on your face and head, and we love you the way you are.” And Raven added, “Plus, with the money you save, you can buy me more toys.”

Eww kay.

Back to the aisle and the fact that the co-worker was listening, and heard the clerk telling me of the two beauty supply stores to pay a visit to to find “this product.” I walked away wondering what rumour I will be hearing about myself down the line.

I decided to make a quick stop at CVS because there was no Absorbine Jr. there at Wallgreens either. Guess what? CVS had no bald man head paint spray either, and no Absorbine Jr. So I bought some athlete foot cream which happens to have the same ingredient as over-the-counter yeast cream for women. So being I’m a value hound, I had to go into the feminine hygience section of the store to see who was paying more, athletes or women, for this product. Thankfully, it looked like a pretty even keel sort of exchange, so I walked out of the store with the tube made for the feet.

I wonder what the people who tossed sweet Leissl into a shelter would think of her now. They would never get a dog from my rescue.

Onto the rest of the adventure!

Helen & Leissl

Day by Day

Posted on by

This was our visitor on Wednesday morning.

And the Hibiscus flower that bloomed was dark and intense.

This evening, after supper, Luna decided to lick snouts instead of emptied dinner bowls.

When she got to the Queen Mother, she found that not everyone appreciates her snout cleaning efforts.

Luna is still lookiing for her nose.

And Raven was looking for a break in the weather last weekend.

Then there’s Leissl…

No explanation, yet.

Helen

A Brief History of Luigi

Posted on by

Luigi’s second class in Novice Obedience Handling was on Monday. He did really well. He showed everyone what a dog who crabs looks like. That is, he sticks his rear end to the side of the handler and that part walks sideways while the front part of him, where his head is, walks straight ahead. I was expecting a magic pill to fix it, but there isn’t one. I know what I have to do. Work.

You know, Luigi is a PITA. He’s been one since day one. Though I love him and would never part with him, I was just recently summing up his time with me.

He came in with a stitched up front paw. The former owner did not keep Luigi still, bandaged, or otherwise contained, so the paw didn’t heal, and Luigi was limping. To add to that, he’d been neutered, and let to chew his stitches out. All but two. It was a mess on both ends. My vet advised me to keep the Elizabethan collar (aka cone) on his neck, apply Neosporin you know where, and keep the front paw taped till it healed. So I did all that. And eventually, he healed on both ends.

Then, somewhere after that, he was running in the backyard, and one of his middle back toes starting gushing blood, and that was from Luigi’s fantastic ability to locate and step on the one thing in a mile wide area that can do damage to his bad self. So now he has a “flashlight toe.” That means that middle toe’s pad will stick forward at times, instead of down on the ground, due to whatever connected the paw pad to the toe bone was disconnected.

Then there was the time Lilian came aboard. She was very sick as she was adopted from Miami Dade, which is known for its pets being severely sick form the shelter’s outdated environment, which spreads disease. Luigi felt neglected, but I wanted him to be safe. So I had put a short ex-pen across the kitchen, where Lilian was and I was and Luigi was not. Luigi decided to pout. He hung his head over the ex-pen, and the harder he pouted, the harder he pushed his neck into the pen. This caused a great deal of problems starting in the wee hours of that night, for a couple weeks after. Due to meeting up with a VERY BAD vet “specialist,” Luigi got this bad.

I filed a complaint against the vet who did nothing, except charging a couple grand for “waiting to see what happens.” I just got a letter today that said – a year after I filed the complaint – that the vet licensing board is finished with their part of the investigation, and now are turning it over to their legal side to see what they suggest. I will bet they suggest nothing even though this was highly negligent as if I had not pulled Luigi out of this vet’s “care,” Luigi would have suffocated to death. His throat was so swollen the night this picture was taken, he was whistling as he tried to get air. He also got uevitus, which is low blood pressure in the eyes, and he was close to going blind.

Before it gets worse, it did get better. The night I brought Luigi home, I had to find another emergency vet to take him to. It was a crap shoot for me because I had just lost faith in specialists. However, I did need to do something. So at 1 a.m., I took Luigi to another specialist, and by the next day, this is what Luigi looked like:

Meanwhile, during this whole event, my non-specialist vet who initially started treating Luigi, took an x-ray, which on it showed Luigi had a bladder stone. So after Luigi healed from this surgery, another specialist that was not the surgeon who did the good work above, removed the lump that was left in Luigi’s neck, which probably from hindsight, could have just been left alone. He said he had to “move” the salivary gland, which does not make me feel secure. God put it in a spot for a reason, and it wasn’t for a surgeon to go in and move it around. This surgeon said he put it in a place where a “hole” was. Eww kay.

He also, under this same anesthesia, removed Luigi’s bladder stone, which when evaluated, was determined to be a calcium oxalate stone, which is why I have to feed Luigi a special homemade diet.

I had asked this surgeon’s assistant if she could ask this highly paid surgeon if he would do a “show cut” on Luigi’s toe nails while he was under for the two surgeries. What I know now, which I didn’t know then, I would have enough sense to say NO, even though I had not gone through vet school. But this moron had one of his vet techs do the nails. It was HORRIBLE. She ground them down with a high-powered drill, and the heat damage alone, I cannot fathom. Luigi’s toe nails were so infected, which then infects the legs and can go into the bone and rest of the body. However, this particular surgeon told me NOTHING on post-care for Luigi’s nails. There were no written or verbal instructions on how to care for them.  Luigi’s toenails were wide opened to infection!  I asked Dr. Ego on the follow-up visit for some guidance, and he told me to ask my regular vet. He had NO clue is basically the premise here, and damaged up a good set of toenails on a wonderful dog’s paw.

I asked my vet to help me with Luigi. That was another half a grand, because the one who did this to Luigi would not admit blame, and when I first contacted him about it, said it HAD TO BE something else entirely like CANCER and if I wanted him to check it, I’d have to bring in x-rays. That surgeon is as pompous and arrogant as they get.

With my vet and through the message boards, I found a long road ahead with keeping Luigi’s nails uninfected – they were open wounds! I wrapped them and kept his tootsies in boots.

And months of soaking and more antibiotics and money, and even to this day, from November 2006 till now, his nails are not back to normal.

I also filed a complaint on the vet who did this to Luigi. It was filed the same time as the one above, and I got the same paperwork back on him today. I had never filed complaints on any vet till this double tragedy.

Now, I have to feed Luigi a special diet, with vitamins and herbs particular to his system’s needs, and when I trim his toe nails, it’s more soaking.

We are now dealing with a rash that comes and goes on his belly.

My regular vet said this boy is high maintenance, and that is the most accurate definition of my boy. But he is worth it.

As for obedience, well, he is high maintenance there too. There is no better crabber in the world. When he sits, he doesn’t tuck, but he goes back about 2 feet from where he started from to end up in a sit. That and his crabbing are enough of a project to fill a master’s thesis. Add to that the boy cannot sit in an ex-pen quietly, so has to sit in the front seat of the truck while his sister, Baby Puss Queen Mother, has her turn at class.

Luigi, heza my PITA.  Heza boy.

Helen

Raven Teaches An Old Dog New Tricks

Posted on by

Raven worked the crowd Sunday.

She really laid it on thick.

Though she didn’t fool Tank, the Doberboy, who dropped by.

Raven has a way of wrapping a human around her finger. How do you think I fell for her? Then reality set in.

Trying to *explain* Raven to a person gets me no where, though. I pretty much figure Raven’s (evil) plan is in full operation and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. So I watch.

Others watch, too. Some even think about trying Raven’s (evil) plan on for size.

The sales pitch…

Errr, anyway…

Is this the smile of cuteness? Or is there tartar lurking between those teethies?

I guess I’ll just keep living with her to find out.

Eeegads!

Helen