Go for a ride???

Well, she did it again! Every time I think that she might turn out to be a normal dog, she does something strange. We were loading some things into a friends trunk. When we didn't let her get into the car, she decided she was going, no matter where she had to ride! No one will ever leave Jade home!
My husband and I have had a few arguements about her sleeping in our bed at night. I have awakened too many times to find myself hanging off the edge of the bed because Jade is in the middle. She's not JUST in the middle, she takes the WHOLE middle! So, we were discussing this problem again the other day when we decided that the problem wasn't Jade (of course not) it was that the bed was too small. We have a queen size, but absolutely need a king. It happens to be a water bed too, so we can't just change the mattress, we have to buy a whole new bed. Also, since Jade moves a lot during the night, it has to be a motionless, which costs quite a bit. So, we now have to try and find a waterbed dealer here in the mountains. Should be entertaining.
I also discovered another Jade quirk. I mix whatever meat thats leftover from dinner into Jade's dog food. I know that I get tired of eating the same thing over and over, so I try to make her dog food a little more appealing. However, if you want to talk about spoiled, she's gotten to the point that she doesn't want leftovers!!! If she has prime rib one night, she doesn't want it the next night! I thought my husband was bad about left overs, but Jade has him beat! There are some things that are so good that Ricky doesn't mind eating it two nights in a row, but not Jade! What would she do if she had to eat plain dog food every night? What really scares me is that she is going to be two years old next month.....what is she going to be like 5...6 years from now??

Okay, your not going to believe the latest Jade quirk. I was walking her when she started "marking her territory"! Do you believe this one? I have never seen a female dog try to lift her leg to go! The only thing I can think of is that she saw a male dog doing it and thought she would do it too! Unbelievable! She is not good at it naturally. Kept falling over. Then, when it wasn't working right, she tried just backing up to a bush! I was laughing histerically. I'm sure that people passing by thought I was a basket case. I have seen her try to hump Capone, and was told that when a dog is fixed, that sometimes happens, but this??? It has to be a Jade first! She really is quite a dog. She's ours though. Right or wrong, good or bad, she will be with us all of her life. Who knows, we may make a world record someday!

a miracle?

The good Lord, not only gave us a best friend, He gave us a miracle. My husband is diabetic. I was working out on the property with a friend of ours. We were trying to stock up on fire wood for the winter. Ricky, my husband, was inside the house alone and Jade was out with us. All of a sudden, Jade began barking like crazy. Gary, our friend, went to see what was happening. Jade was standing at the front door, barking at something inside. When Gary got there, he thought that Ricky was on the other side of the door, teasing her or playing with her in some way. When he got close enough to see in, he could see that Ricky was in trouble. He started screaming for me. I was all the way at the back of our property and could barely hear him, but when I did, I came running. My sister had diabetes all her life and I was very familar with insulin shock and diabetic coma's. The minute I saw Ricky, I knew that he was going into a diabetic coma. I was able to give Ricky what he needed. He made a full recovery. If it hadn't been for Jade, I don't know what would have happened because neither Gary or I were going to go into the house for quite a while and Ricky wasn't in any condition to get help.

We got Jade at a shelter. We thought that we were saving her life, but it turned out that she was saving ours! She might not be "pure bred", but she's our "pure miracle".

We had to go to a funeral in Florida. On the way back, we stopped and spent the night in Jekyll Island at the Caribbean Beach Resort. Its right on the beach, and Jade had the best time! Even better, she got a boyfriend! As you can see, it was love at first bite. The people in the background were the owners of Jade's love interest. They were there for the week. She was just so happy that we ended up spending an extra night just so that she could have a good time. Boy, what we do for our dogs! At any rate, Jekyll Island is dog paradise. As you can see, as long as the dogs are well behaved, no leashes are required. They romp and play to their hearts content. Just make sure you carry water! And, of course, a poop bag! If they drink the ocean, I can guarantee you that there will be a lot of vomiting going on. I don't remember his name, but he was a beautiful yellow lab about 8 months old. Even though his owners swore that he knew absolutely nothing of the ways of love, he begged to differ! He would follow her anywhere! Chicken Jade has always been afraid of the water, but while playing ball with her boyfriend and two other dogs, she forgot where she was and found herself in the waves before she knew what was happening. It was wonderful!

They are going to tear down the Caribbean Beach Resort at the end of this month. Cracks in the foundation because of it being built on sand. However, they are going to build a new one. I can't wait! If you are a dog owner and love to show them a good time, this is where you should go! The price is right too. Tell them Jade sent you!

I'm patiently trying to get your attention,

you know I adore you and - OH! did I mention

I love to be near you, to share the same space?

Just look at this "follow you anywhere" face!

You know I'm your faithful, dependable friend,

so eager to serve you, true-blue to the end.

I'm sitting here staring at you like a sap,

hoping to find a soft spot for a nap-

What do you mean, I'm too big for your lap?

Its lonely out here on the deck by myself;

I sure didn't mean to knock over that shelf!

How long will I have to endure this disgrace?

How CAN you stay mad at this cute little face?!

My "heart"

I just had to record a milestone. Jade has learned what "go pee" means!!! I was always able to tell Max to "go pee" and he would. I thought that was really cool and came in handy many times, but I never thought that I would have another dog who would do that. For those of you who are unfamiliar with doggie habits, males will pee immediately and on anything. Its called "marking territory", but females can be a real pain in the legs. They do not go immediately and sometimes can take hours to go. They have no desire to mark thier territory and will go only when they have to. There is no way of knowing when that is. However, Ricky thought that Jade was smart enough to learn this trick and surprised me by teaching it to her. All I can say is: you go girl!

Jade's vacation

We went on vacation to Florida, or at least we thought it was our vacation. It turned out to be Jade's. The first hint should have been that while we drove for 12 hours straight, she slept the whole way. Then when we got there, we were exhausted and she was bright eyed and bushy tailed. Thank God for Capone. He is my daughters West Highland Terrier. Fortunately for all of us, he has as much energy as Jade does. So, Capone took over babysitting services while we rested. If I hadn't seen it for myself, I never would have believed that two dogs could play non-stop from 7am to 11pm. With the exception of putting food into the body and getting it back out again, they played!



People tell me that I spoil my dogs. Could be. At any rate, Jade's dinner consists of Beneful Dog Food mixed with whatever meat we have had for dinner ourselves. Her favorite dinner is when we go out to eat. She sits in the car and patiently? waits while we eat. When we come out of the restaurant, we had BETTER have a doggy bag! She knows that she will get a small treat then and has to wait until we get home so that I can mix it with her dog food. That's my way of easing my conscience. If I mix it, I'm not feeding her people food, right? I'm just making her food taste better! At any rate, my daughter is very strict on the "people food" thing. Capone is absolutely NOT allowed! The first thing she had to do was train her mother, and then the dog. It kills me. I'm convinced that my "grandson" feels that I don't love him! He is also convinced that if he doesn't eat it, Jade will get it! The funny thing about that is, Jade could care less. She is so used to getting people food that its not a novelty to her. Any dog could come up and push her aside and eat her food. She would wag her tail because she KNOWS that her owner will just give her some more! BUT, the bad part was that this little 20 lb. Terrier was trying to put down 40 lbs. of food every day. He would eat his bowl of food and then attack hers. ( That is the dry food that stays in Jade's bowl just in case she gets hungry during the day. By the way, it is possible for a 20 lb dog to eat 40 lbs of food because his digestive system is in high gear at all times. He is the only dog I know that can poop twice or even THREE times in one walk!! He did this every day that we were there, which was one week. He also managed to down a large Milk Bone dog biscuit and a small rawhide daily. From now on, whenever someone says something about "being full of it", I will think of Capone!

Now, Capone is a very well trained dog. At least that was until Jade got there. In order to keep her from getting food before him, he managed to get into the garbage and eat 3 large Ravioli's. He had spaghetti sauce all over the kitchen floor. My daughter also informed me that he had diarrhea for 3 days after we left. Like I said, "full of it".

Capone is the proud owner of a doggie door. It is the smallest one they make, I think. Jade weighs approximately 65 lbs. If you have ever seen a really fat woman try to squeeze into a girdle, you would get an idea of what it is like for Jade to get through the doggie door. She was not about to let it get the better of her though. She absolutely loved the idea of being able to come and go as she pleased, so squeeze she did. In and out, in and out. She had a ball. Like I said, this was HER vacation! The only bad part is that after she gets home and sleeps for a couple of days, she is very depressed. You don't dare mention the name Capone. After she spends 5 minutes of running around trying to find him, she then pouts for hours.
It took us longer to get over "her" vacation than it did her. It will be awhile before we try that again. We are hoping that we can get Capone up here in Tennessee for "his" vacation. We live in the woods on the top of a mountain. There are all sorts of animals that Capone could only dream of, having been city born and bred. I'm sure that it will be a vacation to remember!

Interior decorating by Jade

We absolutely love Subaru's. We have had 4 now. Our last one had 189,000 miles on it and all we ever had to do was give it oil changes and replace the brakes once! Terrific cars!! So, when we decided to get a new car, of course, it was another Subaru. Now, Jades nails grow at a ridiculous rate! We try to keep them cut, but it is almost impossible to keep up with. Up until now, we never had a problem, other than my arms which look like chopped hamburger most of the time. The new Subaru has been outfitted with the cheapest, lousiest material they could find. I don't know why. They always had beautiful material before that outlasted the car. The Forester has a console which Jade has claimed as her "throne" from which she survey's the world as it passes. She wasn't in the new car 5 minutes before I noticed that there were several holes in the material from her nails. Then I noticed that there were also holes in the door under the window. I was able to make a cover for the console, but I have no idea what we are going to do about the door. Thinking of keeping her off of it is mute. I know that all dogs love to lean out the window and have the wind in thier faces. Doggie heaven! But Jade takes it one step further than any other dog I have ever had, just like she does with anything else. She leans out so far that her face is actually in the front window! I have watched her struggle to stay out there even when we are getting on the interstate and doing 70 miles an hour!!! Most dogs give up at 40 or so, but not Jade! The wind has to try to rip her ears and lips off of her head before she returns to the inside of the car. Even then, she will try a couple more times, just in case the car has slowed down since the last time 40 seconds ago. Then she looks at me with complete disgust and lays down on the back seat and goes to sleep. That is, until she feels the car slow down and then she is up and at it again. If we happen to have all the windows closed and the air or heat on, she figures that her rightful place is in my lap! Now, she weighs 67 pounds. She is not what you would call a "lap dog". You can't tell her that though. I have seen her contort her body in ways that would make a pretzel jealous. I humor her when I am not driving, but trying to tell her that she cannot be in my lap when I am driving has turned into a war of wills. First, she tries bullying her way in. If that doesn't work, she tries the "sneak approach". She can slowly inch her way in without you even realizing it before its too late. Finally, she gives you the "hang dog look". She makes you feel as though you have just destroyed any hope of happiness in her life! She can bring you to tears. I haven't figured out how to make her understand that its a matter of safety. She only knows that her "Mommy" is rejecting her! Its bad enough that when she stands on the console, her "flying nun" ears are directly in my line of sight. As a matter of fact, they have even been known to hang out directly in my eye. I have also been the recipient of a huge wet kiss on the lips when I turn my head to check out whats next to me or to see what I am backing into.

When we bought the car, we were really only going for an oil change. We took her with us, which we do most of the time. We just walk her around while we wait. This time, however, it was very hot out. We were trying to find a shady spot with a breeze, when one of the men came out and told us that they were "pet friendly" and that we could bring her in! I tried to warn them, but they didn't believe me. As is her normal nature, she thought that everyone in the show room had been put there for her to play with. She gets down on her elbows with her butt sticking up in the air, tail wagging like crazy and she begins to bark. Either that or she leaps up on them and almost knocks them off thier feet. Then she tries to tear around the area as fast as her little? paws can carry her or until she comes to the end of her lead and is brought up short and almost choked to death. Of course, everyone thinks she is adorable and incourage her to more antics until my arms are almost torn out of thier sockets. I think that we will leave her home from now on when we go to the dealership. I do have to give them credit though. How many car dealers allow you to bring your dog into the show room? If you are ever in Knoxville Tennessee, be sure to stop in Grayson Subaru and tell them that Jade sent you!

So, when she isn't hiding or running away, she's destroying. She loves toys with squeakers in them. She can find one and remove it in a record time of 27 seconds. We timed her! She can have all of the stuffing out almost as fast. The worst problem with this is that she will eat it. The squeaker, the stuffing, it is all edible. She has also developed little idiosyncracies. She knows her way around. She also knows what belongs and what don't. If she notices anything, and I stress anything out of the normal range, she goes crazy. We had an old car with a cover over it, that sat in the same spot for a year. One day we were trying to sell it, so we removed the cover. She went crazy. I bought a plant, I hung a wind chime, a limb fell off of a tree, and each time, she had a hissie fit. I will give her credit though. No one would dare come into the yard without her noticing it immediately.

She is also a waterfall. Her tongue is enormous. She can hold a cup of water in it. When she finishes drinking, water pours from her mouth where ever she may go. I have to keep a mop by her water bowl. I made the mistake of giving her a drink while we were traveling down the road. Everything was fine until she finished, and decided that she needed to stick her head out of the window. Needless to say, the waterfall was immediately blown back into the car. Everything and everyone was covered. She is also a lover. She loves to give kisses. Now, I appreciate the sentiment, but have learned the hard way to avoid kisses immediately after drinking. That big tongue of hers can wet you down normally, but after drinking, you need several bath towels to try to stem the flow. You will never need makeup remover with Jade around. My daughter allowed us to keep her Westie over night once. Of course, all that playing meant that a constant supply of water was needed. I can only tell you that poor Capone looked like a drowned rat the whole time.

Life with a tornado

Jade also turned out to be a big chicken. I was out on the deck, sweeping the autumn leaves off when I moved a table to clean under it. Wasps had carved out a home there and I found out the hard way. One of them attacked me and stung me on the foot at least 3 or 4 times. Jade was laying by the door, minding her own business when it decided to attack her too. It stung her on the nose several times before I could get her in the door. It was horrible, poor little thing. Now, whenever she hears the hum of a bee or wasp, she either runs for the house and if she can't get in, she will run for the first person available or hide under something. At the time this happened, she was very little, maybe weighing 20 lbs, if that. She now weighs 70 lbs, so she's not a little puppy anymore, but she will try to get under anything. Sometimes its so small that only her head is under, but she thinks she is hidden. AND, of course, if I'm out there, she wants me to pick her up! I would love to talk to the Dog Whisperer about this.
The first time we took her to the dog park, she refused to get out of my or my husbands lap. She was sure that every dog out there wanted her for lunch! She finally found a little Terrier and sensing no threat, attached herself to the poor dog. Even though she was a puppy at the time, she probably weighed 20 lbs more than the Terrier. As much as it tried to get away from her, she was determined to keep it as protection. The second time we went, she was a little braver, with emphases on the "little". She would run for the little dogs who would run from her and then if a big dog approached her, she would run for our laps. Its still that way today. The closest dog park is 50 miles from our house, so we cannot take her as much as we would like. I'm sure that if she could go more often that she would overcome her fear, but we can't. We did take her to my daughters. My daughter lives about 800 miles away. She also has a dog. It is a West Highland Terrier named Capone. Believe it or not, they are a perfect match. Capone has endless energy and sometimes plays too hard. They alternate between trying to kill each other to seeing who runs out of energy first. They range from the lowest corner to the top of the highest piece of furniture. For Capone, this is natural, but for Jade, who thinks she is the same size and will not be outdone, she will follow him no matter where he decides to go. When we have to leave, both of them will mope for days.

Jade was unlike any dog that I had ever had before. She was very easy to house break, but that is where "easy" ended. Everything else was a fight. She had enough energy to power the electric to New York City. She could pull all the stuffing out of a toy in 2 minutes flat. Unfortunately, I became her favorite chew toy. My arms and hands were covered with blood everyday, AND she bit HARD! I tried every method know to man to get her to play a little gentler, but found that the only thing that worked was biting her back! Have you ever had dog hair between your teeth? I do not recomend it. BUT, it worked!
She would and still will, eat anything! She ate weeds, rocks, wood, bark, paper, cardboard, material, and anything else she could get her teeth on. One time, I emptied a roll of papertowels and thought she might like playing with the tube. I threw it to her and then answered the phone. It couldn't have been more that 2 minutes that I looked at her to see if she was playing with it. It was gone! She had devoured it. Of course, everything that went down came back up. That is how I discovered a lot of things that I didn't know she had eaten. The Vet had given me some pills to try to stop her from throwing up all the time, but nothing would keep down things like cardboard. Max's favorite toy was a pair of socks. I would put one inside the other, balled up and pushed to the very bottom, and then I would put a knot in it. It looked like a ball with a streamer. Jade ate hers. I have several boxes in the back bedroom. At least one edge on every box is chewed. She never leaves a mess, she eats it.

First there was Max

Max was my heart. He was with me from 7 weeks of age to 13 years. Quite old for a Rotweiller. His birthday was August 8th and I had to put him to sleep on August 12th. I really probably kept him longer than I should have, but I was selfish. I didn't want to let him go. He had developed heart disease, blindness, arthuritis and weakness in his back legs. If it hadn't been for the pain, I would have kept him longer. He had been everywhere with me. He was my constant companion, "my heart". I even have a "America's funniest Animal" tee shirt because of him. He would grab my hand and pull it down to his rear for a scratch. If I didn't respond, he would growl and do it again and again until I did what he wanted.
The day that my husband took him (I couldn't bear it) to be put to sleep, I sobbed uncontrollably for hours. I proceeded to cry every day thereafter for 6 months! People would tell me that I needed to get another dog, but I didn't ever want to get that attached again! The heartbreak was more than I could bear. Finally, my husband couldn't stand it anymore. After 6 months of watching me bawl, he said, "Go get another dog!"
At first, I wanted another Rotty. Then I decided that the best thing I could do would be to adopt an unwanted. I spent months in shelters. If you have never done that, its heartbreaking. You want to take all of them home! Finally, one day, I came across what looked like a 6 week old Rotty mix. The people at the shelter thought she was half Rotty and half Chow. Now, I had had a Chow before. He was a sweetie, but I found out that I had been VERY lucky! Most Chows can be mean. I had decided that I would never have another one, even though I loved Teddy very much. (Teddy Bear) Strike one. Strike two was that she was a female. I always liked males the best. But, she was soooooo cute!
And so, she came home with me. She stunk so bad and her fur was matted. First thing was a bath! She was petrified, but it had to be done. Then we discovered that she had a cough. Our first night together was a horror. She coughed and cried all night long. The next morning it was right to the vets. Kennel cough. The following weeks was force feeding medications, which she hated. We discovered that she was afraid of everything! We also discovered that she threw up every time we put her in the car. Strike three! I take my dog with me everywhere. What was I going to do with one that threw up all the time? Back to the Vets! We also couldn't help but notice that tears constantly poured down her little face. Introverted eye lids. For those of you that have never heard of that, it is where the eyelids curl under and scratch against the eye, causing blindness if not operated on. Strike four! She had to be 6 months old before she could have the operation, so I had to put ointment in her eyes twice a day and sometimes 3 or 4 times. I was determined that she would not be blind.
So was the beginning of our lives with Jade. The complete opposite of Max in every way but for better or for worse, she was ours.