Short one on the move

The short one left town for a month! First stop was my grandogrent's house. I on the other hand have stayed home to assist with important home improvement projects. Don't tell Anna but there are less walls in the house than there were when she left.


Here's my grandogpa snuggling with a strange looking owl.


Grandogma and the short one enjoying the sunset with a glass of wine after swimming all afternoon.


And this is the beautiful view of the high Sierra that she enjoyed while out for a run in Mammoth this evening. I'm pretty jealous but I don't think I would have enjoyed the next stop (Vegas) so much so I'll be kickin it at the house with the boys, rolling in rotten fish and eating hot dogs. THAT'S the life!

I can fly!

I have no photographic evidence of my claim but just ask the short one... in an attempt to rescue a particullarly special stick from it's eminent demise I jumped off a 15 foot high cliff into a river. It turned out to be a bit upsetting as I maintained my usual jumping composure and slapped the water hard with my belly. The short one must have thought it looked fun and decided to jump of the rock which was not good for me as I have been left with the responsibility of making sure nobody drowns. It was a rough evening by the river for me but I did successfully rescue at least 40 sticks and 3 people from the frigid waters of the North Fork of the Middle Fork of the Willamette River. I'll see if I can get some photos tomorrow but in the meantime, here is a picture of the peeps and I on a bike ride.

Photos from the summer

Here's Paul. Well that's really just his leg covered in insulation from the attic where he's been crawling around fixing things. He moved in with us for the summer to help out with some projects and settle in Hood River or Portland. He is THE BEST! And he gives good belly rubs and feeds me bacon.


It's been a big blueberry season so the short ones got together with Melissa and some even shorter ones to scour the farm for juice blue bombs.


We've also got a garden going! It's a little one but it's a start and the peppers on this plant, while not smelling exceptionally tasty to this dog seem to be a hot commodity around here.


Here's The tall one on a ride through what seems to be a sprouting forest of lupin. I have a feeling that with climate changing soon these flowers are going to replace the trees. They are HUGe!


The short one went on a solo birthday ride (she didn't even bring me!). I thought it seemed strange that she'd pack an ice pack and a beer in her pack but she seems quite pleased to be enjoying it at the top of the climb with the view reflected in her glasses.


That's all I've got for now! I'm headed off to work with the tall one to supervise while he builds trail.

Near death dogsperience.

I almost died last week. For no reason that my people or my vet have been able to pin point I spiked a dangerously high fever, stopped eating and started looking rather drunk. The small one, being the worrier that she is drug me (literally) to the vet where I was poked prodded, injected, drained and cooed over by three very concerned women. While I do like my vet and her assistants, I do not like to go there. It smells like scared animals and illness and I'm always afraid that I might end up getting stuck in there as it seems many others have. In fact, on this trip they tried to keep me overnight but my amazing people know me well enough to know that staying the night would have created more stress than healing. So, I went home and after a couple days of having pills stuffed down my throat I'm doing much better!

Laying in the dirt season

It is officially laying in the dirt season! I love this time of year for a few reasons. One, I generally get to swim a lot. Two, my people shape these lovely dirt piles just for me to lay in. Three, grilling usually leads to dropped food and meat juice.

Being a dog rocks.

Wiggly black dog gets a cat

My peeps got me a cat! They actually got me two but I still haven't met them because apparently they don't like people or dogs much. So far the only real benefit I've received is a few bits of cat food but hopefully they will start catching those creepy ghost mice that keep me up all night!

Meow

This is what happens when the short one goes for a ride without me!


She could have been eaten!

Getting Lazy in my Old Age

Wow, I can't believe I've left my millions of readers hanging since October! What can I say? I'm a busy dog. It seems like every time I get ready to write you a compelling story about my wiggly shenanigans one of my peeps toss me in the car and we're off on another adventure.

We went down to visit my Grandogrents in CA for Thanksgiving which was awesome. Their neighbors have the most delicious compost pile I've ever tasted. It was good fuel for the back country skitastrophy my peeps took me out on. In search of good snow we drove for miles through 1'+ deep snow in the Subaru before nearly getting it stuck. Didn't make it to the access point for the extra rad skiing so while the tall one drove back down the super sketchy road, the short one made some turns with me while we skiied down the road. We then headed over to Mt Shasta where they slapped the skins on their tele skis and drug me up the mountain through deep, thick, wet snow for about an hour. Once they turned around I knew I was screwed because my big lab feet are definitely not as fast as their freshly waxed skis. As I post holed down the mountain up to my chest as fast as I could they disappeared through the trees ahead. I figured they were planning to leave me up there and almost gave up hope when I saw the short one upside down with one of her skis planted straight into the heavy snow. She didn't seem to find my attempts at assistance helpful but eventually dug herself out and headed back to the car with me.

Shortly after our trip to CA I was once again hucked into the car and heading North to Forks WA to visit my other Grandogrents and family. I got to kick it with the wiener dogs, Big Gus and Little Gus while watching the peeps partake in this very strange custom during which they make a huge mess removing stuff that has all sorts of interesting smells on it from fancy boxes. I don't really understand the purpose since very few of the boxes contain anything edible or stinky but people are strange like that.

I was trying to help.

Happy!

The Tall One picked up a copy of a novel our friend from MI just published!

Afterwards the tall one dropped the short one and I off at a trail that took us through the rainforest out to a secluded beach. We ran the whole thing even though I'm pretty sure by the looks we got from the other people on the trail that I wasn't supposed to be out there. Silly dog haters. The tall one headed out to scope the surf which was WAY to big to enjoy so we headed back to the house for some really yummy dinner.

Julie pants just like me sometimes!

Julie and Anna after skating to the water fall.

Julie, CJ and Jason getting ready to head back down the hill.

There's been a lot going on here in the Gorge too. The peeps have been working and Anna has been enjoying lots of time with her friends, skiing and running while Jason's been spending much more time kayaking than he has in quite a while. Our friends, Melissa and Corbin Shays (and their cute kids) have had a impossibly difficult winter. Corbin passed away on January 4th after a long and amazingly graceful fight with brain cancer. Being a dog I don't know much about these things but he was one happy guy who's laughter was contagious. He made people happy and dogs wiggly and I always liked that about him. I think that even in his absence he is still bringing smiles to a lot of faces and that's not something just anyone with only two legs can do.

Corbin shredding.

The peeps seem to be gearing up for a busy spring/summer of travel. The tall one just built up a new bike to go with the new line of jumps that he's been working on in the yard and the short one has been eagerly awaiting the guy in the big brown truck who I can only assume from the excitement she expresses when talking about the impending delivery, must have a huge load of dog treats, rawhide, or stinky stuff. I'll be sure to post a picture of said package's contents soon.

I guess that's all I've got for now. I've caught you up a bit and hopefully I can do a better job with this blogging stuff... I've said that before. I'm off to stare at the bowl of cat food the short one has been putting out for our friendly ferrel mouse catcher. The bowl is just sitting outside of the glass door and I'm confident that if I stare at it long enough I may be able to somehow eat it through the glass. I'll keep you posted on my progress.