Glucosamine and Fish Oil

We've been giving the girls glucosamine/chondroitin supplements and fish oil since Luna's one year X-rays. Though the X-rays didn't show anything requiring surgery, they did show some very early joint changes--what would be osteoarthritis in humans but is called dysplasia in dogs. Dr. Greene didn't recommend any intervention beyond these daily supplements as a form of preventative. Since Luna is asymptomatic, we, of course, haven't noticed a difference in her activity. Abbie, however, has benefited greatly from them. She actually RUNS--not lopes or trots, but gallops--now. It is a beautiful thing to watch, and I'll do my best to catch it on film. Today was an absolutely gorgeous January day, so we spent much of it outside. I didn't catch them running, but I did get a few good shots.

Cosmic Humor

A few nights ago I had a 4-year-old HELLION come into the ER. All anyone had to do was look at him--not even the wrong way--and he would scream bloody murder. He kicked. He swung. He did everything short of spitting at me. He was awful. But he gave me an interesting thought. "This must be what the vet feels like when I bring Luna." Then it occurred to me that the cosmos has an amazing sense of humor. I made the choice, many years ago for many reasons, not to have children. As many child-free people are, I have been quite critical of parents whose children are ill-behaved. Loud, disrespectful children who don't mind are a serious pet peeve of mine. Now I have one. She's just covered in fur. Pretty darned funny.

On the 21st of November, a day after her first birthday, I took Luna and Abbie for a walk with the ulterior motive of taking some 1 year pics of the big girl. These shots are from that walk.

Roll Over, Roll Over

These last few days I have thought a lot about and been in awe over how much we can love them, and how quickly. We have many nicknames for Luna: Goober Dog, 'Tard, REtard, Devil Dog, Luna-tic, OH MY GOSH!, Luna-Balloona, Bella Luna, Little Bit, Little Sister, and I'm sure there are more that I'm missing. They are uttered in amazement and frustration, and occasionally anger, but always there's at least a little bit of love behind them. More often than not, there is a lot of love behind them, even when we're frustrated. Always, though, there is love. Though we loved her from the start, she has become a piece of our hearts. ..How could she not? Have ya seen those ears?!

She looks such the regal guard dog in the picture above. She's definitely becoming more sassy. Today a couple of folks came to the door and knocked, and she was not fond of that at all. The bark she offered was not a welcoming one.
For whatever reason, Luna loves our shower. She has to check it out every time we go to the bathroom and the door is open.
While we want her to be a good citizen, and much of her homeschooling is for that, we have to throw in the occasional just-for-fun work. "Roll over" has been our project the last couple of days. Dad helped her master the final touches today. When I got up this afternoon, I decided I wanted to get it on video. Luna was so excited, though, that I couldn't quite get her to do it. That I had the camera in one hand and the treats in the other didn't help any. She's accustomed to some accompanying hand gestures, so I confused her. The result was amusing, so I posted it and the more perfect results when Dad came to help out. (Note how Big Sister is sitting and downing trying to get treats, too in the first one.LOL)

Puppy School

We went to J & K Canines today for our first class of puppy school. We would really like for Luna to be a well-behaved, well rounded companion, so we are trying to train her well from the beginning. They talked with us about properly establishing ourselves as the pack-leaders, the top of the pecking order and about how to reinforce the good stuff and discourage the bad. Part of discouraging the bad was using a noise maker like a "shake can" so we stopped at the store on the way home to get a few of the big cans that make the best ones. Here the girls wait patiently.

Another suggestion we got was to use something other than Big Sister to work off some of Luna's herding instinct and energy, and a soccer ball was one of the suggestions, so we went right away to get just that.