Here's a look at my birthday gifts!!

Hey, here it is Wednesday already and I forgot to show you guys my birthday presents! See my new yellow frisbee? I took it out of the package but I am saving it for sometime later. I already told my brothers, no teeth marks in it that aren't mine! And we have eaten a lot of the treats in the bag (I was my usual generous self and Bandit and Winston seem to like them too!) And we've all nibbled on the bunny cookie a little bit. Course Bandit would rather nibble on a real bunny. He used to catch a bunny every year in the garden. Bandit's pretty fast for an old guy. He'd lay out there and pretend to be dead, and the bunnies would sneak in under the stockade fence and nibble on Mom's lettuce and stuff. And Bandit would just wait,and every day he'd lay a little closer to the garden, until one day, he'd wait til they were busy stuffing their little cheeks, and POW! he'd snag one and drag it around the yard. Then usually Bailey would steal it from him, and Mom would have to come out and break it up before someone got hurt. Sometimes Bandit catches skunks too, he doesn't even care if they spray him, he just bashes their heads in. NEVER cross that guy--he's my big bro. But now there's a picket fence around the garden, and Bandit can't get in there to snag any bunnies. I knew he was jonesing for a bunny, so I gave him a big piece of the ears off my bunny cookie. How sweet am I, huh?

Not much to report here. Mom and Dad were teaching a class on Saturday and Sunday, so they pretty much didn't have any time with us. I got Mom back by keeping her up almost all night last night, just bugging her and stuff. She was real tired today. She did get back at me by locking me out of the bedroom for the day. I had to nap in the living room with my brothers. That's no fun.

Mom made some soap on Monday night. Lemon Sugar (again, because some lady bought a whole bunch of it.) You already know what it looks like so I won't put a picture up. You'd rather see my presents anyway. And she made a lavender-bergamot-cedarwood combination out of the mango butter soap. It smells kinda good. Sorta Lavender-Woodsy. Bergamot is that stuff in Earl Gray Tea that makes it taste Earl Gray-ie. Mom really loves Earl Gray with a bit of lemon in it. Me, I pretty much drink water. Sometimes I have a few licks of Dad's coffee on Sunday mornings. It's yummy, but he says I shouldn't have caffeine. Mom likes drinking seltzer water and she offers it to me but I don't like the bubbles. Today Mom is drinking some green tea. It's called Green Caramel or something like that. The Tea Guys make it. Until recently they were right here in Florence, where we live, but they had to move to bigger space. They make all kinds of neat tea and ship it everywhere!

Right now Mom is making lamb chops in the oven. She took an egg and some worcestershire sauce and some red wine and used that to dip them in, then she put bread crumbs on them and stuck them in the oven. And she's making carrots and broccoli to go with them. They sure smell good. Maybe there will be a piece for me. I doubt she will do anything else tonight because she is real tired from me keeping her up all night. And she is working in Boston again tomorrow. That means she gets up at 430 in the morning. Which she tried to explain to me, feels like 330 because of that daylight savings thing. I don't care as long as I get breakfast before she goes! Then Friday she has to drive far away for a meeting. Friday is my Dad's birthday and she needs to have time to wrap his presents. I got him a nice shirt, I already told you that. And she got him a new coffee maker. And my brothers got him a new CD player for the bedroom because he likes to listen to music and his old one broke. No one got him a frisbee though. Guess he can use mine.

Well, now Winston appears to have peed in his diaper, and Bailey and Bear are arguing over a toilet tube roll. I better go check it out! Catch you guys in a couple days. Love, Me.

It's my birthday!!

Hey everybody! Today's my birthday! I'm seven years old. That's 49 human years!! Do you think I look old? The first picture is me today and the second picture is me from when I was about 3 years old. I think I look pretty good for my age...you can't see any gray hairs or anything. My brother Bailey, on the other hand, has got a lot of white hair on his face and he's only one year older than me (he says he's going blond but I think it's white). And my brother Bear is nine and his face is really white. Whenever people see us together they always think Bear is older than Winston, but Winston is 10! Anyway, back to ME. I got some cool presents for my birthday. Maybe tomorrow I will post a picture of them. I got a new yellow frisbee, so I can start out the season fresh (but I will still love my Old Yeller, too, whenever I can find it again under all this snow.) And I got some special chicken and banana treats. I know that probably sounds gross but it's a tasty combination and has special stuff in it to make my eyes and coat shine. I'm the only one who likes them in my family. Mom says that's good because they cost six dollars for a little package. So they are only for me on special occasions. She was laughing in the store because they had a bag of chicken treats 'for a peaceful and calming lifestyle' and they had chamomile and lavender in them. I doubt that would help our pack!! And I got an Easter Bunny decorated dog cookie from the dogfood store. I guess I will only get little pieces of it so it will last a few days. Yummy! And of course I got a scrambled egg for breakfast and Dad said that he will take Mom out to dinner for my birthday and they will bring back a doggie bag for me. I guess they can't really take me to dinner with them, so this is the next best thing. And it was sunny most of the day and Mom was home until the middle of the morning so I got to play around outside. I guess it's going to rain all night and all day tomorrow. I don't care too much, as long as I don't have to be in the pouring rain. Maybe it will melt the snow faster.

I don't have anything to report. I didn't really do much thinking yesterday or today, except to wonder what I was getting for my birthday! Mom is letting me play with socks today AND she gave me two coupons for get out of jail free cards, so when I wake her up at 230 am I don't have to go into Winston's crate. Ha Ha, I will figure out when she will be the most tired and I am going to use those coupons. Mom did say though that she is kind of disappointed I didn't want to donate to a shelter. Well, maybe I will but not right now. I will need to do some research first.Maybe I would rather donate my time and work at a shelter. At Mom's job, people can get paid to work one day a month doing community service work. So Mom is probably going to sign up to help at the Northampton Survival Center or the Western Mass Food Bank because she likes those places and says they do good work. She is happy now that in Massachusetts there is a governor (that's the pack leader) who cares about everyone and wants to make people's lives better by getting people to help each other. I'm just happy that Mitt Romney is not our pack leader anymore! Need I say more? We all know how I feel about him. I think HE should have to volunteer his time in a shelter for dogs and cats and clean up their poop and stuff. But that might not be fair to the dogs and cats. Uh, I better stop because it sounds like I am going to rant and Mom said not on my birthday, she wants a quiet day with no hassles. Okay.

Mom is kind of mad at Winston. He has been having a pee-fest around the house. His diapers are always wet and she is doing a lot of laundry. She should have gotten him a dozen more diapers for his birthday!! And me, I am no trouble at all because I am just about perfect. They are so lucky to have me in their lives, I am like a little shining star.

Did I tell you that my Dad's birthday is on March 14? He is going to be 49 too!! Don't tell him but I got him a nice shirt from Eddie Bauer. Well, I picked it out in the catalog and Mom went and got it for me. He will like it. I might get him some greenies or some other kind of treats too. Not sure yet, depends on how much money I can scrounge out of the sofa.

There is some kind of a barkfest going on...not sure what it means but I need to go check it out. Maybe they are singing happy birthday to me? Bye for now.

Love, 7-year-old-me.

Another Weekend Gone, Another Snow Storm!

So here it is another Monday already! And the weatherdudes said we will get up to 10 inches of snow between Friday and Saturday. They were right, for once. We got at least 8 inches, it is almost up to my shoulder and I am 11.75 inches at the shoulder! I think Mom is going to cry. She is really sick of snow. And Dad was going to go out to someplace in the east side of our state to do something but he didn't because he had to snow blow. I can't even step off of the back step, because there is so much snow out there already. The sun has been out, why doesn't this snow melt and go away!!!
Hey, I had a bad dream last night. I don't remember what it was about but I woke up scared and panting, and Mom had to pet me for awhile. Then I wasn't scared anymore but I had to go outside to pee (of course it was 2:30, my favorite time). She was mad at that and she locked me in Winston's crate again. You know, I believe I am a political prisoner. I am imprisoned because of my beliefs,and for no other reason. (I believe it's ok for me to go out at 2:30 in the morning.). I watched a news show about some guy named Putin in Russia. He doesn't like anyone who doesn't like him, and if they say bad things about him he has them locked up in a mental hospital. One man was on the TV....he was a journalist who said some bad things about Putin and he had been locked up for two and a half years, and every day he got injected with anti-psychotic medication. Now he is out but he shakes all the time and can't think straight, and his words sound all funny. Maybe I was dreaming about being locked up and injected!!! Someday I might call the MSPCA and see if they can really put me in a crate just because I like to go out in the middle of the night. Then again, Mom said that if I did call and the MSPCA wanted to take me, they might put me in a cage until they found me a new home. And there would be no guarantee that my new home would be nicer to me. They are pretty nice here. I mean, I get to sleep on the bed and I am Dad's favorite and all. Mom says I am just being rebellious. I think I will wait to see what happens on my birthday. If they forget, I walk!!! Ha ha, I talk big but I really wouldn't go anywhere. I have a great life here, just don't tell them I think that way, okay?

Did you see the soap picture I posted? I helped Mom to make that soap over the weekend. She wanted something really spring-y so I suggested that she try these colors called 'peacock colors' instead of her usual oxides and clays. She scented it with White Peach. It sure does look like spring! Sometimes you just have to try different things, right? She just started to cut and hasn't finished or cleaned up the soap bar yet, but she had to do some other stuff so she will finish later. She made some Patchouli also, it was really soft when she checked it and still is...she tried to cut it and said it's like butter! I wouldn't know, because ever since I've lived here we've eaten Smart Balance. So I guess I would say, it's soft like Smart Balance!

So now it is March. March means that Spring will be here soon. I guess the Daylight Savings thing happens next weekend. In the Spring they turn their time clocks back one hour. This means that there is more daylight when they are awake. It also means that we get to eat breakfast a little earlier, that's how I look at it! And March is very windy as the earth changes position. Mom was reading an article about wind-farming yesterday. Wind-farming is what they do to make electricity so they don't have to depend on oil. On Cape Cod, (that's a place in Massachusetts that sticks out into the ocean and a lot of people go there to see the ocean and stuff, I don't know if they see Cod), anyway on Cape Cod they have been trying to do wind-farming projects for 8 years now. All the rich people don't want it because they said it will spoil the view. I heard Mom say that if they don't do it soon, they won't have a view because of all the pollution. Cape Cod has some of the worst air pollution in the whole NorthEast! More kids have asthma on Cape Cod than should, and the only reason is the air pollution. Anyway, if we used more wind and solar (that's 'sun power') we wouldn't be dependent on all the oil that we have to buy from other countries that own it. Plus eventually we will run out of the oil. Oil is made from the dead bodies of dinosaurs and other animals that lived a long time ago. There were only just so many of them! (and diamonds are made from the dead bodies of plants and trees!!) And we get gas as a by-product of the oil, too. Not THAT kind of gas, the kind we use to heat and cook and stuff. (Bear perked up when I said 'gas', he gets real bad gas, ha ha!!--and he's a renewable resource!!!!) But the sun and wind are pretty much free, no one owns them, they would just be able to own the equipment to convert them into electricity. Dad says there are too many rich people in this country whose whole empires are built on oil and they have too much influence over our energy policies. They just want things to stay the way they are so they can keep making money. All I know is, my dogfood has gotten expensive because it costs so much to pay for the electricity to make it, the energy to transport the ingredients and the energy to transport it to the dogfood store. I imagine it's the same with people food. I would hunt for my own food but Mom doesn't want me to, she said I would get worms. So I don't. I let her feed me because it makes her feel better. Speaking of which, perhaps I will go see what is taking so long as she is supposed to be prepping our breakfast right now. Catch you later! Love, Me.

When will it stop snowing?

Hey Everybody! Did it snow yesterday where you live? At my house we had rain, then snow, then more rain. The whole back yard has water in it because there is no place for it to go. My feet do not like going in water! And Mom says it is supposed to snow again in a couple days. When will Spring be here? I prefer mud season to snow season!
I broke my own rule and posted two pictures for you to look at. One is an action shot of me helping to clean the house. I didn't even have to be asked, I just picked up the roll of papertowels and went right to work. Okay, well, actually I shredded the papertowels and Mom picked them up, but it's the thought that counts. (and that way if Winston had to pee on anything, the shreds were right there to help clean it up!!). Mom made some soap on Sunday and finally took a picture of it. It is called Sweet Orange and Patchouli. MMMM, it smells nice. She is running out of Patchouli. That is some kind of stuff that she puts in soap and all. It comes from a plant that grows the best in Indonesia, and she says the crop has been very poor after that big wave came and ruined everything and washed all those people away. So Patchouli is expensive (over $100 a pound) and hard to get. Well, hard to get the good smelling stuff. She said there's some stuff from China that is real stinky. It's probably made from lead or something. You know how I feel about China. Maybe I will get to go there someday. Mom knows lots of people that have been there and they say how beautiful it is. But I would go talk to the people so they would stop eating dogs and killing their baby girls and sending us poisoned toys and using up all our earth's resources and stuff. And now back to our regular programming.

So Mom is home sick today. She hopes she is getting a cold and not the flu. And so she's grumpy. I tried to help by waking her up last night to make sure she was ok. But she got mad and put me in Winston's crate for a while. I was just taking her temperature. With my tongue. On her forehead. A lot. So today she brought some cans out to the garage and she didn't even know that she locked me in there! Well, she says she didn't know. I barked and barked and she could hear me but she didn't know where I was. It was cold and kind of scary. If Winston or Bear was locked in the garage they would have rummaged through all the trash before they called for help. But I am not like that. I just wanted to be out of there! Finally she figured it out and rescued me. And she was sorry and gave me a cookie so I guess it's ok, except my throat is kind of sore. So I was wondering what we will do today since Mom is home. Probably not too much. Maybe make some soap? She was thinking that she is running out of the Lemongrass and the Chamomile, and a lady ordered some the other day so more is needed.And I am going to help her to make some labels for her soap also. But I don't think she really wants to do much. I might try to make her some chicken soup later. It doesn't look too hard. You take a chicken and put it in water and boil it for a while. And add some other stuff, whatever is in the fridge that might work. You know, it would be easier to just eat the chicken---after it's cooked but before it is soup. I will try this and if it works out I will give some to Mom and my brothers. I will update you on this, and maybe I will post a recipe for you. Right now I need a drink of water because my throat is still sore.

Happy Monday!

Hey everybody, it's Monday and the sun is shining! It was real cold this morning but it is supposed to warm up to 45 degrees to day. Yay, maybe some snow in the yard will melt and I can get around better. There's at least 18 inches of snow back there, at least that's what Dad says. I have to walk in the paths that Bandit makes so I don't fall in! I hate Winter.
Here's a link you might find interesting

http://www.flyingskunk.com/live.html

I'm sorry I can't make it a live link right now. I think I broke something on the blog. I should have waited for Mom to help me. Anyway, you can copy and paste it yourself. It's to a chicken farm in Massachusetts. And there are goats, too. And you can watch them in their yard!! Sometimes I watch it with Mom. I was watching today and I thought you all might like to see it too. You have to click on Gumby to activate the webcam. And there is a volume control so you can hear the chickens and goats. Sometimes the goats walk right up near the webcam thing or the chickens do. You can only see them in daylight though because they go to sleep at night. I think there should be a webcam to watch me and my brothers. Mom says she doubts anyone would watch because we are either sleeping or moving so fast that no one could see us anyway! That's it for now. I took some pictures (oops, I mean, Mom did) of her new soaps that she made, and then Mom took pictures of me helping to clean the house but they are not ready to be posted yet. Mom disagrees with me that I was helping to clean the house, she says I was just shredding papertowels. Yeah, they left a roll of papertowels where I could get it and I ran around it with it for a while and rammed it into my brothers and then I shredded it! But it helps because then Mom has to pick it up and vacuum and stuff. It might not get done if I didn't point the way. Uh oh, I don't think she liked that. I haven't had breakfast yet, I better shut up now so she will still feed me!!! I will chat with you later. Have a wonderful day. Love, Me.

Hi Everybody, here it is Sunday again. Boy time sure goes by quickly, doesn't it? We got a whole bunch of snow on Friday!, like 8 or 9 inches. The Governor sent Mom home from work! We are all so sick of the snow. When will spring be here????

Here we have a picture of Citrus Splash, a soap that smells very pretty. Mom made it the other day. She just got done with some hemp oil soaps today, but she didn't take any pictures of them, she wants them to stay nice and warm under their blankie until they are done. Nothin' much to report. I'm still doing my best to get Mom up at 2 or 3 a.m. She locked me in Winston's crate after I did that a couple times but I won't give up!! Heh, Heh. I will win this battle! So now she's really tired because she hasn't had enough sleep, and she has to go back to work again tomorrow. She was mad today because everything was going wrong. Well, she shouldn't be mean to me and I will help her. I'm still working on the vegetarian thing. I'm modifying my approach, I think it will be more that I don't eat red meat, I'll still eat chicken and stuff. Gotta work the details out and Mom has to agree, since she feeds me and all. It's because of my carbon responsibilities--it takes a lot of energy to grow food to feed a cow and then transport it to be murdered and cut up and made into meat, and then transport it to a store near us. Or, we could eat vegetables from nearby and save all that energy. Oh, Mom says stop saying 'murder', that's kind of harsh. She says politics has no place in my blog. She's probably right, so I'll shut up now about that stuff. And I won't tell you who I'm going to vote for either. She's kind of grumpy today, perhaps a glass or red wine will help. Or some whipped cream? I like coffee myself. Sometimes, on Sundays, my Dad lets me drink some coffee out of the bottom of his cup. I like the way it tastes. Fair-trade, organic coffee, of course!

So yesterday was Grandma's birthday. (Mom's mom). She turned 77 years old. That's like, over 500 dog years! They had a party for her but I wasn't invited because it was at that dog Maggie's house, and Maggie is old and I am rambunctious. (That's what Dad says). Oh well, I will wish her happy B-day some other time. MY birthday is coming up fast....on March 7 I will be 7 years old. No one ever believes I am that old, because I look and act so young! It's all in how you think, that's what I say!! Ahem, for birthday presents, if you are thinking of getting me any, I like the regular sized Greenies, and all sorts of dog cookies. Whipped cream is good too. No toys, because my brothers just take them and wreck them. Mom says maybe I should consider giving a shelter a gift instead of getting presents myself. She is too goodytwoshoes! She better get me something! I know Dad will, he always brings me presents because I am his numero uno!!!. He is making oven-roasted lamb stew for dinner. It smells really good and I will be getting some of it I'm sure. Yum, can't wait.
Hey, we watched The Brave One with Jodie Foster last night. Well, not with her, I mean, she was the star. It was a very good movie and very thought-provoking. It was directed by Neil Jordan. He's from Ireland. He directed 'In Dreams', a movie that Mom worked on when it was being filmed in our area. She said she did a lot of work with him and the people in the movie. I don't know, it was before I was born, but she has a nice picture of the whole cast and crew, and Neil Jordan signed the picture for her because he had so much trouble sleeping and she helped him with that. Oh well. So big deal. There was a Hollywood dog trainer at that movie too. He was training his dogs, because there was a dog in the movie who had to do stunts in traffic and stuff. The dog trainer told Mom that dogs from shelters make the best movie dog-stars. The dog that was acting in the In Dreams movie was from a shelter. And the trainer had the son of Miles, the Jack Russell dog that starred in that movie The Mask with Jim Carrey. Miles died, but his son looks just like him. He was training Miles to be in another movie. I should be in the movies. I am a prima donna, whatever that is, Mom says. She says I act like a movie star already, ha ha!! I will catch up with you guys tomorrow or the next day. Gotta go think some more.

Hey did you see the eclipse last night? Faboo, wasn't it? I was sure to wake mom up in the middle of the night so we could all go out and see. There was an eerie red glow in the sky, and when the moon came back it was bright like the daytime!! Mom was very impressed, but at 4:30 a.m. she was not too happy that I had woken her up to see it. 4:30 is when she had to get up this morning to go to work!!

Here is a nice picture of some soap that she made over the weekend. The yellow and white one is called Lemon Sugar, it looks kind of like a lemon meringue pie, doesn't it? I hear they are pretty tasty but have never had one. The top reminds me of whipped cream. I LOVE whipped cream...Mom sometimes squirts some out for me and I lick it up. Oh don't worry, I never touch the tip of the can, I wouldn't want to get sick from all the human germs or anything. The blue one is called Clean Blue Tonic. It smells nice and clean. She made some other soap, I think it's called Citrus something, but I only like to post one picture now at a time. I'm just funny like that.
So, Mom locked me out of the bedroom yesterday. I think I mentioned that. I ended up snoozing and thinking on the sofa in the living room. It's not very inspirational. We were all kind of grumpy yesterday...Bailey too, because he likes to lay in his round bed in the bedroom and snooze during the day. (actually he really prefers to lay behind the woodstove but it's not on fire because a piece broke on it. I think Mom said it might be done for the season.) So I was grumpy, he was grumpy and Bandit was grumpy. ONE OF US (and I'm not saying who), knocked over a plant in the kitchen and got dirt all over the floor. But Aunt Lisa helped us out by picking up all the dirt, so nobody got in trouble! Mom wouldn't have been too happy if she had seen that! (I'm thinking it was a payback thing, but I don't want to say!!).

So last night I floated my new idea to Mom and Dad. I'm thinking of going Vegan. A Vegan, remember, is someone who doesn't use animal products. I think it's a very important statement to make. But Dad was being difficult about it. He wanted to know if I planned to get rid of my fur coat, since Vegans don't do fur. Well, I hadn't thought of that. I don't see how I can do that, really, I was kind of born that way. Do you think Vegans will be hostile to me because of the fur thing? And then Mom was being difficult, when she said, OK Casey, boiled vegetables for you I guess. And then she reminded me that there are animal products in my dog food. HUH?? Oh yeah, the label does say Chicken. But, (gulp), I'm a dog and I think I'm supposed to eat meat. I was just thinking no EXTRA meat, and no leather coats or shoes or honey or eggs or silk...I guess I have to re-think my position. Although then Mom did tell me about a vegetarian dog she once knew. I guess that a long time ago, when Mom was just out of college, she worked in VISTA, some kind of program where people don't get paid very much to help people who don't get paid very much. She said they got $45 a week in pay. She also said that $45 a week was what her father used to get paid for being an electrician working for the federal government way back in the last century before she was born. Mom said that this was to represent "poverty level" so that they could work better with the people they were supposed to be helping. BUT, they got really good health insurance, which usually poor people don't have. ANYHOO, to save costs she shared an apartment with 3 other people, who all worked for VISTA. They rented an apartment in a building and next door to them was a hippy family. Hippies were people who lived in the last century who didn't always agree with what other people did,and they tried to change things to make them better, and they dressed differently and had long hair and liked to listen to music and stuff like that. They sound like nice people, don't you think? Anyway, these people were vegetarians and they had a big German Shepard named Xanthus (you say it ZZanthus) and he was vegetarian too. The family said that they had gotten him as a puppy and he had never had meat. He did get to eat milk and eggs though, but no beef or chicken or fish. They made his dogfood special. He was a nice dog and used to come visit my Mom and her friends all the time. One of her room-mates was kind of a jerk named Howie and he used to think it was really funny to give Xanthus hot dogs, because Xanthus would always throw up right afterwards. Maybe that would happen to me if I stopped eating meat, too, I wonder? Well, I am definitely going to give this some more thought. And I just also realized that the whipped cream in the cans comes from cows...I'm not sure I can give that up. Maybe I'll just try giving it up for Lent. I don't know what or who Lent is, or if Lent gets to keep the whipped cream, but it sounds like a short-term thing and maybe I could just try it and see. So I'll get back to you on the Vegan/vegetarian thing. I really need my pillow back in the daytime, I do better thinking on that than on the sofa. I will post more thoughts later.

Moon-Garden

Hi again, it's just me. Here's a nice picture of some soap that Mom made a few weeks ago or so. It's called Moon-Garden. She was pretty happy with how it came out. She said it's supposed to smell like a night-blooming garden. Hmm. Just smells like human soap to me, but I am a dog so what do I know, right?
I posted the picture to kind of apologize for waking her up last night. I was really thirsty and I needed a drink of water. But she couldn't go back to sleep after that so she was kind of grumpy this morning. And she locked me out of the bedroom today when she left for work, something about....maybe if I didn't sleep so well I would sleep better at night'. I will be sure to wake her up later tonight, like maybe 3 or 4 am.

There is going to be a lunar eclipse tonight. That's the other reason I posted the "moon-garden' soap (a little theme, there). I think it's supposed to start around 10:30 or so. The moon might be red or something like that tonight. I hope the sky is clear, I would like to see it! If I get to stay up and watch it I will be sure to describe it for you if you decided to go to bed early. Later, dudes. (and dudettes

Oops, I forgot to post anything yesterday!!

...even though I promised. I really needed dinner, I think I had low blood sugar or somethin'. But I missed the whole day instead. That plumber guy was here for a good part of the day. We couldn't use any water until about 4 pm, just in time for Mom to make dinner. Fortunately she had stockpiled some water for all of us (although we could have gone outside, it ws raining hard enough, ha ha!). Speaking of rain, there was so much over the weekend that there is a flood in the yard just outside the door. My feet still get wet up to my ankles unless I walk on top of the snow. Most unpleasant. And Bailey got in BIG trouble yesterday (I am laughing still!!). He hates water even more than I do (he hates baths and you should see him when he falls in the pond!!). He doesn't like rain at all and he had to go out to, well, you know...tinkle. Mom walked away from the door and when she looked out again Bailey had decided that he could just go right up against the back door. MAN, did she yell at him!! And Dad made him go into Winston's crate for a while. Ha, it serves the little suck-up right. He has been trying to steal my Dad from me but I think that put a halt to it! Although last night I heard Dad telling him he is a good boy and he is the second-favorite. Now I think I should watch out that Bailey doesn't try to set me up to get in trouble or something.
So Mom is kind of grumpy because the plumber guy was here for so long yesterday that she couldn't make any soap. And she had a dentist appointment to re-build a piece of her molar that broke last week. She came home going 'owwie' and her face was all puffy. She said it felt like she had been in a boxing ring. The only dental work I've ever had done was a teeth cleaning a couple years ago, and I don't remember it because they used anesthesia on me. My dad calls me buzzard-breath now so I might have to go again and have it done. Clean teeth keep you heart-healthy, did you know that?? Yup. And Mom always complains about this--she says that humans know that good dental care is important, but they must not really care because they don't really like to fund dental care health insurance for kids. And there are very few dentists that will accept the medicaid dental payments. She says why don't we put our money where our mouth is (ha ha mom).
That plumber goy was funny yesterday. Dad thought he was working with a partner in the basement, but no, he was alone! He just talks to himself the whole time (and jokes and laughs and whistles, too!). he told Mom that he went through 2 packs of hacksaw blades to cut through the old cast-iron pipe (it had a leak in one spot but the rest of it is solid as a rock!)Mom kept telling Dad, no I think there's only one person down there. Then a couple hours after he left Mom had to call him back because the new pipe was leaking!!! But now it's all good.

Interesting fact of the day:
Did you know that last year the state of Massachusetts (where I live) collected 438 million dollars in cigarette tax? It all goes into the general revenue fund. That is a lot of dog biscuits! Mom told me that it means that even though cigarette smoking is down in MA, there's plenty of people who still do it. Teenagers are smoking a lot, and that means they could be hooked (customers) for life. Our state is thinking about increasing the cigarette tax to help fund all the health insurance that it is requiring now. Because smoking makes a lot of people sick. Ah, I was just wondering...what will happen if all the no-smoking education works and everyone stops smoking? We won't have all that extra money to use. I don't know, I guess it's ok to tax people for some stuff, even though it's not their fault that they use it (they are addicted), but it seems like we should look for some other money sources, too, ya know? I don't smoke and I never have! Of course I am a dog and we can't really smoke because we don't have thumbs to hold the cigarette with.
By the way, the picture I posted is one I got from Mom. Someone at work sent it to her and said, this could be a real injury prevention issue! :) So Mom wrote a letter back, that said she was investigating the situation and that there would be a multi-pronged approach (get it?). And more, but I won't go there. I just thought it was a cool thing to see. I wonder what happens when they stand up?

Almost President's Day!!

GRRRRRR........are you scared yet? This is me doing my super Wolverine impression! Back off, Jack! No one better try to come in my house or take my dinner or my toys! Actually I'm pretty nice most of the time. But as a professional Jack Russell I do have to ensure from time to time that my minions will obey me. Not everyone can curl their upper lip like I can. Notice my chipped fang? I got that in a dogfight (which I won, of course), when that stupid Sammy lived here. He was nice for a while, but then he tried to take over, and him nothing more than a foster dog!

Sorry for the glare on the picture, Mommy snapped an action shot but she had the camera on the wrong setting. She's a goof when it comes to technology. Duh.

So, this is Presidents weekend and tomorrow is Presidents Day. I am not really clear on what it means. I DO know that Mitt Romney is not involved, so you can rest easy. I think it's a day when if you were President you can get a good deal on a car, but I am not sure. I'm just stringing together some thoughts from the TV. Mostly I watch Animal Planet when Mom and Dad aren't home. When they are home I watch the news and sometimes I watch SciFi channel or the History channel with my Dad. They've been having some weird commercials on about buying cars lately.

We haven't done too much this weekend. For some reason no one took me for a ride (although I will give them another chance tomorrow). Mom made some soap (Lemon Sugar shea butter and Peppermint-Lemongrass Salt Bars--she didn't take any pictures yet but they both came out nice and they smell real good!) Mom and Dad took a whole bunch of trash to the recycling center yesterday. Then later they wanted to go have dinner at The Big Mamou http://www.chefwaynes-bigmamou.com/ that opened up last week near us. They had lunch there and it was really good food, or so they said....I didn't notice any doggie bag coming home from that trip!

Anyway, tonight they went and met George and Sue at Opa Opa Restaurant http://www.opaopasteakhousebrewery.com/ to celebrate something or other. They spent a lot of money! And AGAIN, no doggie bag! What is with this, people??? No ride, no doggie bag? I am seriously considering calling the MSPCA and asking for amnesty. I am a political prisoner. I am waiting for dinner and nothing is happening. I'm just not happy about this. Bandit is hungry too, he's woofing at Mom. And Winston has gone through 2 diapers just since they came home. So Mom is doing laundry tonight because tomorrow the plumber is coming and there won't be any water for awhile. A plumber is one of those important people...I'm not sure what they do but I know that everyone needs them and I think they run the country or something like that. We are having a very old pipe replaced in the basement before it breaks. It is cast iron and is over 50 years old. It started leaking a while ago and they patched it but said the whole piece needs to be replaced. And that they will be here tomorrow. Sure hope so 'cause the flood insurance hasn't kicked in yet!

You should see me right now, I am petting Bear. Mom and Dad think it's so cute when I sit next to him and put my paw on his head. I am not really petting him, I am taking his temperature. He always has a really hot head, because when he was little he had the mengenitisis or somethin' like that. He's kinda slow because of it, but I like him alright. I'm sorry I'm distracted, I am really hungry right now. I am thinking that I will go and russell up (that's a joke!) some dinner and maybe I will talk about my thoughts tomorrow when I am feeling better. I hope you have a good night and if you are a president be sure to get to the car place early in the morning. Love, Casey.

(I hope you don't mind that I signed this "love", I feel like I know you pretty well by now. Let me know if it bothers you and I can sign it, "very truly yours, Casey M. Clapp" the M stands for Michael. I'm named after my Dad, because our noses are the same).

Sunday is Funday!

Hey everybody! What do you think of my "reaction shot" pose?? Mom asked me if I like Mitt Romney and I went "phooey" and stuck my tongue out. I know he's not in the president race anymore, but I'm still worried that he might get another job, like running a dog shelter or something. Gotta make sure nobody forgets about him. Actually, I'm kidding you, Mom woke me up and I had just yawned when she took this picture. That's why I'm not really cute and alert, I'm not really awake yet. So here it is Sunday February 10 already. It's been snowing since yesterday, but it's kind of a rainy snow so there's only a couple inches on the ground. I made Mom clean up the back step so it wouldn't freeze. I'm very safety-conscious. I want to be one of those 'service dogs', you know, the ones that wear the neat vests and patches and go everywhere with their owners?? Mom doesn't think it's a good career choice for me though. She says I'm too much into 'me' to be a helper dog. Unless it was for a person who was addicted to dog cookies or socks, then I would be an ideal service dog. She's being sarcastic, I think. Whoa Nellie! The wind is blowing about 50 miles an hour!! The trees are bending over and the snow is going sideways. The lady on TV said it would be very windy today. Yikes, there goes Bandit, barking. He's afraid of the wind. When the wind blows he barks and wants to hide under the bed. Well, maybe that's not as stupid as it sounds. I mean, trees fall down in the wind, so maybe he's just being careful. Speaking of trees, did I tell you that we had one of our big maple trees taken down? Yup, one of the maple trees in the back yard was dying. One of Mom and Dad's former paramedic students came and cut it down for us. He is a certified arborist. He told us that maple trees are not the best trees for the average back yard because they should be in an area where the leaves just fall down on the ground their whole lives. The leaves give them back all the nutrients. You can't fertilize a tree and give it everything that it needs. Eventually they die. He's right. Another of our maple trees died a couple years ago and had to come down. Mom is kind of sad. Did I tell you that she grew up in this house? Yup, her dad built it when she was three years old. Her great-grandfather (her "jaju") was from Poland. He didn't speak very good English but she understood him very well. He took her into the woods in back of the house when she was about 7 and she picked out 4 young maple trees for the back yard. He carefully dug them up and she helped him to plant them. They were just skinny things then. And he planted other maple trees and some horse chestnut trees. Everything he planted lived because he was very good at growing things. And now it's many years later and two of the trees have died. The man said that there's another tree that he's concerned about. Trees are important. I hope he can take care of the rest of our trees. My brothers are worried that they might have killed the trees because they pee on them all the time, but I think they are overestimating their own powers!! Hee, hee.

We've just been hanging out in the house today. Feeling kind of lazy. Dad doesn't feel good so he's snoozing. Mom made some soap today, let's see, she made some Clean Blue Tonic (it's blue with a white topping and lots of green jojoba beads in the white) and she made Precious Amber and Patchouli. She got this Amber resin (that's sticky stuff from a tree and it holds together essential oils and stuff) and she wanted to try it. It smells really nice. First you weigh it out. Then you crush it up and melt it in a little bit of the oil that you will put into your soap. Her hands smell really nice from it. Well, I liked it, Bailey didn't think it smelled good. Then when you are making your soap you add it. And she added some Patchouli also to the soap. It will turn brown so there was nothing to do about color, but she says that's ok, because it will smell so nice. She calls it Precious Amber and Patchouli because the amber resin cost about $10 an ounce (that's $160 a pound!) and Patchouli essential oil costs around $100 a pound now. Ha, that's nothing. There are some essential oils that cost way more than that and Mom doesn't even buy them! Like chamomile essential oil is between $500 and $1000 a pound depending on which kind you buy. And Sandalwood is endangered so it is around $1000 a pound too. Man, and I thought my dogfood was expensive. I use Wellness dry and it costs $42 for 30 pounds!! Oh you know what? Dad just woke up so I am going to see how he is feeling and maybe we will cuddle on the couch and I can pretend to be his service dog. Casey Clapp, in service!!

Well she cut those darn salt bars and they look pretty good for human soap, I guess. Here's a picture. I was trying to post an action photo of me baring my teeth in my best 'wolverine' pose but I just can't make it happen. The picture must be too scary even for the computer!! Mom was pretty happy today when she came home. Guess what??? Mitt Romney dropped out of the presidential race. Yay! I knew the dogs of America would win in the end. We all signed a petition, you know. I guess he just couldn't face the stress of having all of us against him. I feel relieved now. The nightmare is over. I meant to tell you, in that big stupid-tuesday-thing (I think that's what it's called), he won in Massachusetts. I was sure glad to find out it didn't mean he was coming back here to be in charge! I will be keeping an eye on him though. We may not have seen the last of that guy.
So what's shakin, baby? (get it, shaken baby..hee hee that's an injury prevention joke I think). You should have heard the rain and thunder and lightning last night!!! Did you have it where you live? I thought the house would fall down, the thunder was so loud. Who ever heard of thunder and lightning in February in New England!!! It rained, it rained some more, and it's raining again today, alternating with snow. But a lot of snow melted over the past couple days...I can see my green frisbee, which is my second favorite, partly frozen in the snow. Still looking for Old Yeller. It's ok, I wouldn't want to play with it just now anyways, my feet get too cold. Mom says I'm a wimp. I am not! I am sensible.

So my Dad started his new job. He looks very nice in his shirt and tie. He used to wear a shirt and tie at his other job, until he realized that nobody cared. Then he would only wear one if he had to be at an important meeting or something. And he's home earlier than before. So that means in the summer he can go outside with me and play!! We still have Auntie Lisa come to see us in the middle of the days that mom goes to Boston though, because sometimes Dad is distracted and forgets to let us outside to pee and stuff. And it's better for us to be able to stretch our legs and run around so we aren't too grumpy. Mom was mad at me in the middle of the night because I wanted to go out...she wouldn't get up!! But then she got up early this morning because she couldn't sleep, so I was ok til then. I got her back though, I shredded some of her business cards that 'accidentally' fell on the floor. AND, I messed around with her computer, it won't work the way she wants it to. I am truly a 'devil-dog', ha ha ha!!!

Mom is yelling at Winston to shut up. He just keeps barking. He freaks out sometimes and hears things. When Dad's not home Winston thinks he has to protect everyone so he barks and the fur on his back stands up. And sometimes he drools. He looks like he's got rabies!! But everyone else has listened and there is nothing to worry about. We just ignore him. Mom thinks maybe he sees ghosts though. Sometimes he looks at the wall and then it seems like he's watching something move around the room that none of us can see. I think he's just nuts. Period. Oh, but speaking of hearing something, I think my Dad is home--gotta go!!!

It's GROUNDHOG Day!!!!!

Ok I know this isn't the most flattering picture of me...it makes me look fat, doesn't it? Mom is not a very good picture-taker, plus she was kind of mad because that's her sock I am holding. So today is groundhog day. I watched that stupid fat groundhog on TV....according to Phil there will be more winter coming our way! I think he's just making this stuff up as he goes along. I don't like groundhogs much; they are on our Jack Russell 'natural hunting certificate' list as eligible. A natural hunting certificate is when a judge comes along with you in the woods while you hunt for a fox or groundhog or raccoon or something. If you do the right stuff you get a certificate suitable for framing. I guess that means you get to keep whatever you catch, too. Anyway, groundhogs seem kind of snotty and they are rather dangerous if you make them mad. I would need my brothers to help me out with one of them. Mom said that a long time ago she had a dog and it was in the field next to her house, barking like crazy at a groundhog. So Mom took a broom and went out there to show that groundhog who was boss. And guess what? It chased her and her dog all the way home and stood outside her door grunting. It didn't like the broom, I guess. It must have had baby groundhoggets or something. Mom used to throw stones at it when it was in her garden eating the tops off of all of her plants. She hates groundhogs too. Now why would they make a big deal about a stupid fat rat with a bushy tail? Anyway, it'll be winter until it's spring, I think. No worries, we'll get there.

Today Daddy went somewhere and didn't take me. I thought he would, I was looking especially cute and hopeful, but he wouldn't open the gate, in fact Mom came out and carried me back inside. I heard her tell Dad that I was moping around for a long time after he left. What's mope? I was sad and I didn't want her stupid old cookie. I wanted to go for a ride. I heard him say that maybe he'll take me for a ride tomorrow. Hope we go somewhere that has dog cookies!

So Mom and Dad took an online questionaire to see who they should vote for. Mom's came back to Mr. Obama and Dad's came back to that Hillary lady. Dad was freaking. He's a Republican for goodness sake! Mom was just happy that she agreed with Mitt Romney on only one thing in the questionaire, and she said she didn't stick around long enough to read what the one thing was. I was trying to take the test, but I lost interest because it doesn't ask me anything about dogs. She said there was no question that asked, would you vote for a man who is so inconsiderate that he makes his own dog ride on top of a car and when it poops itself because of all the scariness, he hoses it down and keeps driving? Well, would you vote for that man? Don't get me started. The super 'lection thing is on Tuesday (that's 3 days from now) and Mitt keeps calling here leaving messages for Daddy. Mom just hands Dad the phone and says, "Mitt called you again." And then last night some lady called and asked Mom if she and Dad would be voting for John McCain. Mom was very polite, she just said we hadn't all made up our minds yet and we would consider it. Heck, Howdie-Doodie would make a better president than the Mittster.

I was going to tell you about how much money Mobil made in oil profits this year, but my numbers on my keyboard don't go up that high. So, I won't tell you. I'll let you imagine all the dog toys and Greenies and stuff that you could have bought last year if you weren't paying so much for gasoline.

I think the woodstove is going out, Mom should put more wood in it, it's getting chilly in here. I must go bug her until she takes care of that. I will chat with you later.

Another Fur-day (I mean, Friday)

So here it is, Fur-day again! Today is Daddy's last day at work in Boston. Then starting next week he will be working in Springfield! YAY! I don't quite know where Springfield is, but I do know that it is a lot closer than Boston. Daddy seems very happy, too.

You don't want to be outside right now. It's sleeting/freezing raining and cold! Glad I'm inside. Mom is at work, Dad is at work, my brothers are sleeping, and I am surfing the net!

I am also wearing my red bandana today in honor of Go Red for Women Day http://www.goredforwomen.org (women are female people) Dogs don't get heart disease but we should still support our owners and stuff. I'm what's called an 'activist'. Even when I am napping I am actively thinking about important things. Did you know that more women die from heart attacks than men? That's because women have different symptoms and people (even doctors) don't think women are at as much risk for heart attacks as men are. So when they have a heart attack it is often ignored for too long. That's why everyone needs to take care of themselves and eat right and exercise, like I do!

I'm thinking that Mom needs to snap some more action photos of me...you guys haven't seen me lately. You may not think I look any different, but in a few short weeks I will be SEVEN YEARS OLD. Daddy says that in human years that makes me 49! And no gray fur yet, even though it is a major effort to keep my brothers in line all the time! Yep, my birthday is March 7, in case you want to start thinking about what you are going to get me! Remember, I really like the regular sized Greenies, and I like Butterfingers candy bars too (only Mom says I'm not s'posed to eat them, so she will sometimes just get me the little sample sizes from Coopers Corner.) And doggie cookies are always appreciated! Is it bad to tell you what I want for my birthday? I'm just trying to be helpful. I'm not trying to be a pig or anything.

Mom is going to make more soap this weekend. Her friend bought almost all of her Lemon Sugar Shea Butter soap. I wish I had a picture to post of it, it looks like lemon meringue pie, light yellow on the bottom and white frosting on top. If I liked sweet lemons I would enjoy the smell, but I'm more of a patchouli-dog myself. Daddy uses Mom's patchouli hemp soap and he smells fantastic! And she said she wants to try making something called 'bath bombs'. Hmmmm, first of all, I don't care for the word 'bath', and 'bomb' sounds kind of unsuccessful. Why would she want to do that? I will just have to wait and see.

And Saturday night is her brother's surprise birthday party. He's turning 50 years old. In dog years he's only about 7 yrs, 1 month. Doesn't seem like a big deal to me, but humans tend to have different standards. All I know is, I am not invited. Boo!

Did you remember that the Superbowl is coming up on Sunday? It's the Patriots (my home team) and the Giants. I don't really understand football, but I do know that on Superbowl Sunday there is always some EXCELLENT food in the living room! Yum, I can't wait!! I will update you as to what we have to eat! Must nap now, my paws are starting to get stiff from all this typing!

It's Wednesday already!!

Ha ha do you think this picture is as funny as I think it is?? My Dad sent it to my Mom for me so I wanted to share it with everyone. I hate cats!! Well, I've actually never met a cat in person, but I still hate them. I've heard all sorts of things about them: they smell, they're lazy, they don't follow the rules and they hate dogs. I don't know if these things are true or not. (Mom calls this 'prejudice' but I call it 'dog-lore') When I go to the Vet-Doctor I see cats in the kitty-condos. They seem kind of scared of me. And some seem kind of nice. My brother Bandit likes kittens, he is very gentle with them, but then, he is not a Jack Russell! I sure wouldn't want to have one living in our house though because I'd probably have to share my pillow---NO WAY! When Mom used to do Jack Russell Rescue she had to place some dogs because of cats. One dog ripped the tail right off of a cat and the people said, 'this dog's gotta go now!", so Mom found it a new home, one with NO CATS. Then she got a phone call from a lady who was all upset because while she was gone her son's two Jack Russells killed her cat and when she walked in they were playing tug of war with it! (Bailey calls that "Cat-Capades!") Sorry, I don't mean to laugh, but how stupid can people be? We are hunting dogs, after all, and it's in our blood to hunt for animals that are our own size or smaller. We can't help it. You can be home and supervise us and we will be nice to the cat, but if you leave us alone and don't separate us, someday you will come back to a very sad situation. Mom was always trying to explain that to people when she did Rescue. And, there are some jacks that do get along with cats, so people expect that it will happen in their house too. Oh well. That's part of why she stopped doing Rescue, because 'some people never learn', she says.

Mom kind of likes cats but they don't seem to care for her. She had a cat when she was little. Its name was 'Silky' and it used to sleep in the road. I guess we know what happened to that cat, don't we!! Then when she was out of college she got a calico kitten. She liked it, except that it was a big hunting cat and used to drag dead animals into her house through the cat door. A couple times they weren't dead. Once the cat brought in a chipmunk that got away and ran around the house for a long time. Then, one other time the cat dragged in a big starling (that's a bird) and it was flapping around until Mom caught it and put it outside. She said the cat used to look at her and every once in a while would just scratch her face for no good reason. So that cat went to live somewhere else in a barn so it could catch mice and it was very happy. And Mom decided to stick with dogs, because we are better!

But I digress. So John McCain beat Mitt in Florida, which is where my brother Daniel is staying for awhile. I'm glad Mitt got beat. Maybe he will get the message. He is trying to say what a great thing he did for Massachusetts by enacting 'health care reform' and making everyone have health insurance. But it is seriously screwed up. There's not enough money to cover all these people that need good health care. There are problems with the kind of health care available. The fines on employers who don't cover their employees are really just symbolic (typical, Mitt will protect his business-buddies). Mitt's gone and now we have to fix all this stuff. And he can brag about making change without having to troubleshoot the problems. I'm not a very political dog, but I have a great nose, and something about Mitt stinks! (not the good, roll-in-it stink, but a creepy stink!).

And John Edwards is dropping out of the race for president. That's too bad. He seemed like a nice guy. Mom didn't like everything about him, but he seemed reasonable to her. And she says that Elizabeth Edwards rocks. Mom wishes he would have been able to stay in it for delegates, maybe he could have been the vice president candidate. Oh well. Who knows what will happen.

I don't mean to be rude right now, but it is very windy and rainy and that is perfect nap weather, so I'm headed to the pillow to catch some ZZZZ's before everyone comes home! I will get back to you later.

Well, I am in the doghouse with Mommy, so I decided I would post a picture of what she did yesterday to try to get back on her good side. (if there is one!). What you are looking at is a tray of soap, 'salt bars' to be specific, scented with a really pretty oceany smell called Mediterranean Sea-Salt. A salt bar is made with at least 50% sea salt, coconut oil and a little sunflower oil. It's a very neat, long-lasting bar of soap and she says it's sort of like taking a shower in the ocean. I wouldn't know, I hate baths, as we all know by now. Never took a shower, either. But, it's pretty. It will be ready to use in about 3 weeks.

So what did I do that was so bad? Well I'm not sure what her problem is. I asked politely to go with her this morning to get the Sunday paper and some coffee beans and she said ok. I left the gate and went right to the car and got in like I'm s'posed to. I sat in my seat on the way to the store. I must have misunderstood her when we got there because she yelled at me when I jumped out of the car. Something about I'm supposed to wait and I could get hit by a car. BUT, there was a huge black dog nearby and I had to protect her. I started to run towards him and Mom yelled at me, and then the dog looked at me and I realized how tall he was (he looked shorter from the car), so I just barked at him and jumped back in the car. The man that was walking him thought that was funny. Mom said something to him about me and they both laughed. I hope she wasn't making a joke about me just because I was being cautious. And I didn't even eat my cookie til Mom came out of the store. She was still kind of mad and she carried me to the gate when we got home because she said I might 'take off' and run into the road." Hey I'm not stupid, I'm just little.

So Mr. Obama won something in South Carolina yesterday. I saw it on the news. I don't get what all the fuss is about. I'm mostly worried about Mitt Romney becoming president. We all know how I feel about him. And I can't say it too often...you get a really good idea of how someone is going to treat you by how they treat their dog. Boo, Mitt. Hey, does Mr. Obama have a dog? I don't think so. That's kind of worrisome. I know the Hillary lady and her husband have a dog. I don't think they spend much time with him though. And I don't know about the other person Mom talks about...John? somebody. He seems nice though.

Mom has been complaining about the taxes this weekend. She has been working on them and she is pretty grumpy. Her part-time job at the Sleep Lab is actually causing some kind of problem on the taxes. Oh well, she had to stop working there when she started working in Boston. I hope it doesn't mean I get shorted on Greenies, though. I loves ma Greenies!!!

One more week til Daddy starts his new job. I can't wait. He'll be home sooner because he won't have to spend 20 hours a week just driving back and forth to work. More time to play with MEEE! He actually doesn't drive all the time. He and Mom are in a 'van pool' where they share the driving with other people. My Mom is big into saving the environment. She hates plastic bags too. Me, I don't mind them so much because they are fun to tear apart. She is into recycling and is always pulling things out of the trash that Dad throws away. So the deal is, SHE takes it to the recycling center. Paper, cans and bottles. And always use cloth bags at the stores. Did you know that in our area there are stores that have cloth bag co-ops? Yup, they get people to make bags out of donated fabric, and then they put them in a big box in the store. You can take a bag to carry your groceries and stuff home, then you bring it back next time! It is a great idea. It saves money for the shopowners, and saves all that plastic from the landfill. It sounds like plastic could last til the end of the universe. Did you know that even China, the place where they eat DOGS with RICE sometimes, has banned plastic bags??!! What are we doing about it here? Not much as far as I can tell. We need to get on the stick and persuade people to use cloth bags for everything. And, here's a bonus: cloth bags make it easier to carry even more dogfood than usual! So you can get your dog more treats at once!! Isn't the world a great place!!! Speaking of treats, it's time for my Greenie. I love having great breath. See you later.

Hey you guys, it's 2008 already! This is my theme for the new year. Daddy sent it to me (well, he sent it to mommy for me) because he says that some of his co-workers seem to think they are special, but..........ha ha, they are really just bumps on a log. Some of my brothers think they are special too. Ha! Daddy's getting a new job soon and he will be closer to home so he and I can snuggle more in the morning! Yay!

So did everyone have a nice holiday? I like the holidays because Mom and Dad are home and play with us all the time. I've been having great fun playing 'tag' with Mom. I see her coming and I steal something of hers, like her undies or socks, or sometimes an earring if I can get it. Then I flaunt it in front of her and just dare her to get it from me. MOST of the time I win! (that means I end up getting a cookie to bribe me to let it go.) (but sometimes Dad yells at me and says, "Casey, give it to me." I must obey Dadddy, so I lose out. But that doesn't happen very often, hee hee!). Yesterday was Dr. Martin Luther King day. We didn't go anywhere to celebrate it because it was so cold out. (it was, like, maybe zero with the wind chill, and that's too cold for us to be outside!). But I watched some stuff on TV about it. Then I watched Animal Cops Houston. And, have you been following the 'lections? That stupid Mitt Romney still thinks he can be president. Mom says he's got a lot of teflon on him. She calls him the spin-doctor. She says if he is elected president, he will probably never be at work! That's because he spent more days outside of Massachusetts when he was governer than in Massachusetts working for us, the people that elected him. Loser, Loser, Loser. I will never forgive him for the dog thingie. Read one of my summer blogs to see what I have to say about that!! Also, I keep hearing a lot of dogs and cats talking about how they don't want a black man or a woman for president. Well, I don't even want a person for president, they have really screwed things up! How about a dog for a change, or here's an idea, how about the BEST PERSON for the job, regardless of if he or she is human or not?

I have been going exploring lately. Mom gets mad, she says I'm 'bolting the gate' whatever that means. I just wait til she puts her coat on and then I run out the door with her and go to the gate and squeeze through it. I pretend I can't hear her when she tells me to wait. Then I go to the car and hop in and she takes me for a ride somewhere! So far I've been to the bank (got a cookie from the drive-thru teller), Spoleto Express (got a cookie from the drive-thru person), Coopers Corner, (got little treats from Mom for being good), and to grandma's house on Christmas (got prime-rib off of Dad's plate). It isn't like I haven't traveled you know, I go to the vet and all. It's just that I used to get kind of car sick but now I don't. Plus I see dogs out walking with their owners and I can bark at them all I want while we speed by!!

I am so worried about the world right now. Mom says we might have a recession, and that would mean fewer cookies and toys for us. I am so glad that we heat mostly with the woodstove so that we don't have to pay the huge heating bills that other people have to pay. And Mom and Dad have pretty good jobs that probably won't go away if things get bad. Mom doesn't want us dogs to worry about stuff, but I can't help it. I live in a nice house with a nice yard and I feel safe. My pillow is nice and soft and I always have breakfast and dinner. We have trees and birds and flowers, but the climate in general is getting dirty. Have you seen the world clock yet? http://http://www.peterrussell.com/Odds/WorldClock.php It keeps track of lots of stuff, like how many people are dying, how many trees are being cut, and so on. I don't see anything about homeless dogs or dogs used in pit-fighting or experiments. Don't forget that stuff happens too. People are animals, and I don't mean that in a complimentary way.

Great chatting with you. I need to get back to some serious napping before aunt Lisa comes to let us all out today. Mom and Dad are working in Boston all day. That means auntie Lisa checks up on us in the middle of the day. She's cool, but I'm not showing her my money trick yet (that's where I turn in cash for cookies. If she wants to see that she'll have to give me the cashola first! My personal stash of coins is just about gone. See ya.

Hey, click on the fish in the picture and he swims! hee hee!

December already!

Hey how did it turn into December so quickly??? Man it got cold....brrr....and then we had snow and freezing rain and sleet, and the snow (a couple inches) is still out there! I don't like this, it's the reason I moved from Minnesota. (okay, okay, I was adopted, that's why I moved!).

Mom is worried about the fish in the pond because she didn't turn the heater on and the top of the pond is so much ice that we dogs can stand on it without falling in! she's turning the heater on tomorrow so I hope those fishies will be ok. If not, they will be frozen into the ice! That happened one year when her old heater crapped out. Bailey spent hours on the pond, digging them out and eating them. What a pig. But he sure does love his sushi.

This time of year it's great to sit by the woodstove. Our woodstove is made out of soapstone (there goes mom with the soap theme again!) and it's in the fireplace. So we dogs take turns lying behind the woodstove on the hearth. It's not too hot and the stones get all warm. Great for my sore muscles!The Woodstock Soapstone Stove Company http://www.woodstove.com is where our stove came from. We got it a long time ago, before Bailey and I were even born. Ours is called the Keystone. And we can see a picture of the fire inside because the front is glass. aaaaaahhhh. So nice. I've got more to talk about later but I just wanted to check in with you guys and let you know we are all doing well here. It's almost dinner time! Yum, Mom got some cool canned beef stew (doggie beef stew) to go with our wellness dry food. I CAN'T WAIT!!! Later dudes.

Happy Furday! (er, I mean Friday!)

is this a cool picture or what? It was taken by Mom's friend Lorna Rae when she was in Alaska a few months back. Lorna Rae used to work as the clinical coordinator for the paramedic students when Mom ran the paramedic program. Mom says LR is what is called a 'travel nurse' now and she works in different places so she can see the whole country. (A nurse is sort of like a vet tech, only for people.) She is having a wonderful experience. You know, a bird that size could easily carry me off (after all I barely weigh 20 pounds!) Sheesh! I should buckle down and eat more just in case....Mom says those bald eagles do live in Western MA too. I've never seen one, but last year a great blue heron used to stop by our pond to catch frogs. He was pretty impressive too!

wow is it cold and windy today! And they say it will snow/sleet/rain on Sunday. The best part about winter is that the woodstove is going. And now Mom and Dad leave the bedroom door open during the day so it won't be so cold in there....that means I can nap on my (our) bed all day and think. Not much to report on this last week and so I haven't been thinking all that much. Dad is real busy and he has been very tired lately. Some nights he doesn't even feel like playing with me. And Mom has been so busy that she left a batch of patchouli soap in the mold for 3 days! (usually she unmolds after 24 hours...it doesn't hurt the soap any, it's just that she likes to check it sooner and have the mold free to make more soap!) She is going to examine paramedic candidates at an exam tomorrow and then she is going to look at a soap display thingie in West Brookfield that she is thinking of buying. So she will only have Sunday to get food and cookies for us, clean the house and make soap. She'll be busy, so I am going to help her by finding things on the floor that I can pick up and put 'away'. I helped her last night by not waking her up at 3:00 a.m. Sometimes I have to go out in the middle of the night. I figure she would rather get up with me than to have to clean up a mess later. She agrees, but she still gets kind of grumpy about it.

Both Mom and Dad are really looking forward to their weekend away in Maine, which is coming up in a couple of weeks. They like to go to Kennebunkport. They used to stay at a really cool place on the beach called the Ocean View, but it was sold and doesn't take guests anymore. So they will be the Mainestay Inn, in Cottage 7 (where they stayed once, a long time ago). http://www.mainestayinn.com They love Kennebunkport in the winter!

And when they go away we stay at the kennel, where we have the coolest time! We all love it because there are so many other dogs and lots of people to play with. Mom says sometimes it costs more for us to go there than it does for Mom and Dad to go on their vacation! Ha! The only bad part is, I miss my bed and I miss sleeping with Mom and Dad. They've never taken me on a vacation with them. They said maybe someday! Well, I am off to do some activities before I settle in for my daily nap. I will catch up with you later.