Birthday!

So today is the day. Ruby is the big 01. Or the big 07 in human years. She celebrated with a pre-birthday fun day at doggie daycamp yesterday, exhausting herself to the point that she couldn't even get off the couch last night. After that fun bender, today was kind of a down day. I did take her for a walk. Our first since my ACL-eliminating accident on September 11. She was so excited to walk and was very well-behaved even when several bunnies taunted her from the darkness of the neighborhood. We had a discussion as we walked about how if she bolted, Mom was just going to have to let her go. So I'm sure that's why she was such a good girl. I topped off her morning bowl of food with a treat and left her for the day.

She desperately needed one (see previous post L'Oreal 5.3 Fiasco), so she had her first annual birthday bath tonight as well. It might not be everyone's favorite birthday activity, but it was just time. So right now she is in a horizontal position sacked out on the couch. Like all Great Danes.

So to backtrack a little, there have been plenty of Ruby Adventures, but my knee surgery and readjustment to work have put a cramp in my blogging. The first week back was pretty exhausting. This week has been better, and blessedly short, so here I am.

The squirrel watching continues. I'm not sure who was more interested. Dog? Or teenage boy?

Regardless, the little critters continue to mock Ruby openly. They've even gotten brave enough to venture up onto the deck to eat out of the chum bowl of corn and sunflower seeds. When she sees them, Ruby about goes right through the sliding glass door. They are smart little buggers. They move away from the door slowly, until they hear it slide. Then it's a race to the closest tree where they sit and cackle at her. It really is fun for the whole family.

I purchased a new food bowl a few weeks ago. It is huge and tall and very sturdy. The old one really wasn't tall enough for her and was made of melamine, so pretty much fell apart. (she's not the neatest drinker). She doesn't like water unless it is straight out of the sink or toilet anyway, so a couple of weeks ago we caved and just let her drink.

We call it the well and she drinks out of it every night. Much to the annoyance of the cat. To be fair, he always has that disgusted look on his face.



Among other adventures, Ruby has destroyed completely two of her remaining three beds. Fluff everywhere, beds in the trash. So she now spends her work days on a hard plastic floor. And I. Don't. Care. I'm done fixing beds.

Last week someone accidentally left Ruby out to have the run of  the house for the day. Nobody realized it until we all returned home. And nobody was more surprised than I that everything was still in place. There were no 'gifts' left anywhere in the house. Even the cat's door was open, her food and litter readily available. With such a success, we decided to give it a second try. Day two of Operation Leave Ruby Out went just as well. I suspect she spent those days laying in the chair in the front window, looking forlornly at the driveway waiting for someone, ANYONE, to come home and pay attention to her.

Day three, the youngest was home sick with a stomach flu. So we felt pretty confident that Ruby could have the run of the house without cause for concern. Around lunchtime I got a cryptic message from the sick one that Ruby was in trouble. Something about tearing up Sophie's bed and she had put her in her kennel for the rest of the day. I had no idea how badly day three had gone until I got the following video via iPhone, about an hour before my work day ended.

So what that WAS, is a waffle foam bed with a zippered cover. For some reason, the cat had taken up residence on it. I think to make sure that everyone noticed it and so that Ruby faced adequate punishment.

There was no missing it. I'm taking the price of dog beds out of her college fund. Enough already.

Favorite picture of the week...coming home from daycamp, enjoying the view out the moonroof...

All for now.

L'Oreal 5.3 Fiasco

A few weeks post-ACL reconstruction and feeling a little more human, I got a wild hair to, well, color my hair. Freshen up my look. Brighten my hair for winter. My lack of tanning and current super-dark black color gave me a bit of a goth look so on my way home from physical therapy, I stopped at the local market, bought myself two L'Oreal color/highlight kits in my favorite color combo, 5.3, and headed home to update my do. $30. Instant update.

I let the dogs out when I get home and they were thrilled to get out and have their dinner. Then Ruby, as she does, stayed glued to my side while I started step one of the hair color (the 5 in the 5.3).

That's when the fiasco started.

So I'm standing in front of the bathroom mirror in the old t-shirt with the rubber gloves on, squirting my head with color from the plastic bottle. Ruby is lying directly behind me, in case I should quickly try to escape. You can't be too careful apparently. At one point, as I was squirting color on the back of my head, there was a small bubble in the bottle. I squeezed extra hard to loosen it and heard the sound. I turned to Ruby to see if I had gotten any on the carpet and all looked OK.

If you've ever colored your hair and spilled the goop on anything, you know where this is going.

I finish my hair, put it up in a clip and turn to see a number of blotches of hair color on the bathroom carpet. (I know, I know, it's really ridiculous that someone put carpet in the bathroom, but someone did.) See, it takes a good 5-10 minutes for the coloring solution to appear as anything but clear. So I'm pissed off that I've ruined the carpet, even though I hate the carpet and we plan to replace it...someday. I'm on my hands and knees with an old rag trying to clean up the mess, when Ruby walks in.

And I see this:

My apologies for not even getting the greatest picture of the mess.

As you can see, Ruby is speckled with L'Oreal 5 above her eyes, on her legs, and down both sides of her body. I've watched a lot of CSI, so I can recognize a spatter pattern when I see one. As best I can tell, she was directly behind me with her feet neatly in front of her and her face turned up to watch me when the shower came her way. I can even match spatter patterns on her sides to identical residue on the carpet (or vice-versa) like you would map the constellations. It had also splattered the black on her nose, turning it a rusty red color.

Of course, by the time I see it and have assessed the damage, the hair dye is completely dry. Set in. Permanent. On the dog AND the carpet.

To make matters worse, the hair color took on the dog and the carpet, but not so much on me. One emergency visit to Colorific and $109 later the next day, and all is well. But for about 12 hours there, it was hat-city for me and humiliation for my dog.

When I picked her up from daycamp the next week, the girls at the front counter said 'we love the spots' and said they had decided a young child with a Sharpie must have gotten to Ruby over the weekend. I fessed up. Just me and some hair color. Nobody else to blame. :)

As I sit here tonight, nearly two weeks and a bath later, Ruby's spots are just as bright. I honestly don't know if they will ever come out. I've thought about mixing up the highlighter kit to see if we can at least soften them but there's not way she'd ever sit still. And then we would probably just need new carpet in other rooms too.

On the flip side, my hair looks great. For only $139. Oy.

A year old...REALLY?

As she sits here next to me, legs folded under her like a lawnchair in her post doggie daycamp state of exhaustion, I can't believe that Ruby is almost a year old. When I picked her from the litter of 8 at only 5 weeks old last December, it was because I looked down and saw that she had climbed into my lap in precisely the position she lays in right now, while I was distracted by 7 other energetic puppies. So as I've said before, it was more like she picked me.

It is remarkable how such a tiny body could grow...essentially 9 times her bring-home weight of 9lbs 2oz...in under a year. Nobody can lift her to weigh her any longer, so we're just guessing she's around 100 pounds. And at her back, she is officially table height. Her face rests comfortably on the kitchen table at any time.

For all my complaining about her various transgressions, I love this silly dog. Most days she's in trouble more than out of it, but it turns out she CAN be trained. When she looks at me like I'm the greatest human on earth, I know that at least in Ruby's world, I really am. And, on even my worst days, when everybody else on the planet is pissed off at me, I can always count on Ruby to look at me and smile her big, goofy, slobbering smile. She's really my best buddy and as I've recovered from this stupid knee surgery, it's been great having her by my side (or safely on the floor at my feet).

I have to return to work tomorrow, a few hours a day this week and then full time next week. I could lie and say I'm looking forward to it, but, well, that would be a lie. But at least I get to look forward to coming home to a wonderful family who, though sometimes collectively or individually pissed off at me, still support and love me, and to this big droopy-eyed, lovable dog, who will never see me as anything but perfect. That feels pretty good.

Enough of the sloppy stuff...

So I've written about Ruby's constant dismantling of various toys. Every once in awhile I try and patch some of them back together, unless they are too far gone and then they sleep with the fishes. Last week, deep in a Vicodin haze and needing something to do, I pulled out some of the headless, legless and stuffingless toys and started to patch. Then I got creative. Perhaps it was the drugs.

So that's formerly Rasta Monkey, wearing Floppy Squirrel's face as a mask, huddled up with Headless Horsey, now sporting Rasta Monkey's dreads. Together, they are now known as Squirrel Monkey and Rasta Horsey (who was very happy to have his head reattached to his body).

I guess I'm channeling my inner Sid (please get obscure Toy Story reference).

Ruby doesn't seem to care, she plays with them like she always did. I gotta wonder if she has nightmares though. :)

Favorite picture of the week requires a little explanation. That's an episode of America's Funniest Home Videos on TV. Two squirrels stalking a bowl of Halloween candy with one of those motion-activated scary hands that slaps when you get close. Ruby shot off the couch and started barking and leaping at the TV when she saw the raccoons. 

It must be so confusing for her. 'They're here, but I can't GET them!'

Carry on...