Molly: 1 month later

Okay, so life has been busy and we've been slackers (just ask Retired Mama) about updating this blog! As of Thurs. we will have had Molly for 2 months. She's a great dog! We still are working on having her walk without pulling. But, in the past month, it has gotten much better! During this month we also hired the Eugene-version of the Dog Whisperer. We met with her for 3 private sessions and she helped Dave and I learn a lot of techniques for handling a 70 lb, very strong dog. Molly's been in her PetSmart class for 6 of the 8 weeks. The dogs in the class no longer hold any allure. Trust me, most other dogs and every cat that walks the earth continue to be something to spaz out about!

Last week we had the opportunity to drive up to Seattle to see Romel for a few hours. He was out for a librarian conference and had a red-eye home on Sat. We loaded up the pooch, drove the 5 hrs and got to hang out with Romel. It was the first time we've had her walking in a city and she did great for a long time. Many people seemed surprised to see her and then smiled. Dave noticed that she was making lots of people smile and said to me, "It's like Molly is a rainbow." It was also her first time in an elevator. She walked in, sat down ... and when it started to move, she hunkered down and widened out her front legs like she was holding on for dear life. She never balked at getting into the elevator, but she'd walk in and just get into the position of holding on. The elevator was in our hotel and she did a really good job. Luckily, we didn't see another dog in the hotel because she would have spazzed out. But, instead she looked like a doggie with good manners! And Romel was the first family member that she has gotten to meet. She had a great time visiting with Romel. Oh, and there was an unexpected snow fall in Seattle, so she also got her first snow in too. While she may have done many of these things before (except meeting Romel) they are the first time she did them with us. On the ride home we broke it up with a visit to a beach in Tacoma. We ran and ran and ran. We also found out that she will easily go into the water! This place was on Puget Sound and the waves were quite small. She skirted the water's edge until there were 3 ducks about 15 ft out. She got up to mid-leg before we called her back. Since it was snowing/raining it seemed like too much water to send her for a full swim!

Her other news is that she's been sorta sick. She threw up twice last week and then seemed over it. Then she threw up mid week. Then nothing. Then Sunday she threw up again and had bad diarrhea. We've seen our vet and she doesn't have any parasites. She threw up again last night and today they did a blood draw and she doesn't have anything wrong with her liver, pancreas, etc. Next, it was an xray to see if she had something blocking her GI track. Again, nothing out of the ordinary. Okay, so we have a healthy dog that throws up?! She's now on a prescription of an anti-nausea and an antibiotic. The only thing the blood work showed as a low white cell count ... so she's not fighting an infection. But, with the low count she is now more likely to pick up an infection. So, the antibiotic is to prevent her from actually picking up something.

On other news, Dave has 1 more day of work at Applebee's. He'll finish tomorrow by doing a double shift! He's quitting because he'll be teaching at the local community college. This term he's teaching the first Exercise Physiology and 2 strength training classes. He'll also be working in an exercise testing lab on campus.

We've got some pics, etc. but I have got to make dinner! Hopefully it isn't a month until our next post!