MUNGO EATS Latin America

Time to update you on Sargon’s progress.  The little turkey is now 14 weeks old.  He is growing like a weed.  He is now eating about 4 1/2 cups of food a day and really, I cannot remember ever feeding another puppy quite this much food before.  Just for comparisons sake, Mungo eats just under 3 cups of food daily.  Feeding time is actually quite grotesque, as Sargon eats his meal down in a few seconds!  Before I can walk to the sink to fill his water dish, his meal is done.  Crazy! 

For those readers not living in Calgary, we had a big spring snow storm yesterday.  I am not sure what the official number is, as far as how many centimeters of snow fell, but let me show you by way of a picture. 

This is the picnic table sporting the “new” snow.  All of this snow fell in a 24 hour period.  The table was completely clear before this snow fall.  The nice thing about spring snow storms is that usually once the snow stops falling, the sun comes out and it is nice and warm out.  Sargon is not terribly fond of COLD snow, but spring snow is fine, and he spent a lot of the day tromping around the back yard playing.

Pretty much every time he goes outside, he comes back in with snow on his nose.  Makes me giggle!

When Sargon first came home, he was about 1/4 the length of Mungo.  He is now at least 1/2 if not a bit more!!  He gets his fair share of treats.  Now he gets to lick out the yogurt containers too.  Of course, since his tongue and nose are shorter than the big hound’s, he has to adapt.

(try to ignore the “longhair” in the shot…haircut is coming soon!)

Of course there is the danger that when you use this technique, you may get a little yogurt on your nose…even on your eyebrows, it would seem.

He has started some puppy obedience classes, and Sara is training him.  I am still too busy with Mungo and agility.  She is doing very well with him.  He gets distracted sometimes, but he is nowhere as stubborn or difficult to train as Mungo was.  In any case, he is doing well, growing, learning, and fitting in to this crazy family.  And, of course, after one does all that growing, playing, and learning, one has to sleep well!!

No tooting Mungo!!

I thought I would give you all an update on how things are progressing at the clinic.  It is a very difficult job building a clinic, I have come to realize.  My days are filled with problem solving and making decisions, and I am only involved in one tenth of the decisions made.  Most of the issues are handled by my tremendous construction managers.  They keep the ball rolling…most of the time. 

Even though I am “over the moon” thrilled with my construction managers, I am less than pleased with the work done by the designers.  A lot of the issues I am brought into, have to do with mistakes, oversights, problems with the design.  One of the newest…and biggest issues that was “missed” by the designer, is that when the exam room doors are closed, I cannot open one stack of drawers and two cupboard in my millwork.  The doors and the door handles are in the way. 

I am not sure why the designer did not account for this.  I likely would have missed it as well, but designing and architecture is not my business.  It is extremely frustrating to have to constantly clean up ones mistakes.  We actually have gotten so frustrated with the designer, that we have fired her and are forging on without her.  So now all the questions come to me, and with the help of our wonderful construction crew, the problems are sorted out.  Slowly!!

Even when the designer is not involved, there are setbacks.  We received two wet tables today.  These are essentially long sinks set on a bank of cupboards.  We mostly use the sinks for laying dogs on when we are cleaning their teeth (remember they are anesthetized for this).  The tables were both damaged, either in packaging or in freight, and so they cannot be installed until they are first repaired.  Hopefully we will be compensated for the cost of the repairs.  One table just had a crack in the laminate, but the other had chunks of laminate cracked off and the sink portion of the table was completely snapped off of the cabinets beneath.  Check out the pictures.

We are fortunate that our millworker is still on site, and he is awesome.  He will repair them, better than new, he assures us.  I believe him. 

So we forge ahead.  Our opening date is slated to be April 18th and with luck, we will still make our deadline.  I will be very happy when this portion of my life is over and I can go back to doing what I enjoy…taking care of pups!!

It is time for an update on Sargon the Great.  He has learned a few new skills this week.  The first one is that he now sits and waits for his food to be put in the bowl and continues to wait until he it told “okay”.  This is a huge improvement from when he would dive into the bowl as you were pouring, as this often resulted in kibble being scattered around the bowl and on his head.  It is VERY difficult for him to stay until he hears the key word, but he is doing it.  He spends a considerable amount of time trying to convince me, or anyone that will listen, that he is STARVING.  He likes to sit in front of the pantry door and give me this hang-dog look.  Good thing I know a thing or two about puppies!

He also learned how to go down the stairs this week.  He learned how to ascend the stairs a few weeks ago, but he would often get stranded at the top of the flight, not really sure how to get down.  Now as long as he concentrates and takes it slow, he can descend the whole flight of stairs.  If he does not concentrate or tries to go quickly, things can go awry.  The other day, he heard the door bell ring and “rushed” down the stairs.  He ended up going down half the flight head first, on his back…oops!!  He still bounced up when he hit the landing and raced off to the door, thank goodness.  Slow and steady, small hound, slow and steady.

Also this week something happened to his right ear.  I am not sure if his ear is just going through a “stage”, of whether his right ear will start to “airplane”, but I am NOT liking it.  If you look at his picture, you will see that his left ear is perfect, but his right ear is…NOT!

For you “not-dog” people out there, let me tell you about ears.  There is a huge amount of hoopla, mythology, and craziness that goes into making sure that dogs ears are “right”.  For instance, there are dogs that are supposed to have “prick” ears, which are ears that stand straight up, like a German Shepherd.  If you own a breed with this type of ear, you are likely told not to touch or play with the dog’s ear, because if you do, they may not prick properly.  Sometimes ears are taped up together, or with sticks in them to try to encourage the standing up form.  Some breeds have tipped ears, like Shelties, which are basically prick ears, that have the very point “tipped” down.  If you own a dog with tipped ears, chances are someone has told you to glue the tips of the ears down to the main part of the ear to get this tipped look.  I actually know of someone who asked their vet to cut  the cartilage in their dog’s ears so that they would tip.  Finally if you have a dog with hangly-dangly ears like my hound, you probably have heard of someone taping washers or weights to the bottom of the ears to make sure the hang downwards and don’t airplane (which is when the ears stick out to the side).  I will be honest with you, I have never really thought that any of these remedies help at all.  I am pretty sure that ears will do whatever they want to do and no amount of taping, playing, or weighting, is going to do much difference (I guess surgery might, but that is cheating).  I know there are many people that will disagree with me, but that is what I think.  And, I will admit, that I have always kind of giggled at people that worried so much about what their dog’s ears looked like.  Does it really matter??  Never would I have thought that I would have become one of the “ear obsessed”.  But as I look at Sargon and I see that crazy ear winging out to the side, I have to say I am having a hard time focusing on anything else.  I am constantly refolding his ear so that it sits “properly”.  This of course, lasts about 2 seconds, because as soon as he moves a miniscule amount, the ear “refolds” the way it wants and is once again “unproper”!!!  Am I going to tape a weight to his ear…no!  Can’t jump on THAT crazy train, but maybe… maybe you could all join me in keeping your fingers crossed that one day Sargon will again have two “proper” ears!!  (Wow…I am NUTS)!

Sara and I were in Canmore today, so that Sara could participate in a ski race.  It wasn’t just any old ski race, it was the nationals.  REAL skiers were there…skiers like Chandra Crawford, people who have been to the Olympics to represent our country. 

Now before you get all excited, let me tell you why Sara was there.  The nationals were being held in Canmore this year.  Every year they are somewhere different.  Because the races were nearby this year, Sara’s coach thought it would be a good idea if some of the kids tried a race.  Her intention was to have 3 or 4 girls race in the same race together just for the experience of skiing in a “big time” race.  It was expected that they would finish at the end of the pack, especially because they don’t even have their age category at the nationals.  Normally Sara skis against 12 and 13 year old girls.  At the nationals, she would have to ski up a level, meaning she would compete against 14 and 15 year old girls.  Also, when the idea of skiing a race in the nationals first came up, the intention was for the 3 or 4 girls to ski together on the weekend.  Well, somehow things did not go as planned.  Instead of skiing on the weekend, Sara skied on a school day and instead of 3 or 4 of her teammates skiing in the same race, Sara ended up signed up on her own.  So here was the situation, she skipped school and went to Canmore to ski in a race against 13, 14 and 15 year olds girls, and her coach was not able to be there.  Not really what she was expecting.

In any case, she was a bundle of nerves before the race, which manifested itself as a grumpy girl.  Luckily, we did not have to wait long for the race to start.  It is hard to tell during the race how any individual person is doing.  Racers start every 15 seconds.  More or less, as long as not too many people pass you, you are doing okay.  You are doing even better if you pass someone ahead of you.  Sara was passed by 3 people and she did not pass anyone.  We waited for the results. 

Her goal for the race was to not be last.  We knew and she knew that she would be close to last, so being “not last” was a pretty good goal.  Well, she was not last, she was third last, finishing 78th out of 80 racers.  Was she happy with this…you bet!  She was even more pleased that the two racers that she beat were 14 and 15 years old.  So there you go folks, first show in the nationals and she finishes “not last”…hopefully it will only get better from here!!

I’m proud of you Sara, and love you lots!

Yesterday, the final biathlon race of the year was held at COP.  It was a Kinder Cup Race.  Kinder Cup is a race series developed to get new biathletes interested in competing.  The races are usually shorter, and the emphasis is put on fun, rather than serious racing.  Younger biathletes are encouraged to race in this series.  Even non-biathletes can give it a try if they wish.  The races are really there to encourage participation in the sport. 

Sean raced yesterday, but so did Sara.  A girl from Sara’s grade, in her school, trains with Sean’s team and Sara thought it would be fun if they competed in a race together, as a team.  Sara did take a biathlon course many years ago, 4 or 5 at least, but has not shot since that time.  She asked the girls’ biathlon coach if she could shoot one night this week, just to get a little practice.  I think she took 10 or 15 shots that night. 

There were 3 events at the Kinder Cup.  First, there was a sprint race.  This was an individual event.  Each kid started individually, and had to ski 3 loops and shoot at the range twice (5 shots per visit to the range).  Just before the race started, Sara found out that she had to shoot on small targets instead of the large targets she had practiced on earlier in the week.  She was not impressed.  Still she did her best.  We told her that even if she missed all her targets, she could likely ski faster than most of the kids there.  Turns out she did not miss all her shots, she shot 3 out of 5 each time in the range.  That shooting, along with her speed, allowed her to secure first place!!!  First place?  For a gal that has shot 10 0r 15 shots in the past 5 years??  Crazy!!

The second race was the relay.  This was a super short race.  The skiers skied directly to the range, shot their five shots, did any penalty loops dictated by how they shot and then skied a short loop back to the start where they tagged their partners.  This is the race that Sara did with Hayley.  Well, just as in the previous race, her speed made up for her shooting, and in Hayley’s case, her shooting made up for her slower speed.  The two of them combined forces to finish third on the podium.

The final competition was a sharp shooting competition.   Did you think I was going to tell you that Sara ended up on the podium in this category as well??  Did you forget the part where she only shot 10 or 15 shots in the past 5 years??  She was out in the first round!!! 

Still, a podium finish in 2 out of 3 races, is quite amazing for a girl who is not a biathlete.  These results left Sara wondering if she was barking up the wrong sports tree.  She has NEVER won a gold medal in a ski event, many silvers and bronzes, but never gold.  Luckily, it is the end of the ski season, she has the summer to ponder which route her athletic career will take.  Whatever she decides, we will support her.  We have even suggested she try a little of both next year and see what she thinks.  Wait and see.  For not she can relax and enjoy the gold and bronze!!

Way to go Sara!!