Happy Howloween!

It be Torture The Dog With A Hat Howloween today!

Furstly the BIG NEWS, not that it do me any good now that I is out of hiking commission...

That fugitive in MY hiking grounds - CAPTURED LAST NIGHT!!! WOO WOO!!

The skeery dood, not so skeery no mores.

Again, thank you all fur the healing vibes and purrs and I tells you I feel them ALL and they put such a big SMILE on my mom's face!

So this morning, mom do not be awake at the usual 5:30 so by 6 I could holds it no mores and I had a poop eggs-plo-shun all ofur the office rug.  I has nefur efur done that before even when I was a pupster.  Mom sayed it be OK coz we be needing a new rug in the office anyway so after she gets to the Home Depot today fur a cheap replacement (just in case...), you will be seeing a brand spanking new rug in my office!  Fur now we just has the stinky spots cofured with upside down wee wee pads.  Pew.

I nommed my breakfast without assistance this morning.

So tasty!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!  Oh yes, I did snarly face and GRRRRR at my sis!

"MOM!  She did snarly face and GRRRRR at me!"

Look at what I scored from my Auntie Joann and her dogs!  It be like trick or treat delivery!

Today was the day I was supposed to be leaving for my gramma's house in St. Louie but as you can see, I is still in Noo Joisey.  If'n I continue to gets better, we might go in a couple of days but mom says I cannot be hasing poo eggs-plo-shuns at gramma's house. I be werking on that, k?  Since I cannot hike on my trip I will has lots of time to catch up on your bloggies while at gramma's house.

Update

Hi efurrybuddy!  I is slowly coming back. I has felt your healing vibes and they is werking!  Thank you all fur your nice comments and well wishes - you all is so pawsome!

I was getting up on my own last night but as you can sees, my head still be spinning.  Yes, that be Sydney cheering me on in the background.

I could stand still fur a minit and not fall ofur without mom holding my harness handle.

I nommed foods from mom's hand instead of her squirting it in my mouf with the syringe.

I wedged my behind between mom's legs to hold me up fur my fave butt skritches.  Sydney helped hold me up.

Hey, what is you doing in MY bed?

Here I is this morning right after I was up drinking water out of my bowl while mom was still in bed.  She woke up to the sound me me drinking my water out of my bowl and was so happy.

Then I nommed breakfast all by myself right out of the bowl.

The V-E-T called last night and I heard mom telling on me how I peed and stuffs.  Seriously? Do that be all it takes to make the peeps happy?  But I is still holding out on the poop.  I has been known to hold it fur 5 days when conditions was not just right, BOL.

So we was supposed to be leaving on our big trip tomorrow.  I can still ride in the car but I cannot hike so that means I can still go visit gramma.  The V-E-T sayed that would be good coz I would be unner constant snoopervision and safely confined in the car where I would not be wobbling around and stuffs.  But right now it still be hard fur mom to get me in and out of the car so we will prolly wait a few days.  So fur now I is going to go back to napping and getting better. 

(P.S. - Susan (Lexi da Shih Tzu) - Thank you for that link!  Very comforting to read a firsthand account versus the tons of medical stuff I have been reading!  Daniela)

Old Dog Vestibular Disease

Shawnee's mom here because Shawnee is not herself right now.  We had a very scary episode yesterday. Shawnee was fine in the morning, ate breakfast, a normal start to a normal day.  Then around noon she started to lose her balance.  Over the next couple of hours everything went downhill rapidly to the point where she was running into walls, panting excessively, drooling and her eyes were darting back and forth nonstop.  I made it to the emergency clinic 30 miles away in record time, in a panic, thinking this was the end.  How could this be?  She just hiked 10 miles last Sunday and was perfectly fine.

They rushed us right in at the emergency clinic.  After a thorough examination, the vet felt Shawnee might have Old Dog Vestibular Disease.  It could be because of ear infections (per the vet, her ears are "pristine" so not the cause in her case) or thyroid (tests still out on that but only to rule it out since the vet says she does not look like she has thyroid issues) or, as is most often the case, it just happens for no known reason.  Fortunately, the prognosis is good assuming she improves over the next 72 hours.  If she does not improve, then it could be something more serious.  So for now it is wait and see.

Head tilting to the right because her world is spinning.

She can barely walk right now and has her hiking harness on so I can help her if she needs to get up.  She will not eat or drink so she gets some canned food blended with water in a syringe every few hours.  When I am able to get her outside, she won't do anything and just wants to come back in and fall into her bed.

Here is a video of her eye movement, which is actually a little better today than it was yesterday but her head tilt is worse today.

Now that I am no longer so concerned that her life is over, I can start obsessing about whether or not she will ever hike again.  I posted that question to a Facebook dog hiking group and the experiences of others is very encouraging - all have said their dogs did recover and were able to hike again. 

I wanted to throw this out there because it is darned scary.  It affects both dogs and cats and you think they are having a stroke.  In something I read a neurologist wrote that the worse the symptoms, the better the outcome.  It's with less severe symptoms that the problem tends to be more serious. 

Later last night, once I started to come down out of panic mode, I recalled having heard about this before.  Then it started to come to me where it was I heard it - Blogville, of course!  So I dug back and found the post - it was Anna's Duncan that it happened to and reading how what happened to him was EXACTLY how this went down with Shawnee and then reading how well he recovered made me feel so much better!  So paying it forward in case it ever happens to your beloved best friend and maybe you will remember having heard about it in Blogville.

Daniela (with a LOT more gray hairs)

Two Hikes in Three Days

I is a little behind and needs to tells you about hiking almost 7 miles TWICE in THREE days!  The old gurl still gots it!  I had been bizzy bizzy bizzy planning my upcoming ROAD TRIP and I gibs you a teaser - I has been in cahoots with that Frankie Furter and Ernie.  Watch out werld!  OK, now on with my hikes.

So we went to that Hairy Man (Harriman) State Park in Noo York last Furiday fur some leaf peeping and fur wetting.

From where we parked the hikemobile we hads to walk by some horses and they all wanted to meet ME.  But I acted all cool and stuffs coz that's how I roll.

Heading to the woods.

Check out that fall foliage!  Pawsome!

Here we is at a seenik and that rawk be called The Egg coz it do look like an egg from far away.  You can see the seeniks better from atop The Egg but I cannot climb that steep so we did not go up.

But this flat rawk at the lake, I was so there!

Chickun jerky break, of course.

Bootiful day in the woods.

Fur wetting waters!

And at the end, a lookalike cuzzin!  Could we pass fur twins or what?

So then on Sunday, yes, two days later, anudder hike!

We went on the Military Road in the Deli-Wear Water Gap - this road be 250 years old, older than mom!

We found little bits of color but in these pawts, most of the leaves already commed down coz of rain and wind and stuffs.

We went down to the Deli-Wear River and I got through this fallened tree just fine but mom not so much.  She had to put her boot covers on because she did not want to gets her feets wet and there be no udder way to get around this than through the waters.  Fur me, wetting my paws do be a good thing.  Mom should try it sometime.

This be ruins from an old fort from the 1700's.

Chicken jerky time!

We hads to be furry careful along here.  Some peeps coming from the oppawsite direction told us their dog had chased a small bear up a tree up ahead.  So not cool, dood!  We did not want momma bear to think I did this (I would NEFUR do such a thing) so mom got out her air horn if'n a momma bear be luring nearby to skeer her away but we nefur seened any bears.  Just bear poo.

So we is planning one more hike this weekend before the big ROAD TRIP.  Stay tooned!

The Annual Fall Catskill Hike - Hike #2

OK, sorry to keep you in suspenders.  Here be the second hike of my Catkill hiking extravaganza.

So we gets to hike #2 and OMD, it do be starting at a seenik!

Those do be the Catskill High Peaks ofur there.

It do be where we hiked last year but I had a little bit of a hard time with that Arthur Itis tagging along so this year we went to the western Catskills where the trails do not be so crazy hard.

Did any of yous lose you booty shop appointment card?

So we is off on this hike.  This all used to be an old timey farm so there is old fences and fields and stuffs.

Somebuddy builded this old timey fence out of rawks.

It do go on furefur and efur.

There be old wire fences too and sometimes the wire goes right through a tree becoz the tree growed with the wire inside the trunk!

Stopping for a break.

And a nap.

And a selfie - all matchy in our no-huntin-me oranges!

Then I layed here and watched coz I could see where we parked the hikemobile way ofur yonder ...

... and spied on other peeps up at that seenik.  I watched so they not be messing with my hikemobile.

Now I shows you some pritty fall colors.

So we is off again.

And that, furrends, be my fall foliage hikes in the Catskills.

I hads me a snack in the hikemobile, then...

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ............

Now, I is going to put you all in suspenders again coz I has a big road trip coming up, oh yes I do!  Me and mom, we be going to St. Louie, MeZooRi to visit my gramma and we be doing a haunted Howloween hike by Pittiesburg, hiking in MeZooRi and Illynoy with my gramma (yuppers, my gramma still be hiking) then I be hiking in IndyAnna and OhHiOh on the way home.  So lots of adventures in store.