I am feeling better today. Mom gave me hugs and said she is not mad at me, just to not do that again. So, we ran up and down my little hill, which is always fun, even when I wipe out at the bottom of the hill. I got treats and love and stuff so I guess things are back to normal. I get groomed on Wednesday, since I did not get groomed while Mom was sick. I am kinda nervous about that but there is a nice lady coming here to do it so I don't have to go to a place with other dogs and lots of noise. The sound of things buzzing, like vacuums, hair driers and electric shavers really scares me, especially if there is lots of things going on in the room. Mom's getting her hair done the same day so she said it is Dog And Mom Spa Day. Oh, and I got to go and buy vegetables at the Farmer's Market, which was fun. There was a lady there selling goose eggs and I saw that and wagged my tail, that way Mom knows I like those. She got me one, but she said I cannot have it until I go a whole day without peeing in the house. I really, really want that goose egg.
Bunny Thing is now collecting yarn. She has a huuuuge stash of yarn behind the couch. She showed it to me. It's really impressive, like a yarn mountain! She likes to steal Mom's knitting yarn and take it back there to YarnTown. Her favorite thing to do is when Mom is knitting, and gets up to check on dinner or go to the bathroom or something, Bunny Thing grabs the yard she was using and runs behind the couch with it. I dunno how she picks it up- most of the yarn balls are bigger than she is. But she runs FAST with it! The other thing Bunny Thing likes to do is wait till Mom looks away and Bunny Thing bites through the string of yarn Mom was knitting with, so the thing she was working on starts to unravel! Bunny Thing and me, we laaaaaauuuuugh! Mom has to warn her friends who visit not to leave their cell phones with wires and stuff down where Bunny Thing can reach, because Bunny will bite through the wire and then look up and say,
"Can you hear me NOW?"
It's hilarious! Mom doesn't think it's funny though. Ok, she does a little.
I got some peanut butter on my nose.
It me an hour to lick it off.
It was raining and I got all wet and gross outside.
Mom is doing a little better today, but is still pretty wrecked. The sick that she had has messed up her tummy so bad that she can't eat normal. She has to eat soup broth and coconut water and sometimes even that she wretches up. Mom said she was going "stir crazy" and needed some air today, so we went to the park, even though it was kinda cloudy outside. Dad brought some soup and a blanket for Mom and walked me around a little in the park. Mom was able to walk me a little and I was real good and did not pull because I know she is sick and can't walk fast like she normally does. She walked me to a leafy patch and I dug around a little and found a chicken bone from someone's BBQ! It was gorgeous! it was broken in half and covered in sauce and dirt and ants and what Mom called "Bum funk." I was so excited! I was gonna take that home so I could really take my time digging into that culinary treasure! *sigh* But, Mom took it away from me. I resisted but she swatted my butt and I dropped it. She said I can't have it because;
A.) "Brocco will choke on the brittle bones." B.) "It's covered in ants." C.) "It smells like a leper's ass."
Mom likes to break down arguments into ABC's. Anyway, she won and I did not get to keep the bone, but she gave me a "consolation prize" of a brand new bone and some peanut butter in my kong toy. That chicken bone would have been better though.
I have not been a very good boy these last few days though. Mom has been real sick and she is so sick that Dad has to take the rest of the week off work to take care of her. I've been barking A LOT. Especially at night when Mom needs to sleep. I feel bad but I can't help it. I am excited and confused and just need to bark. I know the humies are frustrated with me, but I can't help it. The potty training is not going so well either. They want me to poo outside, but I insist on pooing in the house. Sometimes I go half outside and save the rest for the house, which Dad says he doesn't understand.
Me and Bunny Thing are getting along really good, but Mom says I need to "respect boundaries" that the Bunny Thing has established. Bunny Thing has two places she does't want me to be in; her food and water bowls, and her favorite lounging pillow. Bunny Thing always lays on this leather Turkish pillow that Mom says they got in Istanbul and Bunny confiscated it and made it her lounge palace. Well, I like that pillow too, and I like to lay my head on it and drool a lot, which grosses Bunny Thing out. So Bunny Thing gets mad and marks her territory, peeing on it a lot so I won't lay on it. But I still do. So Mom moves me if I lay on it. She says me and Bunny Thing both have "special places", like mine is my crate den, and Dad's office, which Bunny Thing is not even allowed to go into. And Bunny Thing has her pillow, so I guess I have more space than she does, so that's fair. Mom says she will designate me my own fluffy pillow, but I might "suffer the wrath of Bunny" if I get on her pillow again.
Me, under the table on Game Night. That's my
harness, which Mom calls "Dog Panties."
That leather pillow with patches is Bunny Thing's
favorite place.
I like sleeping on the kitchen floor. Mom always finds me
asleep in there and gives me a pillow and blanket.
Hi! *tail wagging* I just want to say I am doing so good! The last few days I am really catching on to my new life and how to do things. My new mom and dad are so proud of me and they give me lots of hugs and stuff. This potty training thing is pretty hard living in an apartment and all, but I am really catching on. I am not totally there yet, but Mom says I am 70% there, whatever that means. She says that is good. I have been running and chasing Bunny Thing and eating really carefully, and I have lost two pounds! Mom gives me lean pieces of chicken and we do exercises on the Wii Fit. Did you know doggies can play on the Wii machine too? They can! Mom used the Wii Balance board to weigh me the first day I was here and I weighed 24.4 pounds. Well, last night she weighed me again, and now I weigh 22.1 pounds! I play Wii Tennis with Mom a lot. We play doubles. Mom hits the ball and my job is to chase it and bark when she swings the racket. I am real good at that! The confusing part is that there is not really a ball, so that's weird, but it's fun! When I win games (Mom says I always win) we go for a walk to the coffee shop and we have tea. Well, mom has tea, and I have a bowl of water and a duck treat. The people at the coffee shop like me a lot, and every once in a while, if there is not many people there, they actually let me go inside and sit under the table- and people come over and pet me, and tell me I am awesome.
Here is some more good news: I have only had one seizure since I have been here! Mom missed one medication dose, but I did not have a seizure.
Oh, and Bunny Thing and I are getting along so well! She sleeps by me- not right next to me, but a half a Brocco away. Mom says I measure everything in Broccos. Weight, distance, time... everything in Broccos. So I am about 2 feet long, so 2 feet equals one Brocco. Bunny Thing sleeps a little less than one Brocco away from me, which is good because the first week, she hid fro me and would not play with me at all. Now we play and chase, and sometimes she hops up to me and kisses my face, which Mom says makes her head explode with cuteness, whatever that means. I sleep lots of different places, and Bunny Thing looks for me and sleeps wherever I am. She's a sweet little thing. I like her a lot. I was chewing on a bone yesterday and I got a piece stuck in my throat and I was coughing and trying to get it out, but it was a quiet kind of cough. Well, Bunny Thing was right there, and she started thumping realm hard on the floor to get Mom's attention. That worked and Mom ran over and helped me cough up the bone. So, Bunny Thing is watching out for me.
Saturday, tomorrow, is Game Day again, and that's nice because humies are real nice to me and last time I sat on the sofa with them and everyone petted me for HOURS! Then Sunday, I get to to to the lake, and that is always fun. Sundays are lake day! Mom said she would take me a lot more often, but my paws are a little fragile. My nails wear down real fast on the concrete when we walk to the lake or take long walks. A couple of times, they wore down too much and bled. It wasn't too bad, and Mom fixed me up good, but until my nails grow out a little more, Mom doesn't want to walk me on cement much, and there is a lot of sidewalk between here and the lake, so four now, only Sundays. But Sundays are so much fun! Mom says she needs to teach me not to nip at other dogs so much, but if I learn to be more polite to other dogs, then she will take me to the dog park. But I gotta do something called "socialize" first. One more thing to learn! She says, potty training first. One thing at a time. When I get potty training 100% learned, Mom is going to take me to "basic training" which is where I will learn "Sit, Come Here, Heal" and a couple of other basic doggie things. That might be fun. I saw the class in the park, lots of doggies like me learning things and getting petted and treats. Looks like fun!
Oh, one more thing: today, coming home from the coffee shop, Mom took my leash totally off and I followed her really well. I didn't run all over the place or chase anything. I was so good! Mom and Dad were so impressed! Mom says that when I run, my ears flap and I look like "Falcor The Luck Dragon" from a movie called The Neverending Story. He was a dragon with a dog head. Mom says I make her happy and she's like "A fat kid with cake."
"Chunk" from The Goonies riding Falcor.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Since I have been on a farm with a doggie door for almost 2 years, I am not used to living in a place where I have to rely on humies to take me outside to go potty. So, my humie parents are training me and themselves to do regular potty breaks outside on a schedule so I don't pee on the floor. It's kind of hard but I am catching on! It's also hard not to wake Mom & Dad up every few minutes at night when I want to play but they want to sleep. We're working on that too. I sleep in bed with the humies sometimes but I like to bark a lot at night when humies need sleep. I want to go out and play so bad that I don't want to wait till 7 when humies get up to take me outside. So I bark a lot. So, the humies are working on a gentle method of clicker training and crate training where I have a crate, but the door is always open so I can go in and out whenever I want. This way I have my own doggie den where I feel safe and it's all mine, so I don't worry about other dogs or Bunny Thing getting into it. I have a really soft bed in it, and a piece of my favorite blue blanket, and my favorite new toy- a Kong! A Kong is this weird little thing that looks kinda like a plunger and it is hollow so my humies can fill it with treats for me to try to get out of the Kong. It's kind of hard to get treats out, but it makes me work my teeth and keeps me occupied and having fun. My humie mom fills it with low fat peanut butter and puts my favorite treat in the middle- Turkey Oatmeal Cranberry doggie biscuit in the center- then she freezes it! I play with it and squeeeeeeze it and toss it and I get some peanut butter but then, finally, I get that doggie biscuit and I am so happy I run in circles with my tail wagging. It's bliss!
My Humie Mom has been teaching me to play some game called "Tug Rope" which is where a humie holds one end of a rope and I am supposed to hold the other end in my mouth. Not sure what to do after that, but I have the hold the rope part down. She says, "Ok, brocco, now tug!" but I dunno what that means. She pets me and tells me I tried real hard anyway. I'll figure it out. We practice Humie & Dog games for 20 minutes every day, cuz doggie experts say we doggies don't have a long attention span. I like our Humie & Dog games, even if I don't know how to play them. My Humie Mom says it is nice that I do not like biting things at all, because I do not bite furniture or people or even Bunny Thing even though some doggies would totally eat Bunny Thing! How awful! I would not eat Bunny Thing- she's my friend!
Speaking of Bunny Thing, we are really starting to get along a lot better. She isn't afraid of me at all anymore and she comes up to me to chat and say hello. Sometimes we chase each other. Mostly she chases me and I let her catch me. Also, I am meeting lots of dogs in the building and making new acquaintances. Now I know Lily, and Auggie and Sophie and Jax. Jax is annoying but sometimes he is fun to play with.
My paws are doing better. My nails are growing out. Mom doesn't let me go on the cement much yet. She wants to let the nails grow out more before I run on cement, but we run like crazy on the grass. There is a small hill that Mom & Dad have me run up so that I get good exercise. I've been running up that hill lots and guess what...? I have lost two pounds! My belly is not so round anymore and because I am steadily losing weight, I get more treats! And Bunny Thing taught me to eat apple slices, which don't look very good but they are actually pretty tasty.
Me & Bunny Thing, plotting to take over
the world... or at least the living room.
This is my little hill. A few runs up that and I want a nap!
It doesn't look like much to a humie but I'm little!
This is my new doggie den. The door stays open, but it is
my personal space. That orange thing is my Kong filled
Me and Bunny Thing are getting along pretty well. For a while she was scared of me but now she knows I won't eat her and that I just want to chase and play. She is waaaay faster than me anyway. She can do hairpin turns and go under things I can't get under. She likes to taunt me sometimes, coming up behind me when I am not looking and pushing her paw on my tail. Then I spin around and she is already far away, laughing. I caught her once though! I didn't hurt her, but I caught her. Now we are having more fun because she doesn't run away just because I am in the room. She comes out and plays and I chase her and she chases me.
I am going to have to be more careful on my front paws. My nails are really short and if I run fast on the cement outside, it wears my nails down very bad. Today I ran real fast and it was fun, but then I hurt my paw and it was bleeding. So Humie Mom doctored it up, and bandaged it and now it's ok. Except now Humie Mom makes me wear shoes! SHOES! Little blue bootie shoes. How humiliating! -sigh- But I guess that way I don't hurt my paws so much and my nails have time to grow out long so they don't wear down so easy. Bunny Thing laughs at me though. But she was nice to me when I hurt my paw, and she sniffed me and asked me how I was, without pestering me, so that's nice. It's weird having a sister.
So, I am what Humie Mom calls "chilling out" this weekend. Tomorrow the humies are having "Game Day" which is when them and their humid friends come to the house and sit around the table, and pretend they are wizards and stuff. It's called Dungeons & Dragons. Mom says I can be a "Minion", whatever that is. The cool part is that I will get to meet more humies- Humie Nathan, Humie Josh and Humie Liz. I plan to lay in my dog bed under the table... in case they spill any food.
Bunny Thing, asking if I'm OK.
This is the building I live in. So there is grass but in patches
so I need to wear shoes till my nails get stronger.
My Humie Dad & Humie Mom took me to the park where there is a small lake that humies and boogawoofs play around. There are swings and sandboxes and lots of little mini-humies playing. Some mini-humies petted me and it was fun. Humie Dad gave me belly rubs by the lake, and we had a picnic under a tree. I got to eat some roasted chicken and it was soooo yummy! Then I took a nap and then played games with another boogawoof that looks kinda like me! We walked by the edge of the lake and there are these bird things in the water that look like chickens. They're Lake Chickens! So, I had a really good time and got to ride in the car, which I like a lot too. I sit on Humie Mom's lap so I can see out the window, and I'm really good- no jumping out the window or anything.
All that fun stuff and guess what? I have been with my new family for five days and have not had a seizure! I am really happy and getting lots of love and pets and what my Humie Mom calls SmooshyFaceLove.
So, I've been in my new home for three days now and things are starting to make sense. It's all still a little confusing. I am having trouble figuring out where and when I am supposed to pee and poo. The humies take me out for pees and poos but sometimes I am nervous. Am I supposed to poo on the grass? I dunno! So I poo in the house and they give me that "oh no, you didn't" look that humies get. -sigh- I'll figure it out. But other than that, things are going really good!
I made a couple of friends! One friend is another boogawoof dog named Lily. She is a neighbor dog and her humies are friends of my humies. She is a little black and white dog. We chased each other and played with a ball and it was lots of fun! The other friend is not so much a friend... yet. I'm not sure what it is. Mom says it is a "Bunny" but I dunno what that is. I thought it was a cat at first but it has long ears. Bunny is little, and gray with shaggy fur. She is really nervous all the time and at first she wouldn't come near me cuz she thought I would eat her. I don't wanna eat her though. She's all fur.
So this Bunny lives in the house too, and she doesn't go in a cage. She goes where she wants. She likes to sleep behind the couch or on Mom's lap. Anyway, at first Bunny did not like me at all and she would thump her back feet when I walked in the room. Today she seemed to come around a little, and this morning, she hopped up to me and said hello. We're not exactly friends yet, but I think we could be someday.
Then mom showed me this:
It's kinda blurry, but that's me there, sleeping all nice and deep.
That gray thing is Bunny, and she is licking my fur! While I am sleeping!!!
Is that cute? Or creepy?
Oh, and it isn't just me that has to learn stuff, ya know. I had to remind these humies that dogs like BELLY RUBS!!! I guess Bunnies don't like belly rubs so the humies aren't used to rubbing bellies and they forgot. Well, I reminded 'em!
Hi, my name is Brocco, and I am a 3 year old Bichon-Maltese doggie that just got adopted from All Creatures Great & Small rescue organization in Hollister, CA. I thought I would keep a diary of my adventures so that people can see how much fun it is to have a rescue animal, especially one with special needs. This way you can read about me, my adventures and see pictures and fun stuff. Maybe when you think of getting a pet, you will consider getting a rescue animal, or maybe donating a little money to a shelter. That would be real nice, and you'd feel real good about it too!
Well, like I said, I am Brocco, and here's my story...
I can't remember much from when I was a really little pup, but I think my first humie bought me at a pet store. I don't think that humie was really ready to have a dog in her life because when I started having seizures as a pup, she did not take me to a vet or give me any medication. I spent a lot of time in a back yard, alone and sad. She didn't know what to do with me. So, I ended up in a shelter. It turns out, I have epilepsy. I have seizures that make me confused and scared, and I have to have medicine twice a day and be careful what I eat. That's not really hard at all, but I need humies to help me with that so I take pills on time and get the attention that I need.
That's me, right there. Yep, that one. The cute one.
Then this really nice couple of humies named Skip and Georgia took me in and treated me real good. They gave me love and my medicine and since they live in the country, I had lots of space to play. I didn't even mind their kitty cats! But still, it is foster care and I know that means I need a place that will be forever. My foster parents were so nice and I really like them, but it's hard to take care of lots of animals that need homes. Everyone hoped someone would come along and adopt me. Vivian from All Creatures Great & Small (that's the rescue place) was really helpful in making sure I got the help I needed. I spent 19 months in foster care, which is a loooong time! I mean seriously, look how cute I am! How come humies were scared to adopt me? I think it's because they think it will be hard to care for me. I understand, but I hope they change their minds about adopting boogawoofs like me. Oh, that's a new word I learned. My new humies say it a lot. They say a "boogawoof" is pretty much anything with more hair showing than skin, so ya know, doggies and kitties and bunnies and stuff. Boogawooooooof!
Me, in my new Thundershirt!
So, anyway, lots of time in a foster home. Well, guess what? I GOT ADOPTED!!! I'm so happy! I met this nice couple who live in Fremont. That's near San Francisco, kinda. It's gonna be a different life and a lot to get used to, but they seem like nice humies and they say they are ready to make me part of their family. That's all I've ever wanted! So, after a couple of meetings, I went to their house... my home. Wow, that is nice to say, HOME! They have a 2 bedroom apartment in the city, which I am soooo not used to! I am used to real quiet countryside where I have a back yard, but OK. I can adapt to that. The first night there, I was pretty scared. I mean, what's gonna happen? What do I do? Where are my foster parents that I have been with for 2 years? I miss them already, and I had a hard time the first night.
My new humies, Alec and Rowan, they took me to PetCo and let me walk in the store and pick out a jacket harness and a Thundershirt. A Thundershirt is this cloth thing kinda like a shirt but with velcro straps. It fits like it is hugging me, and when I get scared, it is nice to put on and feel secure. The jacket harness is pretty neat too. It doesn't pull on my neck, and it has glowing REFLECTORS! I look pretty styling' now! This must be how city dogs do it! And you know what? After that first night, I am feeling a bit better now. Still a little nervous, but I am getting used to this place, and I think I might just be HOME.
