If Only They Could See Me Now....

I had one of those days today that just had to make me laugh. I had no choice. one of those moments that make you look at yourself from the outside in, and think, please, somebody, hide me...

As I was standing in the grocery store with a drugstore bag full of sedatives, arms loaded with three boxes of frozen pizza, and not enough money to pay for any of it, I was thinking....

Please, Lord, don't let people think I am really this person!

And I'm not. I'm a well-adjusted, happy, self-fulfilled individual. I am currently living in a place I want to live in, with a Beagle who brings me joy every day. I am in a committed, loving relationship with an individual who makes my heart smile on a daily basis. And I have my own television.

I just happen to also suffer from the occasional panic attack or bout of insomnia, and these issues, from time to time, require pharmaceutical intervention.

I also have a penchant for frozen pizza, and as a result of this, when it goes on sale, I buy armloads and armloads of it.

As a result of all this, times do pop up in life when I need to stock up on both pharmaceuticals and frozen pizza ....

And I'm entirely comfortable with that.

I was just really, really happy that as I was standing there with my drugs and my pizza that the girls who made fun of me in high school didn't happen to waltz into the store at that very moment.

Cow's Hill? What?

After a lifetime of residency in a lovely town called CowTown, I have moved.

Life is full of ups and downs, and my life is no exception.

I have spent the last two months moving to a new location: I live in a tiny bungalow in a town about fourteen kilometres South of my beloved Ranch.

I am now officially a resident of Cow's Hill instead of CowTown.

The choice to move was a difficult one. Do I want to leave the security of home? Do I want to strike out on my own? Do I want to be responsible for filling up my own windshield washer fluid? (Something my father has done for me for the past four years!) Do I want to come home every day to myself and no one but myself?

Well, no. I don't want that. I don't want to come home to an empty house.

So a condition of my moving was that I bring my eleven and a half year old Beagle with me.

Dixie initially had mixed reactions about the move. So did everyone who knew her. People thought that moving Dixie after years of her having the whole run of all of CowTown would kill her. Dixie was initially anxious about her new home. (As was I). However, after about a week, she realized that her new house came with pizza, treats, and the full rin of the couch.

Since then, she has gained weight, gained shine, and gained a love for sleeping in bed with a person. I have never seen Dixie as happy as I have seen her these past months.

In my new home, I have no phone, no television, and no Internet.

Sometimes people ask me how I live. Once, a person even referred to me as "a Pioneer". I mean, realistically, I live in a house insulated with straw. I have no internet, no phone, and no cable. I also happen to milk cows in my spare time.

So perhaps I may just be like a pioneer.

Only, I'm the type who comes with a Chevrolet Cruze and an Iphone.

I'm going to make it a point to blog at least once a week because I love my blog and I love my readers. The problem lies with the fact that I must blog via an Iphone, because in my new house in Cow's Hill, I have no Internet.

But my Beagle and I do have happiness, and that is the most important thing.

On the Untrained Dog...

Mal and I were discussing dogs and their training (or, in some cases, their lack thereof) on the phone this evening. I was speaking of Dixie's higher points: What a wonderful pet she is; how she loves me and is semi-loyal to me, if I am holding treats; how she ...

Mal broke in at this point and stated that Dixie smells and I should wash her more often.

Whatever. My dog is odiferous at best and heinously stenchy at worst. (You will be happy to know that she only gets to sleep in bed with me the day that she has a bath with Pantene shampoo and conditioner.) I can accept her faults.

We then discussed the higher points of Dixie's training.

And by that I meant that we discussed the fact that my dog does nothing on command and will bite people who try to get her off the couch.

But wait! Dixie can sit! She can sit! I swear, if you ask her to, Dixie will sit!

To which Mal countered: But will she sit if you are not holding food in your hand?

Well then. Never mind.

But Dixie comes! She comes when she's called, and that, my friend, is worth its weight in gold.

Mal then stated that she has witnessed, on several occasions, Dixie responding to the 'come' command. She has witnessed, many times, myself standing on the porch hollering at my dog to get over here! And eventually, Dixie will wearily make her way to me.

As pointed out by Mal, this is probably because she has a headache from all the yelling and has given up on a peaceful afternoon jaunt.

But wait! Dixie does come on command if you use a horn!

A horn?

Yes. My family owns a horn. Quite literally, it is made from the horn of a longhorn steer. A longhorn steer horn that has a hole drilled in it such that you can blow into it like a trumpet.

And Mal says: You blow into a longhorn steer horn like a trumpet?

And I say: Yes! And Dixie will come to that!

So you have to carry a horn with you everywhere you go?

No! You don't have to carry a horn with you! Because when you're hunting, you carry a gun! And when you're desperate for your dog to come back to you in the bush, you unload your gun, remove the barrel, and blow into it much like you would blow into a longhorn steer horn. Or a trumpet.

So picture, if you will, my entire family standing in the bush during the first two weeks of November. We are cold, anxious to go home, and awaiting a beagle who doesn't often respond to voice. In desperation, we all begin blowing into the barrels of our guns, and magically, my beagle appears.

That, my friend, is training.

But Mal feels that if you have to carry a gun with you to get your dog to come on command, this is not entirely practical.

Fine. I'll grant you that. Impractical? Surely.

The one thing Dixie is full trained on? The one thing she understands the most? Let me share with you:

If Dixie sees you, in any room in the house, at any point in time, picking up a blanket?

She knows to run to the couch and cuddle into the pillows.

Untrained, indeed. My dog knows how to act and when. Just pick up a blanket and you'll see.

I Just Can't Believe I'm Here...

My life has become fantastic all of a sudden and I'm not sure what to do with it. (That is not to say that my life has not always been fantastic but certain stressors have existed over the past few years that have left me feeling rather overwhelmed).

I want to run screaming through the streets about how everything has turned out. I have finally landed that job that I thought I would never, ever get.

Sargeant and I had another ride tonight and I can't get over how well I'm doing with him. While I do enjoy Sargeant he is a little... well, he's a little powerful. He's kinda strong. He likes to go and leave me feeling like a passenger waiting for him to slow down, only he doesn't really slow down of his own free will.

Since my lesson a week ago I've been working on our transitions and I can't get over how well we are doing with them. I haven't been turning into a terrified slab of jelly on his back every time he does something and when I have a ride like I had tonight, I feel like I am on top of the world.

I am just so excited. I am excited to start living my life the way I wanted to live it, the way I've been craving to live for the past several years. I get to ride, I get to sleep at home every night, I get to sit on my couch, I get to socialize when I want to socialize.

I also have my own living room now that the Clifford Cave has been rejuvinated. Yesterday I gave Dixie a Thanksgiving bath, thinking that I would be thankful for a Beagle who doesn't smell like a combination of the creek, fish, mud, decomposing raccoon (Her favorite thing to roll in), and barn. I washed her thoroughly, starting out with dog shampoo and then giving up because it just wasn't cutting it. I then proceeded to wash my Beagle using Pantene shampoo and conditioner and OH MY WORD. Her hair has never shone so brightly.

After Dixie's bath, I used the blow dryer on her which left her feeling less than impressed. After that, however, I invited her for a nap with me in the Clifford cave and we curled up together, in all of her glorious smelling goodness, and slept the way a Beagle and the person who loves her should.

Things are looking pretty good.

On Napping with Certain Smelly Beagles...

When my parents leave me alone here at The Ranch, Dixie becomes my right-hand-man. Only she's not a man, she's a she, and on top of that, she's a beagle, but I'm sure you get my drift.

Dixie accompanies me everywhere I need to go: The couch, the barn, back to the couch, perhaps up to my neighbor's to have a beer, and then back to the couch again.

Dixie has been forced against her will, for all of her life, to sleep alone at night in the kennel. Getting her to bed at night is much like pulling teeth. Every night I watch her mournful face as she walks sadly to her kennel.

I like to play a little trick on Dixie while my parents are away. I'm cruel like that. I turn out all the lights in the house and say: "Dixie, Bedtime!" And then I look at her. She raises her overweight body sloooooooowly -- oh, so slowly -- from her perch on the couch and she hangs her head in sadness and looks at me with her beagle-y little eyes.

And then I stand up on the stairs and screech "MUPPY!" and pat my leg.

The transformation is amazing. She leaps to life, charges up the stairs like it is her job, and bounds into my bedroom to wait for me to lift her into bed. Watching her snort and snuffle in my luxurious down duvet before laying down brings indescribable joy to my life.

And then we sleep.

Yesterday I gave Dixie a bath, a rare occurrence that makes her feel very, very unhappy. She stands in the tub looking like the most dejected animal on the face of the Earth and tolerates my washing of her. Not happily. Unless it involves rolling in dead things or hunting things that are soon to be dead, most of what Dixie does is not done happily.

So this afternoon, after the other animals had been fed, I stood on the stairs and screeched "MUPPY!" before Dixie bounded up the stairs and then, surprisingly, found the energy to leap into my bed. She plopped herself down on my good pillow and I groaned inwardly though I knew I wouldn't make her move. I didn't want my good pillow to scented with whatever it is that Dixie has gotten into lately: The manure pile, a coon hit on the side of the road, the gravel pits, the horse stalls -- Anything yucky is where Dixie finds her joy.

And then I remembered: THE BATH. Dixie had a bath yesterday!

We then proceeded to have a four hour nap together, her on my good pillow and me taking second fiddle on the far side of the bed. She curled up beside me, all warm and fuzzy and rose-scented. (Oh, how the rose scent beats the scent of the dead things she likes to roll in during her spare time).

And after our time of napping was done, my pillow smelled only faintly of beagle and more like rose and I felt something else: I felt well-rested and at ease.

I may have just started a Saturday tradition: Washing my beagle so we can curl up together without negative effects on my olfactory system.

On Removing Several Layers of Skin From My Face, Foals, and Puppies

Years ago, I wrote this post, in which you'll find an incredibly revolting tale of woe regarding a growth on a dog's head, and also an apt description of my acne medication.

I've decided, again, to attempt to make my skin look clear and wonderful, and as a result I've gone back to using my old acne medication. It still smells as strong, it still dries my skin as much. It currently hurts to laugh, smile, cry, wipe away tears, yawn, and chew on food. So, hey, perhaps it interferes with day to day living a little bit, but really, a small price to pay for clear skin, right?

There are some exciting goings-on here at The Ranch that don't have to do with my acne. For one, we are only TWO MONTHS away from meeting Tia's baby. In fact, it's more like six weeks away. Tia has become quite rotund and on a daily basis you can see her little baby flopping around in her belly. Sometimes at night I go down to the barn and lean my head on her belly to feel the little kicks. Nothing like getting kicked in the head by a fetal horse to make your heart smile.

Before Tia's baby gets born, however, we have another new arrival on her way eleven days from now. Dixie is going to be quite upset about this new arrival, this little bundle of liver-colored German Shorthaired Pointer puppiness. She is flying in from Winnipeg on the fifth of December. SuperNan and I are currently chomping at the bit, so to speak, to go shopping at Petsmart for cute pink little puppy things. My father is busy rolling his eyes at all the delighted squealing we have been doing over this adorable mass of wiggles. Dixie doesn't know what's about to hit her and for this I feel bad: my poor, grumpy old beagle is about to get licked and hassled by this puppy and there is no way to mentally prepare her for that.

In the meantime, I suppose I should be doing something productive with my day like doing schoolwork or excercising on my stationary bike.

This Will Not Take Two Seasons...

Years ago I went through a breakup. Surprise! That breakup, which I posted snipets of, was chronicled somewhat on my blog. I was thinking about how to blog about my current topic when that breakup came to mind, and I recalled that it took me a whole season of Road To Avonlea and a season of ER to get over it.

I do remember opening the gift of Road To Avonlea and thinking, this is exactly what I need when the breakup happens. As it stood, it took me more than a season of Road To Avonlea and as a result, directly after that, I moved on to ER. I sat on my couch with Dixie, I watched mindless television, and I recovered.

I've done this in the past, needed something to distract me while I move on.

I went shopping today and bought a book by Marian Keyes, who I think I love more than anyone in the world right now. Her novels are fantastic and if you start reading them, please start with Rachel's Holiday as it made me laugh and laugh until I was nearly in tears. Wonderful author, that Marian.

I had high hopes for my current dating situation and like so many others, it just hasn't turned out the way I imagined. Mal asked me how I was feeling about some decisions I've made and when I told her, there was silence on the line. And then she said "Ouch. That sounds like it hurts."

Yeppers!

The fact of the matter here is that I am not in the depths of despair. I have moments in the day where I feel kinda sad, and the odd time over the past two weeks I've felt, momentarily, like I've been punched in the gut, but other than that, I'm totally fine.

So I'm making the decision to not require a minimum of six weeks' worth of mindless television. I'm giving this one a book. A Marian Keyes book.

I will read it in peace in my parents' living room with my trusty deer hound by my side.

In about seventy two hours, I will have moved on (And I say this with utter confidence) and then?

Then, Dear Blog, I will post the exciting details of my new job, which is looming closer and closer to me each day.

There is hope!

Unhealthy Attachment

My precious puppy has returned to me, praise be.

Dixie ran off after a deer, or perhaps a rabbit, but this time she stayed in the forest. It is typical that, if you lose your dog, you leave your jacket in the place where you last saw her with a tidbit of food and hopefully, the dog will know enough to stay there until you return.

About twelve hours after her disappearance, my brother returned to the bush and lo and behold, there was my Dixie! She was tired from her shenanigans and slept for a large portion of the day. I returned to the house to fawn over her and she didn't even get up off the couch to muppy with me.

Please know that I use the word 'muppy' here as a verb. Dixie and I have this tradition whereby I squeal "Muppymuppymuppy" at her and she begins to howl, whine, wiggle all over, and generally fly into a frenzy. We muppy over each other when I come home from work, during commercial breaks on TV, if I've been drinking too much, or if she discovers me sleeping in my bed. A big fan of pushing me off my pillows and hogging up the covers, that Dixie.

I sat for the evening that Dixie was gone trying very, very hard not to focus on the fact that I may never see her again. I simply can't imagine a life without her, a life free of muppying, a life free of my trusty couch companion. My life is severely lacking a cuddle buddy to watch mindless TV with, and Dixie fills that void quite nicely.

At any rate, rather than trying to fix my unhealthy attachment to my beagle, I am just going to bask in the fact that she is mine and that perhaps this year was her last year deer hunting. I know she loves it but I have to wonder if it would be worth it should her mind falter and she forgets her way back to where we hunt in the bush.

I Am Trying Not to Despair...

Oh, Dixie.

I love my little Muppy. And I openly call her Muppy in front of the whole wide world simply because I love her.

Years ago, this happened.

Dixie is now nine and I fear that she may have lost her mind, if not just a little bit. She chased a rabbit the other day, quite out of character for her. I think she's just having a bit of an identity crisis and has forgotten that she is a deer hound.

Well, today Dixie chased another rabbit. (How do we know it was a rabbit? Good question. Dixie is such a fabulous deer hound that she has a particular howl for deer, and a different howl for everything else. The howl she let out today and the other day were not her deer howls.)

And now that she is off chasing the rabbit, she has not come home. She didn't meet the gang back at the trucks to go home.

And now my muppy waits, alone in the forest, for my family to return in the morning.

I'm doing surprisingly well. I am not weeping uncontrollably or laying in the fetal position on the living room floor. I feel like someone should give me a token for such behavior on my part.

I can't imagine a life without Dixie, a life without squealing "MUPPY! Muppy muppymuppymuppy" in such a fashion that Dixie goes crazy and spins in circles howling her delight. I can't imagine not having my cuddle buddy lay beside me on the couch. I don't know what I will do with myself should my beagle not return to me.

But I am keeping my spirits high. She has run away from home before, and now she has run away again.

Here's hoping that Dixie returns home safely once again.

Well, That Was A Letdown...

I have been hunting now for four years. And I use the term hunting very seriously here because I have HUNTED with ferocity in hopes of at least SEEING something worth shooting at in the bush.

But I've yet to see a deer.

I fought tooth and nail to get two consecutive days off of work so I could go hunting. I dressed up in my Blaze orange and put my gun in Da JEEP and loaded down my pockets with slugs. I had a cup of warm coffee, a knife clipped to my belt, and my trusty hound dog at my side.

AND I DIDN'T EVEN SEE A DEER.

I'm feeling a little deflated about the whole situation.

Dixie, however, had a grand time chasing a rabbit. This is a terrible habit for a deer hound (As her time is better spent chasing deer) but I figure out of hopelessness, she just wanted to chase something. I feel for her and several times contemplated shooting at a squirrel, or a tree, or into the open sky but chose not to as this is considered poor hunting etiquette.

She did chase a deer today, howling her way through the forest like her beagle-y little self, but sadly she took it about eight thousand miles in the opposite direction of us, so no deer was to be had.

Da JEEP made it through with flying colors. I was so pumped to get to use the four wheel drive for real, to tear it through the mud and laugh in the face of other hunters who would surely be stuck in the mud.

This was not the case and after driving a little ways with the 4X4 turned on, I stopped and turned it off because all it was doing at that point was burning gas. A person could probably make it in with a Honda Civic if they so desired, that is how dainty the road has become.

But, if nothing else, I braved the four a.m. alarm clock ring, the freezing elements and the whipping winds to bond with nature and make some decisions about my life while hoping that the elusive ten point buck would walk out in front of me.

Oh, Happiness...

Remember this post?

I was so sad that Dixie looked old and sad.

Well, a few days after that, Dixie gave up all will to live and laid in her kennel for hours on end, nursing a paw that had some sort of abscess on it. In a panic, I took her to the vet because she had not gotten up to pee in about eight hours. With her bladder condition, this is not good news.

A hundred and thirty two dollars later, Dixie was diagnosed with an infection in her paw that had gone systemic and required antibiotics.

A week after that?

Dixie is back to her old self again! She is happy, full of life, and thrilled to terrify my horse by hunting small game in the ditch beside my riding ring.

She is still grey around her muzzle, but other than that she is bright eyed, eating like an overweight beagle should eat, and greeting me with more joy than she has been in the past few weeks.

Oh, happiness. My beagle is healthy once more.

On Dogs ...

Dixie came into my life nine years ago around this time. I actually think she was born at the beginning of June in 2000. I thought Dixie was a wonderful idea as, at the time, my eldest brother was expecting his first child and I didn't know how I would possibly wait for that little baby to be born.

Dixie was a wonderful distraction.

My middle brother named her just before he left for Basic Training and although I was angry that my names had been rejected by all, I thought it was quite fitting. I am still irritated that my dog was named after an eighteen year old's crush on Natalie Maines, but it has grown on me after all this time. (And I don't know which of the Dixie Chicks my brother actually had a crush on, or if there even was a crush at all, but this is my strong suspicion.)

Dixie has been through many trials and tribulations in her beagle-y little life. We once lost track of her on the farm and couldn't find her for hours, until we heard an odd howling. And when we followed the sound it turned out that she was stuck in a culvert, having chased some critter or other and could not make it out the other side.

She's been afflicted with bladder stones her entire life and in the winter of 2007 she required fifteen hundred dollars worth of surgery. In Deer Season 2006 Dixie chased a deer to a town over an hour away until she landed in a hunt camp, exhausted and begging for sandwiches from the hunting party she happened upon. SHe was gone for four days and they were horrible, horrible days for me.

Most recently Dixie's antics involve hassling one of my neighbors. She goes to his house with great regularity and the last several times I've shown up to say hello, I am greeted by my own dog. My neighbor refuses to feed her or allow her in the house, but she has made herself quite at home in his porch and enjoys hunting various small game on his property.

Dixie is my cuddle buddy. Every time she curls up on the couch with me, snuggling her petite frame into whatever space she can cram herself into, I think of what a worthwhile friend she has been over the last several years.

Dixie is starting to act and look old. She still howls at me when I come home, bounding with glee to where I am so we can spend several minutes fawning over each other. Its like every time I come home, she is shocked that I have returned and must then show her gratitude by howling and licking. It is a nice little ritual that we have going on.

I don't like the looks of Dixie lately. She seems sore, tired, old. I don't want her to be so. SHe is only nine, and may have a good long period of time left with us, but I really just don't like how she looks a little rough around the edges lately.

I don't understand how an animal can come into a person's life as a novelty and then worm it's way into her heart and stay there permanently. I suppose that no matter what the future holds, Dixie will be a large number of fond memories and happy naps.

But that doesn't mean that the fact that I must let go at some point will be any easier. I'm hoping now that this point will come much later rather than sooner.

When All Else Fails: Have A Baby!

My grandmother has been tremendously ill these last couple weeks. I have been very worried for her, as we all have. She has pneumonia and congestive heart failure. Only forty-eight hours ago, the doctors were talking about putting her on a ventilator.

It seems that the medications and care she's recieved in the Intensive Care Unit have done her well, and today when I arrived at her hospital room she was sitting up in bed looking like her old self again.(A skinny, frailer version of her old self, but her old self nonetheless). I must admit that I gasped when I saw her and said "Grandma, you're back to being you!" To this she responded that she didn't have time for a funeral, and that she had too much left to do before she went. Truer words have never been spoken.

My grandmother and I were just talking about nothing, shooting the shit, so to speak, when I mentioned the pets in my life. I was simply stating that, once my current dog leaves me, I won't be looking for another as dogs are quite the hassle. Grandma then said: "You should get something smaller, that you could hold here." And she motioned to her shoulder.

So I said: "Oh, Grandma. I've tried having cats. They hate me and go insane before trying to eat me while I sleep."

And Grandma said: "Oh, for God's sake. I wasn't talking about a damn cat. I was talking about a baby."

I must say that I was stopped completely in my tracks. Here I was, talking about my dog with a woman I love dearly, when she dropped this complete bomb on me.

I NEED TO HAVE A BABY??!?!?!!???

A Baby?

My grandmother was full of her old self today. She was precocious and vivacious, just the way I've always known her, and for this I am very, very glad. I'm not entirely sure that I'm going to run out and have a baby in the fit of glee I'm feeling this moment, but I have to say that almost anything is worth having my Grandma back to the way she was only a couple weeks ago.

On Being Loved...

I came home from work tonight to find my back door swarming with insects.

Now, I hate insects. I realize that, ecologically speaking, insects have their role to play. The problem here is that, quite frankly, I don't really care. They get stuck in my hair and they infest everything, and occasionally they bite my horse. And when things bite my horse?

I get very, very cranky.

Regadless, I'm not sure how best to deal with getting inside one's house without allowing a large mass of insects to follow. I sometimes feel like keeping a large can of BugWhacker on the back porch, spraying them down, waiting thirty seconds, and entering.

But that would be environmentally unfriendly, what with the aerosol and the poison and everything.

At any rate, I did decide to enter my home, surrounded by a swarming mass of insects. I walked into the kitchen, and awaiting me was a herd of wild beasts. Two thirds of the herd starting jumping and making noise and shedding hair around my feet.

And then there was the last third.

The final third waited patiently under the table, whining and squealing the way she does when I come home from work. And after the first two thirds had been let outside -- which allowed a whole new swarm of insects into the kitchen -- the last third, Dixie, came to my feet.

And she howled, and whined, and carried on and licked my face.

And the noise and the hair and the dog breath didn't bother me one single bit, because these are the reasons I get out of bed in the morning. My puppy loves me, and I love my puppy, and her howling when I walk in the door is what makes my life worthwhile.