Oh my. It’s so hot today. I wish we could go for a boat ride.

Wait ... are they getting the boat ready?

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy! They read my mind! I’m going out in the boat!

aaaahhhhh ... nothing like the wind in my ears ....

hey, you said you wanted a close-up of me, didn’t you?

That was fun—now for a big drink of water ...

(Hannah belongs to Andy and Linda of my previous post.)

Thank you all for your heartfelt condolances. It means a lot to me.

We’re back now from settling my Mom’s affairs. It was an emotional week staying in her house without her there and making all the tearful phone calls to friends and family. With every call it brought all the grief to the surface again. We had to wonder what Mom would have thought seeing her house filled to the brim with Rick and me; my sister and her husband; our three large dogs and my sister’s bulldog. Oh yes, and my Mom’s cat: Pookie. The cat that doesn’t like anything or anybody but my Mom. The cat hates me. Always has.

Poor kitty, what was she thinking with Mom gone?

We found her under the bed in the guest room where Rick and I would be sleeping. She was hissing and growling at us per her normal behavior. I didn’t want to get too close as she has attacked me in the past with paws and nails flailing. What to do? My Mom had always said if anything happened to her that the cat would have to be euthanised because she didn’t think she could adapt to anyone else. Even the woman who looked after the cat when Mom made her trips down here to visit us calls Pookie “special” and gives her plenty of space and doesn’t try and pet her. Lord knows I have never been brave enough to try to pet that cat.

At first we thought we were going to try and catch her and just take her to the vet. The woman who usually watched her for Mom was out of town on vacation and due back the next day. So, Pookie got a reprieve while we waited to find out if the woman would want to take her in. In the meantime she was living in our room and getting used to us and the dogs. The woman returned from vacation and said she felt the cat would not fit into her household.

By the second day she started to come out and wander around the room when Rick was in there, and then when I was there. No hissing; no growling; no spitting. By the third night she was sleeping on my pillow. I was afraid to move or reach up anywhere near her, not knowing quite what she would do. At this point, her fate was sealed—she would be coming home with us to see if we could make it work.

When we got home we put Pookie in one of the wire dog crates so she could see us going about the kitchen doing our normal routines and meet the other cats pretty much face-to-face. Here is Sam making her feel at home.

We turned her loose in our bedroom and she’s been under our bed since Friday evening. She’s not eating at the moment, but she didn’t eat for a few days when we first got to Mom’s either. Last night I woke to find her on the pillow above my head. I think I was half asleep and reached up and stroked her head and back. I still have my hand. A little later she was clawing at my side of the bed and then I saw her slip out of the room and go downstairs. So, she is starting to adjust and explore. We’ll see where this leads. Maybe between the two of us we can work out our grief together.

I think Mom would approve.

I’ve been overwhelmed this past week with worries and sadness and I just couldn’t bring myself to write—about anything. Rick’s Dad has finally turned the corner and is now being moved from ICU. It took him about four days to come around once they removed his “doze” meds. He had a low level pneumonia after the surgery and we were worried as he only has one complete lung. They got him out of bed yesterday for the first time in a week and he’s as weak as a newborn kitten. It’s going to take some time to bounce back, but he’s on his way to recovery finally.

While we were worrying about Vaughn’s heart, it turned out that is was our dog Daisy’s heart that we should have been concerned about without even knowing it. I can’t quite believe it myself, but we lost Daisy on Friday, July 6th. She’s gone from us ... our Daisy-Doo. Just like that. I won’t go into the details here but if you remember I mentioned she was sick. We had thought it was an infection of some kind and she was on antibiotics. They had done x-rays and on Monday her heart looked rounder than normal. Our vet wasn’t overly concerned since her heart sounded fine in all respects and Daisy was back eating and she wasn’t as lethargic as she had been. Then on Friday she took a turn for the worse and was having difficulty breathing. We rushed her to the ER at 10:00 p.m., but her heart just stopped on the exam table as she was being given fluids. We didn’t even get to say good-bye to her. We had no clue when we handed her over to the triage nurse and she led her back to the ER room that we would never see her alive again.

As it turned out she had a tumor in her heart that had started to bleed. The fluid was accumulating around her heart and before they could tap it to drain the fluid, she was gone. It’s just too sad. Even if we had diagnosed it earlier her prognosis would have been grim. At least she didn’t suffer, but we would have liked some closure with her with some advance notice. They assured us that this kind of cancer usually is hidden until it becomes critical. Daisy was only five-and-a-half. We will miss her sweet smiling eyes and silly “Doo-ness.” Rest well, sweet Daisy ... we’ll miss you so ...

This past weekend Rick brought home one of the new cameras that his company designs and manufactures, the Miro 2, to have some fun with. Just a $20,000 toy! After chasing bees and butterflies around and waiting for the goldfinches to land on the feeder, he was running out of interesting things to film in slow motion, so I came up with the idea of having the dogs catch food.

We used to teach this trick to our dogs that we showed because it keeps them focused and up in the show ring. Now that we don’t show any of our current dogs, the catching skills vary. I chose Cheez Doodles™,  a delicious and delectable snack we all love (sorry, folks, Wise Foods only distributes in the East—one of the perks of living here!). I throw as fast as I can and it all happens in only a second.

Here is Alex’s attempt. Watch him track the doodle with his eye! Watch for Daisy’s nose on the right tracking it as well. Where will it land?

Now it’s Hailey’s turn, and she misses. You can see the shadow of the doodle as it approaches her mouth on the deck below. She trys a frantic last grab at it.

Success for Hailey! Watch Daisy and Alex track it too!

Yesterday Rick and I were sitting in our little cozy space off the kitchen watching TV. I was knitting, making another pair of felted clogs / slippers for Rick since his are wearing through on the sole. When he crosses his legs I can see the shreds of felted wool hanging forlornly down.

We were relaxing in-between new coats of paint [Biscuit Bitz] in our dining room. I wasn’t really paying attention to where the dogs were as they had been in and out dozens of times already. They like to lay on the snow bank that formed on the deck last week when I only partially shovelled off the snow. In part, I did this because I was lazy, but also because as I shovelled from one side to the other, dogs had decided to lay on the piled up snow. So be it, I thought, I’ll leave it for you if you find it that much fun.

I didn’t see it because I was concentrating on my stitches, but Rick said the dogs flew off the deck and now we could hear them barking. He got up to see what they were barking at, turned around and said very calmly to me “I think the dogs need to come in. They have the bear treed.” I jumped up and ran to the window. Yup, there was the bear up the big oak looking worried, and two dogs barking madly and running around the base of the tree. I threw open the door and started screaming their names, or at least I thought I had the right names. Turns out I only had one right, but no matter within a few seconds of my panicked voice calling come here!  and   leave it!, they gave up their quarry and came running for the house. Good Dogs.

The bear lost no time; the minute the dogs left the base of the tree it was already halfway down, and by the time the dogs got to the house the bear was going over the fence. Whew. Another bear vs dog crisis averted. Sorry, no photo. I was too worried for the dogs to leave them in order to get my camera. I’m sure you understand. It would have made a great pic, however. It was Ursa this time, because I could see the cubs in the woods. I watched them playing for awhile, doing their dance routine and rolling around in the snow.

Last week, before the snow, the bears were quite active. I saw them nearly every day as I walked the dogs. I could almost count on them being in the same spot in the woods every day. Ursa, Major, and Minor would just sit and watch me walk by. When the snow started to fly, they retreated into their cozy storm drain cave. Today I will need to be especially watchful as it’s going to be nice and warm. A perfect day to forage around for food.

Maybe I should change my blog name to read “A Bear Walks Through it,” or “Life with Bears.” ?