Long Time No Post

Us in our HUGE yard.

Yo, it’s Kai here.  Lance is sleeping, so I’ll sneak onto the screen.

I know we haven’t posted in forever.  Stuff happened.  Lots of stuff.  Dad was laid off, got a new job, we moved to a small house in Vaughan, AND we’ve moved to Texas!  That’s right,  I mean, who’d have thought that? 

Texas.

“So how’s Texas?”, y’all ask   (See how I’m down with the local lingo?)  It ROCKS.  I have a huge yard.  There are deer around.  I get to go out all the time.  And best of all, it hardly ever rains.  Sure it’s hot, but no rain?  I’ll take it any day. 

Did I tell you I have a huge yard?  I mean it’s massive.  I can go to the other side and hide out – you can’t even see me.  You can run for, like, forever.    Better yet, as soon as the rest of it gets fenced, I get two or three times that much.  I’m just waiting for one of those uppity deer to waltz onto my ground.  Then we’ll see who’s fast and who’s not.

I have found one thing in TX that’s not good.  Snakes.  I really don’t understand what possible value they have.  Mom and Dad took us to see some.  All I did was look at the evil thing and I got knocked across the yard.  (Don’s comment.  We took Kai and Lance to be ‘snake proofed’.  The idea is to expose them to snakes and use a shock collar to make the experience so negative they never want to even look at one again.  Yes, this is cruel and not for the faint of heart, but so is rushing to the emergency vet an hour away.)  So far, we’ve only seen the two snakes at that one place.  (I’m keeping an eye out though). 

You want to hear about the trip down?  It was pretty rad.  We had this really big crate that mom and dad were in with us (minivan).  It was kewl.  You could sleep all day, and when you wanted out all you had to do was walk over and lick someone.  We got to stay in a new house every night.  One of them had an elevator – it’s like a crate that moves up and down – not too scary I did it as a puppy.  While we were in Cincinnati, we stayed next to this park; it was kewl, but there was this huge dude hanging out there all the time – he had to be like 10 dogs tall.  I tried showing him that there was one dog he couldn’t scare, but he just stood there.  Hmph!    (This would be the statue of Abraham Lincoln in Lytle Park.)  I did keep one set of shady characters out of the car.  We crossed the border into the US and these guys wanted to look into the car – I guess they’d never seen a dog before.  Me and Lance convinced them they should move along and wake someone else up.  (Lance’s really grumpy when he gets woken from a sound sleep.)  Lance and I got a chance to mark the whole way from Ontario to TX. 

You got other questions?  Want to know about living in Vaughan?  The rockin’ dog park we had when we were in the apartment while we closed on the house?  No prob.  But another day; there are deer to watch.

Chow,

Kai

Camping

Yo!  Kai Here!

So for my 1^st birthday Mom and Dad took me (and Lance) camping.  It was GREAT!  I had a ton of fun.  Since we went in the middle of the week, we had the park (Bruce Peninsula National Park) mostly to ourselves, so we were able to hike and run around with Mom and Dad mostly off leash.  We got to play in the water, though Lance was the one crazy enough to go swimming, I, more practically, prefer to be able to touch bottom when I'm in the water.  Still it's a lot of fun.  Dad throws things out into the water, Lance leaps in and goes to get them, and I wait on the shore and take them away from him.  Lots of fun and I don't get my head wet.

Sleeping in the tent was great.  If you haven't done it, it's sort of like crate training your parents.  Except that the sides of the crate are soft.  That, and when you wake up in the dark and nose your Dad to see if you can go out, he grumbles some.  Still loads of fun.

About the only thing that wasn't great were the black flies!  They kept biting the inside of my ears.  Is that fair?  Really?  Geez!  Mom and Dad were going to use Off® on our ears, but they weren't sure it was safe for puppies.  Mom and Dad put up the dining tent and we spent the really buggy times in there.

Overall, camping gets a big 5 paws from me.  Black flies, no paws. 

Later,

Kai

BTW, my birthday was May 3^rd, you all know that right?  I expected at least 1-2 kilos of aged cheddar.  Perhaps you forgot to put it in the mail.

Chews

Yo!  Kai here.

You know when you’ve found the perfect thing to chew?  It’s just the right size and weight?  Thuds really good on the floor or your crate?  You know what I’m talking about right?  It rocks, right.  Right balance of hard and soft, just enough good stuff in the middle so you can dig it out?  I’ve got one of those – it’s a piece of antler.  (Shut up Lance, I am *not* an elk and this is not cannibalism.)

So I’m chewing away this afternoon, I’ve had lunch, and looking forward to a long nap once I get a bit more gnawing done.  So, of course, Dale has to come by and start staring at me.  And the only choice once you’ve been taunted by a cat is to follow him until you can get a good solid sniff or lick in – I mean a guy’s gotta have his limits, right?  Anyway, I head back to my antler, and Lance has snagged it while I was doing my official dog duties!  I mean, what gives?  He’s the older one, isn’t he supposed to be keeping the cats in line? 

Now I’m stuck with one of the 2^nd best chews in the house.  I get the imitation tire and slog back to the kitchen, but, wait, here’s my chance.  Lance is off away from Mom by the bathroom.  If I’m quiet enough, and don’t give it away…  BANG!  All it takes is a couple of quick feints at Lance’s ears (which are HUGE by the way) and I’ve got the antler and he’s got nuttin’!  (OK, he’s got the tire, but who wants that when there’s an antler?)

That's it for now.  Five or six more chews and I'm done.

Later!

Kai

Bye Snow

Hi! Lance here.

I know you humans out there may be happy for, but it looks like the snow is starting to leave.  Saturday we had tons of lovely fluffy white stuff to roll and run in.  Today’s it’s all slushy and messy; I’m going to miss it when it’s gone.    It’s not all bad though, ‘cause with summer comes swimming and that’s almost as great as playing in the snow. 

Still we got a bit more snow time because we went to a new dog park on the weekend.  It was really great.  Lots different than the one near our house with a lot more trees to sniff at and new dogs to meet. 

Here’s a  picture of it:

I’d better go.  Almost time to go outside and bark at the dog next door.

Later,

Lance

p.s.      Here a picture of Kai and me in the driveway.  Mommy and Daddy have got to stop feeding him.  He’s HUGE!.  I mean he must be some sort of a mutant!

See?  How come he's taller than me?????

Snow!

Hi.  Lance here.

Wednesday was the best day in MONTHS.  I mean it was almost as good as when Kai came to live here or when Mommy and Daddy took me swimming for the first time.  I bet you can’t guess what happened can you?  It snowed!!!!!!!!!

I was so excited that I had to get Mommy and Daddy to get us (Kai and me) outside to play. 

Here we are playing in the driveway.    You can just see the streaks of snow on my coat – Kai’s too grey to really see it on him.  

Here’s another picture.  You can really see the snow this time.   You can’t see it in the picture, but we have a ring toy we’re playing with.  I still can’t get Kai to chase with me when Daddy throws, but he’s great to wrestle with when I start back.

Here’s another picture with us and snow swirling around us.  I’ve just run back from the fence with a tire toy.  Kai’s good at lying in wait while I do all the work and catch the tire.  Then, he’s all in my face trying to get my prize.  Nope, little brother, not this time.  (Or next, or the one after that, or the one after that…)

Here’s us just racing in the snow.  It’s the best.  I know it’s not cold enough for it to stick yet, but maybe soon.  (I’d go on the internet and see where all the great snow is so I can tell Mommy and Daddy were to drive, but every time I’m near the computer, Kai’s there and he drools a lot.  It makes it hard to type and Mommy yells yuck a lot.)

After all the fun, we went inside.  Here’s my brother and my cats hanging out at the fire.  It was too hot for me that close, so I stayed in the kitchen where the tile’s cool.

I’m going to sign off now.  Mommy’s going to throw the stuffed rabbit.

Lance

I am the Big One!

Yo!  Kai Here!

It’s official.  I’m taller than Lance.  Woo hoo!  Can I parley that into a bigger portion of the cheese?  Who knows?  I’m like mountains taller than him – it’s gotta be a whole cm.  He says I’ve got stork legs and it doesn’t count.  He’s just jealous ‘cause I can find Mom when she’s hiding under the covers better than he can.  Got weighed at the vet today, Lance is still fatter than me.  I’m 38.4kg and he’s 46.3kg.

We went to the dog park today (the one near the house at the movie theatre).  I met a Bernese there who just didn’t get the whole idea of “dog park”.  It’s not like he was an old dude, but he just didn’t get the idea that you’re actually supposed to run around?  I had to do it all, but that’s OK.  I still had a good time.  Dad wasn’t paying close enough attention, and I found a GREAT mud puddle.  It’s close to 3 hours since we had to come home and I’m still dirty.  I love the fall.

Chow,

Kai

My Crazy Parents

Hi.  Lance here.

I love my parents, I really do.  But sometimes I think Mommy and Daddy may be insane.

Saturday was like many Saturdays.  We went to the dog park and drove around with Mommy and Daddy.  We even got to go to some stores.  That was all fun – always is.

Then we got home and everything got weird.  For some reason which neither Kai nor I can understand, Mommy and Daddy decided to empty their crate of all their stuff and put it all back in!  We (Kai and me) had our crates put in the hall upstairs while they ran around moving things.  Their crate was perfectly fine.  Why move things?  I don’t know.

I haven’t told the bad part yet, have I?  This went on until 3:00 in the morning!!!!!  I mean, really, who needs to stay up extra late to fix their bed?  Kai overheard Mommy talking about the room’s Kung Fu or Kung Pao – maybe there was some thing wrong with their chickens?  I’m not sure why it happened, but the next time they start talking about karate chickens I’m heading to the basement and hiding behind the sofa!

Gotta go (need to stake out my place before Kai gets there),

Lance