Walkin' on Sunshine

So I'm thinking that I need to teach Marty to act like Seymour and have him whistle Walkin on Sunshine when he's in a mood like he was today.

First off, Marty liked his crate before, now he LOVES IT.  He loves being able to stretch out and lay out.  He was super hyper last night and I think it's because he was actually able to sleep comfortably.  Thanks mom and dad!

Today, he was great!  He loved his lunchtime walk!!

"Hey buddy, it's nice out."

"Bark!  Bark bark!...wait, that's a yawn."

K Bye!

Meeting Grandma and Grandpa

Spoiler alert, no new pictures.  It was a pretty overwhelming weekend, as you'll soon read, so I didn't get a chance to take too many pictures.

This past Sunday my mom and dad drove through DC on their way to South Carolina for what is now their 3rd vacation of the summer.  I guess they're enjoying having my sister and I be done with school.  They stopped by wanting to meet Marty, and more importantly, be good grandparents and spoil him.

My parents "like" dogs in theory (my dad constantly teases my mom that he's just going to get a puppy one day) but also realize that they're messy and require a huge time commitment.  That being said, they LOVED Marty.

Surprisingly, Marty was not scared of my parents at all.  He was running around, wanting to be petted and rolling around looking for tummy rubs.  My dad found out the hard way why we sometimes call Marty a bruiser.  I told my dad wanted to play with Marty but couldn't get him to come to him.  I told him that if he sat on the floor that Marty would run right over.  

In typical Marty fashion, he sprinted over, head down, and ensured that I wouldn't be having any late life siblings.

Sibling denying incidents aside, I was a bit surprised how quickly Marty took to my parents.  When they parked, I met them outside without Marty, and gave them hugs while he perched on the couch watching me. I'm assuming this helped out a lot.

We then decided to take Marty to PetSmart with us for his first ever trip to PetSmart.  I was a little worried, but apparently I was being crazy since Marty LOVED IT.  He was running around, sniffing all of the toys, sniffing all of the food, kinda playing with all of the other dogs, and scaring a little kid who kept saying that Marty was "going to get him."  

The kid was nervous that Marty could reach him on his dad's shoulders.

We had a great time at PetSmart and picked Marty up a sweet cushion for his crate and a big chicken flavored nyla bone.  I hope he doesn't get used to this treatment.  

Trouble arose on the trip back to the house.  About 2 minutes after we got into the car, I noticed that the bottom of Marty's paw was covered in blood.  My mom found some tissues and I cleaned out around the paw and saw that he had a 1/4" cut on the pad on his back paw.  It was a large cut, nor was it super deep ("Do we have to take him to the hospital?  Is the vet nearby??" -Mom) it just bled a lot.  

We cleaned out the cut and once it stopped bleeding, crated him for a bit while we went to lunch.  My parents left shortly after lunch, but not before giving him his giant nyla bone.

THIS WAS A MISTAKE

Marty ate almost the entire bone in one sitting.  I was not expecting this at all.  He usually gnaws on the bones for weeks so I was not expecting him to utterly devour it.

This basically led to me staying up the entire night, ushering Marty outside as he would throw up pieces of the bone every 45-60 min.  

The funny part was that Marty could almost control his gag reflex.  I would hear him start to gag and would instantly rush him outside.  He would hold it until we got outside, then give a big swallow and look at me like it was time to play... at 3:00 AM.  Not playtime.

I think he threw up 4 times throughout the night and we went outside a total of 9-10 times.  It was a really fun night.

Also, Daisy is back.  They seem to be getting along, mostly just kind of ignoring one another at the moment.  I'll try to get a cute picture of them.  

I just remembered, my mom got a couple of pictures from PetSmart, so I'll edit this later with pics.

K bye

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

It's easy to forget that Marty is a puppy.

Marty is a big guy, 36 lbs, and due to his cautious nature, was pretty well behaved in the house.  

It was pretty easy to be comfortable of a timid puppy who didn't really run around the house, was too scared to pee or poop inside (he had to use the corners in the backyard), and really just wanted to lay on my lap since no one else really gave him attention.  

Now that he's more comfortable (a big part of this is James moving in), he has no problem running around the house, wanting to play, and just generally being a happy dog.  Now these are all big pluses.  Of course I want my puppy, especially a shy guy like Marty, to be a bit more adventurous and happy-go-lucky, but this has come at a price.

Because of timidity, I think I fell into a training rut with him, since I wasn't too worried about him going to the bathroom in the house or chewing anything up.  As he's gotten more comfortable, he's gotten a bit more destructive (gnawing on shoes, sheets, etc) and has have 3 accidents in the past week.  

I sometimes liken his little puppy brain to a computer.  Whenever he learns something new, he forgets something else.  For example, over the past 2-3 days he's realized that he can poop anywhere on walks.  He doesn't have to find a specific spot that he loves in the park or the church near my house, he can just go on the grass on the sidewalk.  This realization was great.  It makes walks a lot easier, since more areas smell like him making him feel more comfortable, and also helps me, since he now goes to the bathroom with more regularity (he was regular before, but we always had to go to specific "poop spots" which were the only places he would go, whereas now, he'll go 2-3 times on a walk, rather than all at once in a poop spot, and then having to go 2 minutes after we got home).

But as I mentioned earlier, since having this revelation, he's forgotten that he can't go in the house.  A perfect example was this morning.  We woke up a little before 6 (my alarm is set for 6:03).  We snuggled in bed a little bit, i.e. he licked my face and then rested his head on my chest, until my alarm actually went off.  Got out of bed and gave him breakfast.  As he was eating I grabbed my coffee mug and was walking back into the dining room to pour myself a cup.  Mid-pour I see Marty is done eating, and he's looking up at me, when all of a sudden he squats down (not a leg lifter yet) and starts to pee.  He got maybe a half second out before I yelled "HEY!"  This exclamation was followed by him immediately stopping, his ears pasting themselves to his head, and him running in a circle and looking at me.  

As I ushered him outside he was giving me a look as if to say, "Oh no, I peed inside.  I totally forgot I can't pee inside.  Can you forgive me?  I just had to pee and yesterday I realized I could go anywhere so I thought I could go inside but I forgot the original no inside rule.  I'm so sorry, maybe if I jump on you and try to give you kisses you'll forgive me.  Sorry sorry sorry sorry.  I love you...Hey look a bug."

Luckily, not much pee came out and I was able to soak it all up and out of the carpet and then spray some cleaner on and clean it up.  Not a big deal, but it was an odd differentiation from our normal morning routine.  Normally, I'd have let him outside about 2 seconds after I had added cream to my coffee.  But still, accidents happen, it's just weird that they keep happening on the carpet.

Another great thing is that Marty wants to play more often.  This is awesome.  It's so much fun to play with a puppy.  The downside is that Marty doesn't understand how to play with people and that he needs to be gentle.  The other night we were playing and I was rubbing his tummy.  Marty jumped up and crawled on top of me (we were playing and he had to win).  He stood on top of me and started licking my face (normal thing), when out of nowhere he opened his mouth and bit down relatively hard on the side of my face, between my cheek and my eye.  It wasn't hard enough to break skin, but it sure as hell was enough to hurt.  I  yelled "OW!" (whenever he gnaws hard, we don't tell him "No" we yell "Ow" to try to teach him to be gentle.  Other puppies make high pitched noises when they gnaw on each other too hard or play too rough, so this is supposed to teach him the roughness thresh hold.).  Unfortunately, this wasn't a training "Ow," this was a , "That really hurt, what the hell" sound.  

Marty instantly knew that something was wrong and started yelping and crying while running back to his bed.  I got up and walked over to the bathroom to make sure he didn't break the skin.  At this point I had to step back and think.  I didn't think scolding him would accomplish anything.  He knew he had done something wrong, that much was clear, but he probably didn't realize what he had done.  There was no way to recreate the situation, so I figured the best thing to do would be to sit in the chair by my desk and let him pout a bit.  When I sat down, he leaped onto my bed and gave me his puppy look (eyes wide, ears pushed back, head inching forward for a scratch).  It broke my heart, but I ignored him for 5 minutes, until he became interested in something else.  After this I got up and sat with him.  He started licking my hand (still knowing I was upset).  When he started gnawing on my hand, I instantly went "Ow," and then said "Hey."  He stopped gnawing for a few minutes. 

I'm researching the best ways to teach a puppy to be gentler when they play.  This is a really important lesson for him to learn since he will be a really big dog.  

Like I said, two steps forward, one step back, well two steps back in this case.  

Still, he's a good puppy and he's basically a 6 year old.  He's going to make mistakes and he's going to have accidents, it's just my responsibility to do my best to make sure he doesn't do them again.

Sorry for the long post, it's just been a bit of an up and down week.

Marty is also really excited to meet his grandma and grandpa this weekend!

Also, here's a cute pic that Aunt Steph took for us:

K, bye!

Vet Results Revisited

A few people have been asking how Marty's doing since his vet visit.

I'm happy to say he's doing really well!  The antibiotics seem to be working and the lick granuloma is clearing up nicely!

Last week

This morning

As you can probably tell, the redness has gone away and the lump isn't swollen anymore.  The scabbing is most gone and no more pus comes out when you squeeze it.  It's impossible to tell from the pic, but fur is starting to grow back in the area.  I'm still keeping the cone on during the day, and will probably continue to do so through the end of the week.  The vet suggested 5-7 days, but I figure 2 more couldn't hurt.  I think the last little scab will be completely gone by then.  He also never licks it with the cone off.

As far as his ear infection, we've been using the medicine and cleaning his ear every day.  I've even started cleaning out the other ear every few days.  I'm going to have to invest in some long q-tips or something, because it's actually kind of tough to clean out his ears.  For those who don't know, dog's ear canals are actually L shaped, so you have to really dig in there with cotton wrapped around your finger.

OoOoOoOo...Science

Still, Marty let's me clean out his ears and put in the medicine (he doesn't like it though and mostly just "shuts off" when I do it).  He scratches at his ears a lot less, if at all anymore.

All in all, I think he's doing great!

K bye!

Weekends with Elmo

This weekend was a whirlwind.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we dog sat for Elmo this weekend.

Hi Elmo!

Elmo is a little corgi/pom mix that is a bundle of energy at almost all times.  Contrast this to the normally laid back and relaxed Marty.  Marty and Elmo get along pretty well, with Elmo teaching Marty how to be a dog.

Elmo arrived on Thursday night and instantly realized that it was play time.  Marty was really excited and was more than happy to start wrestling and running around.  Within minutes both pups were getting along as if they had never spent time apart.

Dog sitting was really easy on Friday.  Took them both for walks in the morning, took them out at night, let them play.

Saturday, now this was a dog of a different color.  Both dogs are early risers, not a huge problem, while Marty is usually somewhat slow to rise, Elmo was ready to go almost instantly.  This lit a spark in Marty as well, and he was instantly ready to go.

After some breakfast, it was time for a walk.  We had found Elmo's leash (thanks for hiding that Ryan!) and I attempted to walk both pups at once.  This was a bad idea.

Elmo was adventurous and wanted to sniff and spell everything.  Marty, hung out by my side/behind me, and was not surging ahead.  In the end, I had to hold both leashes tight and just force them to walk next to one another.  I think this actually worked out pretty well since Marty saw Elmo just dashing off and trying to smell everything.  Eventually he started sniffing around too.

Once we got back, it was play time.  At 9 AM.  All day.  Basically, all Marty and Elmo wanted to do was chase each other and wrestle.  Wrestling did lead to an interesting realization from Marty though.  At some point he was consistently winning these wrestling matches.  It finally dawned on him, I'm bigger than Elmo.  Once this realization happened, Elmo rarely won.  This pissed Elmo off quite a bit and he started being a bit more aggressive.  This in turn led to Marty being more aggressive.  After lots of "gentle!" calls and separating them and putting them outside, they finally calmed down and wrestled like normal.

Marty is still wearing his cone of shame.  I put it on him for a bit in the morning because I had to run some errands and couldn't watch him the entire time.  Elmo was actually really good with the cone on Marty.  It was as if he realized that Marty had to finish his initiation.

"Don't worry man, the cone isn't that bad."

Saturday ended up just being a long day.  Though both pups would get tired, they weren't tired enough to not play with one another.  They finally crashed around 9 or 10.  I've never seen Marty crash so hard.  It was pretty funny.

Sunday was completely different.  I don't think either dog expected to wake up with the other there.  This was how most of Sunday was spent:

Who's a sleepy puppy??

It was pretty adorable.

They slept most of the day Sunday.  Well Marty slept most of the day.  Elmo would get random bursts of energy.  I'd bring both outside to play, but Marty would just lie down.  I would end up chasing Elmo for 10 minutes until he would also collapse.  The whole time, Marty would sit on the stoop watching, wanting to join in, but just be too tired.

Elmo left Sunday night.  Thank you Ryan for scaring both pups and causing a bark fest, followed by Marty confusingly peeing (not on the new carpets!) on the floor.  Ryan and Gloria, Elmo was really well behaved the whole weekend (except for the barking.  Man, we would tell him not to bark, and I swear, he would look me right in the eyes and bark again almost every time).  He's welcome back anytime.

Marty spent most of the day Monday sleeping as well (I had the day off).  We went for a short run, which he really didn't understand, and did some walking on busy streets.  He was pretty good on the busy streets!

For some reasons he decided that sleeping on top of my was a lot more comfortable than the couch:

So comfy...for him.

Here are some pics from our day on Monday, featuring Marty hanging out in his favorite spot:

I love the steps.

I can see upstairs.

Or I can see downstairs.

Marty loves hanging out on the stairs when I'm downstairs.  I think it's because he can go either up or down pretty quickly, depending on what he hears.

Finally, one last picture.  Here's the look he gives me whenever I leave for work.  I think he can tell when I'm leaving since I take a while to get ready:

"Hey buddy, where we going?  Oh, I'm not coming?  Ok..."

Well that's all for now.

K bye!

Adventures in Walking the Third: Actually Going Outside

Sometime over the past 10 days Marty realized that going outside is fun!  Still very scary, but the fear is outweighed by the possibility of fun.

I didn't mention this last week, since I thought it would have been a one off experience, but last Wednesday, Marty pooped and peed (non-dog owners may not realize this, but talking about poop and pee is almost commonplace between dog owners.  Never thought I'd be talking to a random cute girl about dog poop, but it's happened...twice) someplace that wasn't my backyard.

I accomplished this by taking Marty on a long walk, about 2 hours long.  We ended up at a park about a block from my house.  Marty always felt "comfortable" in this park, not comfortable enough to pee or anything, but comfortable enough that sometimes his tail wagged a bit.  This visit wasn't a fun visit though.  This visit was war.

Throughout the long walk, Marty had been making eye contact with me, as if to say "I gotta go pee, and we're nowhere near home...what should I do?"  When he realized that we weren't going to go home his eyes then said, "It's on."

When we finally did a giant loop around VA Square and Clarendon, we ended up Gumball Park.  Our eyes met again, his eyes begging to go home for sweet release, my eyes drenched in sweat and burning with a fire to see my dog poop in a park.

I decided to chase Marty around a bit and try to make him forget about being scared...EUREKA!!  It worked.  Marty started peeing after about a minute.  Tons of praise and treats followed.  Then, he produced his encore.  Equally praised and full or treats.

Since then, he has no problem going outside of backyard, but he was still scared of going outside.  Last weekend, something changed.  From Monday and through our walk this morning, Marty has been almost running out the door.  He gets scared numerous times throughout the walk, but still, he has no problem leaving the house, and generally enjoys walks a lot more.

I'm so proud of the little guy!  Here's a little video of us hanging out in the park.  Check out the giant difference between his manner in this video:

And this picture:

I'm proud of him and so excited for when he's even more comfortable.

On a side note, Marty's been hilarious with his cone, but has also been letting me clean his ears and apply his ointment.  His paw is already looking better and he barely fidgets when I clean his ear and apply the ointment!

Expect lots of pictures from the weekend with Elmo!

K byeeeeeee

Visiting the Vet

This is proving to be another week of firsts!  Last night Marty paid his first visit to the vet!  Nothing was wrong with the little guy, but I wanted to just get a general check up and ask a few questions.  It actually turned into a pretty eventful evening, so get ready.

Time to go to the vet.  Marty thought we were just going outside for a walk, but he quickly realized that this was not the case when we walked over to James' car.  Marty isn't a huge fan of cars to begin with, but he enjoyed riding in Ryan F.'s car so I thought he might enjoy James' too.

Marty does not like James' car.

James' car was a little louder than Ryan's so it scared Marty quite a bit.  Not to the point of peeing, which is a good thing.  Marty decided the safest place was between my feet, curled in a ball, trying to find the source of the loud noise...the engine.

After an otherwise uneventful car ride (about 4 minutes) we got to Ballston Animal Hospital.  Man, I can't even begin to sing the praises of this place.  Everyone, from the receptionists to the interns, the assistants/nurses, and the vets themselves, were all extremely friendly and lavished Marty with belly rubs, treats, and praise.  They did their absolute best to make sure that Marty felt at home, but Marty was still pretty scared of this new place, with tons of people and the smells of hundreds of other animals.

So...what are we waiting for?

We sat in the waiting room for a few minutes before being brought into the exam room.  See, I had no idea I'd be in there too.  It's like having a baby.  The vet's nurses went over some basic stuff with me, i.e. any behavioral issues to be worried about, is he a growler, does he mind being picked up?  

After going over the basics and seeing how he was cowering in fear behind me, the nurses realized that he was absolutely harmless and crouched down and started giving him treats and telling him how cute he was.  If there's one thing Marty likes, it's being told how handsome he is.  His tail started wagging and he took a couple of treats and plopped himself down right between them.  Then we had to get him on the scale.  

Let's just say, he didn't want to go on.  Cue the first bout of frightened pee.

With a little lifting and prodding we finally got Marty on the scale.  Marty weighs over 36 lbs!!!!  He's going to be a big boy!

I pointed out a little scab on his paw that won't go away and the fact that he scratches one ear a lot.  They said they'd mention it to the vet and she would take a look at him.

I'm not scared...I promise...Maybe...

Dr. Hall came in and was extremely sweet right from the start.  She asked if this was my first dog, and when I responded yes, she went through a ton of the basics and then asked everything we'd been working on.  She was pretty happy with his progress from utterly not potty trained, to pretty house trained, as well as his tricks.  Marty was pretty nervous around her, but eventually he relented and let her check him out without flinching all the time.  

Cue the second bout of fear pee.

See how much he loved it?

Dr. Hall said Marty seemed very healthy for his age.  She said he was a good weight and seemed to be getting plenty of exercise.  She did say he could probably stand to gain a pound or 2, but also that he's growing so fast that he might just seem skinny today.  

She checked his paw and his ear and saw that he had been licking his paw, which had brought about a slight infection, and after looking in his ear, saw that he had a minor ear infection.  I was surprised that when she squeezed the scrape on his paw, that a little pus actually came out.  She said it was fairly common for dogs to scrape themselves and continuously lick the wound.  I thought this would clean it out, but, as I was informed, it actually brings about lick granuloma. Basically, he scraped himself, them overly licked the scrape until it hurt even more and became slightly infected.

Ouch!

She commented on his ears saying that dogs with floppy ears generally tend to get a few infections a year, but that it's usually not a problem.  Dr. Hall also said that if I cleaned them out every couple of weeks that it should reduce the chances of infection.

After being shown how to clean his ear and administer ear drops, Dr. Hall left to check out one or two more things and said her nurses would be coming in to fit Marty for a cone.

"Hey, where are you going?  I was just starting to not be scared of you..."

I think the cone of shame is a rite of passage for all puppies.  At some point, every pup needs to wear the cone, and once this happens, their welcome into the puppy fraternity.  Marty, however, is that perfect combination of gangly limbs, large body, and small head, which makes it impossible to find a cone that fits.

After some searching, they found on.  It's size is hilarious and boy does he not get it.

I promise I won't make anymore fear pee.

Cue fear pee number 3.

After a few minutes Dr. Hall came back and gave me all of Marty's meds.  She said that the cone should be put on for the next 5-7 days to ensure that the scrape has healed and the ear infection should subside within a week too.

Everyone in the room also got a good laugh when I praised Marty for only peeing in the office three times.  They apparently realized how big of an accomplishment this was.

The rest of the visit was pretty uneventful.  Marty didn't look too happy when I was paying the bill.  I guess he thought he had to pay for it.  He cheered up when he realized that I had this one.

It cost HOW much?!

And with that Marty's first vet visit was over!  He was a really good boy and I was glad to get him checked out.

And of course, obligatory pics of Marty with his Elizabethan collar:

Marty does not like the collar.  He tries to forget he has it on, but just ends up stumbling around, almost as if he drunk.  The funniest moment is when he runs up to say hi.  He charges full speed and wants to jump on you, but right before he would normally stop, the cone bumps into me.  He then just puts all of his weight forward and leans in on the cone, not really sure why he's not moving.  It's pretty adorable.  

He also has no idea how to get in or out of his crate anymore.  He just bumps into the top and bottom with his cone.  Again, pretty hilarious.

K bye!!!!!!