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Weezie Iza Star, and Cows Gone Wild!

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Hey, check out who made it as the very FIRST Frenchie LOL on Ihasahotdog (LOL Cats – aka ICanHasCheezburger.Com – for dogs).

funny dog pictures

It’s Mz IzzyBella, now known as Weezie (or DevilDog, to the poor poor puggies who have to put up with her.

Like I said, I can see why she doesn’t make it onto all the fashionable birthday party guest lists. And we thought Paris Hilton was a Diva!

Holy Cows!

Looks like this has been a banner month for cows going nuts all over Ontario!

First I have my own run in with off roadin’, garden crashing, snowbank scaling cows, and now this –

No choice but to shoot runaway cow, police say

Cow Runnung Loose in Mississauga


Police shot and killed a steer that escaped from an overturned truck this morning, saying they had no choice because the animal was charging at people.“It charged at one of the officers, right at him, and he had no choice,” Provincial police Sgt. Dave Woodford said.

He explained that the animal had actually hit and thrown four other people in a residential neighbourhood of Mississauga. No one was seriously injured.

“These things are big animals and they’re just like bulls. When they charge at you, they’re going to throw you,” he said.

The steer escaped from a cattle truck, along with two cows and a bull. The truck overturned at about 6:40 a.m., snarling traffic on the Queen Elizabeth Way near Highway 427.

Two of the animals ended up in the backyard of a home on Brentano Boulevard.

Initially, the animals were peaceful, calmly munching away at the shrubs in the garden.

“They were rubbing up against my father’s shed. They were fine in the backyard. I guess when they tried to get them out of the backyard, that’s when they got really restless,” said resident Teresa Nimer-Boutros.

The steer got spooked when handlers tried to corral it and force it into a replacement truck. One of a number of portable iron gates used to guide the animals into the truck fell, scaring the steer. He knocked over the driver of the truck who was helping in the effort.

The rest of the story is here.

Poor cow. You kind of have to feel sorry for it, although if you think about what was likely facing them at the end of their journey, being shot by a policeman after a nice run through a garden and few mouthfuls of hedge probably seems like a better way to go out.

Mae's Pups & a Meditation on Breeding

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Wednesday, when I went to bed at 10 pm, Mae was doing fine. No temperature drop, no funny behavior – just Mae, being Mae and looking happy to see me every time I came into the room to check on her, wiggling her Mae Mae butt and grinning her grin.

At 2 am, I woke up out of a dead sleep, convinced something in the house wasn’t right. I came down to check on Mae, and found her nesting in her bed, panting heavily and discharging signs of lochia in her pee. Despite being two days earlier than our earliest estimated due date, Mae was in labor, and there was no time to wait for our regular clinic to open at 8 am.

The emergency vet was wonderful – she worked fast, she anesthetized lightly, and she had the pups out within 10 minutes of getting Mae under and on the table. Unfortunately, two of them were dead before birth, with obvious signs of first stage decay. It kills me that there was nothing that could be done to try to save them.
The third pup, a little cream boy, is doing well, although he’s rather small. He eats well and vigorously, and Mae is being an attentive mom. The poor little solo puppy looks very small and very alone in that big whelping box, with no company. Mr. Monkey will be joining him for snuggling as soon as I give him a good clean, and we’ll give him lots of snuggling, but it really can’t be a substitute for the company of litter mates.

This has been a hard year for me with pups. I haven’t had a litter in almost seven years, and then two out of my first three have dead pups. I know it’s just all about bad luck and bad timing, but it’s hard not to take it personally. I’ve been lucky when it comes to breeding – until now, I’ve only ever lost three pups at birth, one litter due to veterinary negligence, and one week old pup. That’s pretty good, for almost 18 years of breeding. As I said to Sean, if I’d had this kind of bad luck in my first year of breeding, I doubt I’d still be in Frenchies. This kind of heartache is hard to justify on an ongoing basis.

For now, I’m just going to watch over this little tiny one, and give extra hugs and kisses to Dexter, Izzy, Harley and Delilah. I’m more thankful for them now than ever.

Here are a few pictures I shot yesterday. The rest can be found over on Flickr.