Blood, Pee and Poop Everywhere!

I've hardly had a moment to myself up here at the Rainbow Bridge since I volunteered to help with the dogs in the path of the hurricanes. Those poor dogaroons down there really need what our angel dog team is doing to help calm their fears. It's rewarding work but I feel a little guilty for not being around for my baby brother, Levi. His problem is getting worse.

Levi will be nine months old at the end of the month and he's been housebroke for five of those months but it's been raining a lot where Mom and Dad live and Levi is giving Mom fits about going outside when it's raining and when the dirt in the dog yard is wet. He's even started peeing and popping on the deck. He'll also ask to go out one door and when he finds out it's raining there, he'll run to another outside door and ask to go out, thinking it might not be raining on the other side of the house. Mom has gone back to square one and is sitting outside with him until he goes where he's suppose to go, regardless of the rain on his back or the wet dirt under his paws. He's making progress. This morning he peed on the rubber mat at the bottom of the deck steps and pooped while squatting on my grave stones. That kid has scrambled eggs for brains when it comes to respect for the dead.

Mom's got the right idea about going back to square one, and I'm sure the problem will work itself out, but I did feel sorry for her yesterday. She woke up with Dad saying the S word over and over again. At first she thought he was trying to pull on his pants while Levi was trying to pull them off. But the tone of the word was different this time, not filled with laughter but panic stricken instead. He'd transferred to his wheelchair, cut his foot and had bled all over the carpeting from the bed to the bathroom and Levi was licking it up. Dad is taking a blood thinner so there was a LOT of blood. Mom jumped out of bed---as much as an old person can jump with arthritic joints---to get Dad and the floors cleaned up and to shut Levi out of the master bedroom while she worked. It took a long time and in the meantime Levi pooped and peed in the living room. That was not really his fault given the circumstances but still it wasn't a great way for Mom to start her day.

So tomorrow the carpet cleaners are coming. Between having the blood removed and sanitized—a $95 requirement for "health reasons so says the cleaning company"---and having the floors in three rooms cleaned and the pets stains deodorized that have accumulated since Levi joined the family it will cost Mom $239 total. If I had time, I'd mental telepathy a little humor down to Mom and remind her that puppy stains might be a good reason to get the hardwood floor she wants installed. What the heck, I'll take the time. What's my angel-brother going to do if I show up late for work? Kill me? I'm already dead. ©

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Prince Charles and the 3rd Obedience Class

"Aaaaah-ah-ah-ah-aaaah-ah-ah-ah-aaaah!" That sound is me doing the Tarzan yell because I'm so proud of Levi's performance in obedience class. Jason would say I'm being boastfully proud but I'm starting to catch on the fact that he says a lot of stuff just to tease me into thinking before I speak. What angel-in-training dog wouldn't be proud of his little earth-bound brother who did TWO figure eight heeling exercises in front of the WHOLE class and out shined all the other puppies when it was their turns on the runaway? The trainer/instructor even said to Mom, "Fine job, excellent!" And she didn't say that to anyone else. She just gave the other humans pointers for improvement as they did their walks.

For this week's homework---there are two pages worth---Mom has to practice having Levi do 'sits' and 'downs' many times in different places, working on him being patience and having good manners. And every 3rd or 4th time Levi does it he's to get rewarded with a "Life Reward" instead of a treat. That part will be easy for Mom. She already praises and pets him to an embarrassing level. Heeling while keeping your dog's attention is another goal on the homework list, forgetting about distance for now. That's a bummer for Mom. She wants to go around the block already. But training lessons aren't suppose to be more than ten minutes long so Mom is going along with the program and not doing the neighborhood tour just yet.

Mom is scary, spooky sometimes. You know what else has she's been doing? Trying to teach Levi to pee and poop on command. A couple of weeks ago the obedience instructor said that when you are teaching something new you wait for your dog to do the action and then you name it. Every since then Mom's been saying, "pee" and "poop" every time Levi does one or the other. The neighbors probably think she is crazy. I sure do. First humans want to tell canines where to pee and poop and now they want to tell them when to do it? What's the world coming to? That's the scary part. The spooky part is that Mom thinks Levi understands the pee-on-command thing as of two days ago when she pushed him gently off the steps and tried giving the 'pee' command for the first time. He squatted and did it, but it could have just been a coincidence.

Me, I had the Prince Charlie advice on peeing and pooping down pat. One time when he was being interviewed someone asked him what was the most important thing he'd learned about being in the royal family and he answered, "Never pass up an opportunity to use a restroom." The Prince Charlie theory on pit stops came up often when Mom and Dad used to travel. It's one of those things that tickled their funny bones and became a family joke with immense benefits to them and to me, a dog who got to mark trees all across America. ©


Top Photo: Johnny Weissmuller, 1930s Tarzan for MGM
Bottom Photo: The Prince of Wales, Prince Charles

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Poor Pooping Levi!

Oh, my God, my mom is ruining Levi! Three nights in a row she got her head lost in her keyboard and completely missed his very weak-but-still-there attempts to use mental telepathy on her. So he did the next best thing a puppy in poop distress could do. He did his job in front of the door. Mom bawled herself out up one side and down the other but if she doesn't learn to pay attention soon poor Levi is going to need a doggie shrink to undo our mother's failings.

To make matters worse, two times in the past few days he's pooped on the deck instead of in the dog yard. That's Mom's fault too. She gave my baby brother too much access to the deck. That deck is huge, wrapping two sides of the house so Dad can take his wheelchair out there from three different rooms of the house. Until last week Mom was limiting Levi to one end of the deck using a lattice work barrier to contain him. But she used that lattice to line the picket fence to keep Levi from doing another Houdini escape.

Too much deck freedom or not, it's not as if my brother wasn't being supervised outside. Sort of. Mom's been faithfully sitting out there with him but when Levi pooped on the deck she was lost in the Marley and Me book. Yup, while reading about the antics and misdeeds of Marley the Labrador retriever our own puppy was having a major melt down because he couldn't find the steps down off the deck to the dog yard. Levi needs to learn to turn his mental telepathy up a notch when he's asking for help and Mom needs to quit being an airhead.

Jason, my angel brother up here with me, says Mom raised three other puppies who turned out just fine and I have to have more faith that she'll shape up before she ends up creating a permanent problem. But I'm wondering if Jason remembers how one-tracked and lost in another world Mom gets when she reading and writing. It's been a long time since he lived on earth with her plus she's seventeen older now.

I also confided in Jason that I'm a little worried Levi might be a tad slow at catching on to how life and bodily functions work. He laughed at that one and reminded me that I was nearly three years old before I figured out farting. Whenever I'd do it I'd take off running as if the devil himself was giving me a rectal exam with his pitch fork. All our canine pals up here the bridge who heard Jason tell that story had a good laugh over that one. ©
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Humpy and the Vet

Yesterday Levi got his rabies vaccination and the rest of his puppy shots. He weighed 12 pounds 4 ounce---a gain of 2 pounds 2 ounces in two weeks. He's going to be a cow when he grows up! Mom says he's like picking up a Beanie Baby because he folds, bends and drapes as if he doesn't have a bone in his body. But he's still going to be a COW! A huge COW compared to all his poodle siblings up here at the Rainbow Bridge. The vet gave him a 'puppy love' neck scarf for being so brave---he didn't even cry when she plucked hair out of his ears---and mom got a bill for $125.32.


As if the little bugger didn't use up enough money from the metaphorical cookie jar, Mom took him to the pet store after seeing the doc and let him pick out a toy. The new stuffie was named Humpy because he looks like he was made for---well, you know. His butt is always in the air and he has a distressed look on his face. Levi likes him because he's got five squeakers implanted. He's addicted to squeakees.

Levi is trying really hard to figure out how to do canine-to-human mental telepathy and Mom is trying to figure out if he's doing it, or not. He is but he's sending his messages off into space without aiming them at any particular person. And you know what else that screwball does? He goes to the window, instead of the door, when he wants to poop or pee. Our angel sister up here at the bridge says Levi's misdirected telepathy reminds her of her time on earth. She says Levi is a space cadet like she was but our angel brother Jason says, "No, Levi's lack of skill is age-appropriate for a puppy." Sarah is sweet but she's still a space cadet. Most of the time we just humor her and her silly notions.

I'm signing off for now. Jason is on the orientation committee up here at the bridge and he's taking me along to greet a couple of newbies. We'll show them all around and make sure they find some friends so they won't ever have to be alone. ©
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Angel Puppy on Earth, Trouble Bubble in Heaven

I've been at the Rainbow Bridge just over two weeks now in human time. Up here, though, there is no such thing at time marked by weeks, months or even years. What is IS if you know what I mean. Mom and Dad still talk about me every day or I should say Mom talks and Dad listens because he can't talk since his stroke. She tells him stories about me as a pup and how much different little Levi is from me at the same age. They laugh and smile at the memories and pour the love on Levi that they can no longer give to me. I may be absent physically but I'm still presence in their hearts.

Levi is the perfect pup for them at this time in their lives. He is sweet and obedient and God knows I was anything but obedient. I was nicknamed the Trouble Bubble for a reason. Adopted at five-and-a-half weeks, I turned out to be a hell-raiser on four paws and didn't make an effort to get civilized until many months later when I had some sessions with a doggie shrink. (See this blog entry for details about Dr. Spock of Dogdoom.) But Mom and Dad were younger back then and they couldn't go through all they did with me again.

At fourteen weeks Levi was the last of his litter to find a home and many of the problems adjusting to living with humans that I had he never developed. He is so tender hearted that he gets his feelings hurt with the slightest reprimand and he takes Mom at her word when she says 'no' to things like chewing shoes laces and table legs. He also doesn't whine or cry when he has to sleep behind a baby gate in the laundry room or ride in a crate in the car. He accepts everything except the vacuum cleaner in his new world including the fact that he can't poop and pee in the house anymore. I'm bragging here but my baby brother even sent his very first mental telepathy message to our mom and she got it! He stood with his front paws on the window sill and kept looking back and forth between the view of the dog yard and Mom, asking her how he can get out there to do his job. Yup, God and I did a great job matching my humans up with little Levi.

Not that Levi is a perfect puppy. He has a stubborn streak about things like Mom's requirement that he not pull weeds in the dog yard and toss them in the air. And forget about the Fooey brand bitter tasting stuff she sprayed on the bark still left along the edges of the fence. Mom got some on her fingers and about gagged on her cookies when it got transferred by accident to her lips, but Levi likes it. He's also a puppy who loves to roll in the dirt and yesterday he discovered the joy of digging holes. Mom better hurry up and get those patio stones over my grave before Levi decides to dig up my bones.

Well, I'm off to my first Mother's Day party up here at the Bridge. I hear tell there will be grills set up where we can snatch all the hamburgers and hot dogs we want and there will be a champaign toast to our earth mothers everywhere. ©
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It's All Mom's Fault!

I shouldn't laugh at Mom. I really shouldn't but she can be an airhead sometimes. Yesterday she got up promptly at eight to take little Levi outside. Right away he peed and she got all happy-wiggly with him, human style, making him feel good for doing his job so quickly and in the right place. So far so good, right? Then she called him up the steps from the dog yard and he came but he didn't want to go in the house. He plunked his little butt down on the deck and here's where Mom made a big mistake. She picked him up and made him come in the house anyway and he promptly pooped on the kitchen floor. Levi is going to be SO confused if Mom doesn't learn to read his very obvious body language soon. Jeez, a blind monk on a mountain top could have seen that one coming. Hello! It was morning and he'd had another poop and pee free night.

Levi is getting five minute training sessions several times a day. He almost has it mastered to come when called, sit when asked and is no longer resisting walking on a leash...well, accept for when he wants to poop and Mom has her blinders on. Yesterday he even went to the door for the first time and sat down waiting for his leash to be attached so he could go outside. Fortunately, Mom saw him do it. Holly molly, she needs to find a better way for him to let her know its poop and pee time in the old corral---and quickly. She can't always be near the laundry room to see him sit patiently waiting for her to open the door. Oh, and add this to little Levi's list of accomplishments: he finally figured out how to go down as well as up the required three steps off the deck.

Speaking of corrals, when I was earth bound I never had an issue with my bathroom duty yard being covered over with shredded bark, but Levi does. He goes out there and tries to chew on every single piece of bark, all 300 pounds of them. Mom got so exasperated trying to dig bark back out of his mouth she finally took a rake and rounded up all the bark she could into one corner. That exposing the dirt which created another fun activity for Levi---rolling in the mud and getting himself tangled up in his retractable leash. He's so little that he can fit through the slats of the fence so he has to be leashed out there for now. I sure gave Mom a run for her money when I was Levi's age---I was bullheaded compared to him---but he's no slouch at creating his own brand of doggie drama.

Every day at tea time when I come to the Rainbow Bridge to check up on my humans, I meet the nicest canines doing the same thing. We laugh and cry with our families and trade stories about our time on earth, but not in a sad way. We are happy and contented here because even though our humans don't always know it, we're still with them in spirit. ©

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Mother's Little Helper

I get into so much trouble and half the time I don't even know why---like today. My dad had diarrhea and since he's wheelchair bound, he didn't have enough time to make on the toilet before it hit. Mom got him in the shower and was trying to get Pop's poop cleaned up off the floor and the wheelchair but she's so inept that she got it on her sweater sleeves and everywhere else but the ceiling. Boy, did that smell good! I was happy to be in the room.

Then mom took the gel pad off my dad's wheelchair and leaned it up against the wall and I thought, "Oh, boy, she's going to let me help clean up the mess." I was licking away while my mom showering dad's butt off when she saw what I was doing. And instead of praising me for being such a good little helper, she yelled at me! What in the world is wrong with that woman? She's too old for PMS. She snapped off her rubber gloves, telling my dad she didn't want to get poop on me as well---as if I'd care, it smelled so good!---and she grabbed me by the collar, making me leave the bathroom.

So now I'm pouting in my bedroom-slash-the laundry room and wondering why she didn't use the 'S' word even once while all this was going on. I don't understand the subtle nuances of when and when not to say the 'S' word. Mom says it all the time, but she tells Dad he can't. ©

An 'S' Word Kind of Day

My mom is having a hard day. An 'S' word day. It started out with me peeing and pooping on the kitchen floor before she got up. That will teach her not to forget to put the ugly black box in the doorway before she goes to bed. Not that I would ever use it to do my business in but I probably would have held off a little longer if it had been present. She got up at 9:05 and she ought to know by now that I pee and poop at nine sharp.

Then I got into the trash and fished out a couple of Kleenex to eat for breakfast. That was her fault too. She had taken the top off the container and left it unattended to answer the doorbell. That brought back great memories---digging around in the trash. I remember my puppy days when even the red pepper she put in the trash basket couldn't stop me from diving for Kleenex and other worthy prizes. Then she bought all those different types of baskets, trying to out-smart me. It couldn't be done. Oh, the good old days before the trash basket went behind a closed door. Door knobs and latches aren't easy for short dogs like me.

I've never understood what is so bad about saying the 'S' word but my mom said it today after she accidentally kicked over my water dish. It was clean and full to the top, too. That was funny watching the water snaking across the laundry room floor as my mom scrambled to find something to stop it from going under the dryer. Well, what did she expect? It was bound to happen sooner or later with that dish sitting so close to the door going out to the garage. ©

Cardboard Prison

I've always been a busy dog---some might say a naughty dog---until this last year when my heart started acting up. I'm 15 ½ years old but I still feel like a puppy inside. I still want to pull toilet paper through the house but when I walk from the kitchen to the bathroom I have to stop and rest half way. Man, that's a long way to go just to cause a little trouble. So, I've been known to pee on the carpeting instead. That seems to do the trick to get my mom running around like a crazy creature looking for rags and a big red spray can that she uses to re-mark the spot that I just did. Why does she do that? I mark. She marks. I mark again. I may be old but I'm still alpha leader in our pack and I can win any pissing contest. Well, almost any. My territory is three steps down off the deck and sometimes I have trouble in our Michigan winters getting down there and... well, accidents happen.

Yesterday my mom spent a long time lining a huge cardboard box with black plastic. I didn't know what she was making but I had an awful feeling it had something to do with me. At bedtime I found out she did have something sneaky up her sleeve. Mom closed me in the laundry room with the ugly black box blocking the door to the rest of the house. I think she thought I was going to pee in it but I fooled her. I waited until morning, until my dad moved the box, and then I peed on the Linoleum in the kitchen.

I like sleeping in the laundry room but I hate being barred from going into the rest of the house at night. I can't look out the dining room door to see the rabbits eating bird seed at midnight. The snow banks are so high next to the deck that they can run right up them to get to seed my mom throws out for the birds. I think one of night raiders is the rabbit I found hidden in the flowers last summer when it was still a tiny baby. ©

The Talented Mr. Cooper

Typing with paws is a bitch so I'm going to let my mom put some blog entries in here from time to time. The entry below is one of hers....but it's about me, so that's okay. She was having a bad day, but---sigh---I sure had a great time.


Mom Wrote:

The toilet is plugged up. I hate toilets---more specifically I hate new toilets. I never had to deal with plugged up toilets before Don had his stroke and we moved, first into an apartment, then into a brand new home. The apartment wasn’t too bad, they had maintenance and we called them a couple of times a week. I’m maintenance now and we’re on a monthly schedule for fixing plugged up toilets. Had I thought about the fact that we’d have the modern, water saving toilets in our future, I would have taken my old one with me when I sold my house. But I didn’t, so after breakfast I went back to slay the dragon in the bathroom.

Things are going better than I expect them to and I’m thinking I must be honing my plumbing skills and I’m a happy camper…until I go to the bedroom to make the beds. Oh yuck! There on the carpet, in the walk-in closet, is evidence that the dog took a turn at trying to unplug the toilet. “Calegon where are you? I need someone to take me away!” This is one of those ‘damn stroke’ moments that not even a raspberry truffle can fix.

I look around for the guilty party, the one who drags everything illegal into his walk-in cave. I find my sweet little gray poodle sitting on the bed giving me a big brown smile, looking like he just came home from a great adventure. “Pearl diving in a cesspool! Come right on up, all you doggies, lay down your quarters! Canine Adventure Park has a brand new feature! Plenty of pearls left before we flush.”

Canine Adventure Park is getting bigger. They now have: The Car Wash, The Canine Poo Poo Beauty Parlor, The Boys’ Tree Farms, The Outdoor Deck-Jail, and now the fabulous Pearl Diving Tank! Maybe I’ll suggest they need to add Bungee Cord Jogging behind a moving car. Oh, I almost forgot the theme park’s most popular attraction: The Laundry Basket. There used to be a time in my life when finding a pair of purple panties on the living room floor had an entirely different meaning than it does now. Now, it just means that our dear darling dog wants us to see his souvenir from his latest theme park adventure.

Okay, enough gripping about the dear darling dog. I strip the bed of the sheets that were just put on clean yesterday and shove them in the washer. Now, the dog needs a bath, the day before he’s scheduled to see the groomer. I think about canceling that $40 expedition as punishment for Cooper’s trying to change the color of the carpeting in the closet. It’s a good thing I keep a case of Resolve Carpet Cleaning around for times like this. Now, if I could just find a product to wipe the smile off his doggie face; he’s having entirely too much fun today and I’m not in the mood to smile back. I think about going after a roll of tuck tape in the garage and that makes me grin, but there’s probably a law against duck tape on a dog. So, I buck it up and scrub his little face extra hard.

He’s still in the shower when a thought depresses me: I didn’t really fix the toilet all by myself. I was taking partial credit for Mr. Cooper’s talented work.

Jean Riva ©