I was taking pictures of Abbey yesterday; meanwhile, the two juniors were fighting over a bone. After a while, Abbey became fed up and scolded the two of them. She is the grand matriarch, all right.
It’s our first official frost this morning – white roof tops against a baby blue sky. Time for some hot tea…
Retrieved.
Jazz, doing what Labs do best…
Together
I don’t know that Abbey and Jazz ever became the best of friends. Abbey had already slowed down quite a bit by the time Jazz arrived. And, being a young Lab, Jazz has been a pretty obnoxious partner in the pack the last few years. But every once in a while, I’ll catch the two of them in a quiet moment.
Abbey is quite literally on her last leg. A few weeks ago she blew out the ACL on her hind right leg. We’ve given her a series of shots and laser therapy to try to promote some healing in that leg, but it’s a chore for her to walk and her limp is very pronounced. Essentially all of her back weight is being supported on her left leg.
Still, she continues to stubbornly limp along. It’s not enough for her to hobble to her dog bowl, she has to follow me to the garage door to make sure that I return with her food. She reminds me at 4:00 p.m. that she hasn’t eaten in several hours, and you know, what the heck about that? We have a ramp to help her down the outside deck stairs so that she can do her business, but sometimes she insists on taking the stairs back up, on her own, which I swear will kill me before it kills her.
One thing has not changed. Abbey remains the most stubborn entity I have ever witnessed.
The most likely thing to happen next is that her left leg will give out. If, or when, that happens, we will probably have to put her down. She is 12 1/2 years old. She is riddled with arthritis, but especially in her front shoulders, which would make doing any sort of hind wheelie contraption very hard. She is one of those Labs that has always showed all of the classic Lab problems: bad skin, allergies, odd bone structure, joint problems, arthritis, and now blown ACL’s. That she has made it to her current age is probably testament to her sheer stubborness. Her last day is creeping up on us; knowing this reminds me to stop what I’m doing to love on her, and also catches me in teary sobs when no one else is around.
On that dog level that none of us really understands, Jazz knows that too. More and more, she shadows Abbey when Abbey is on the move. More often, now, I see them sitting near each other. Never touching, mind you. Always at a respectable distance. But together, nonetheless.
New Recruits
I promised the boy some new Legos as a carrot for helping to clean out some of his old toys and organize his room the last few days. This is not an easy task for him; letting go of his possessions is hard, and he is not by nature an organized child. But cull we must, and organize too. Especially if we are to donate complete sets of toys. Heh.
Legos are one of his most favorite things. Funny enough, I have a picture of him from China playing with those big-block Lego knockoffs. He is quite good at following the initial instructions for a set, and then he promptly dismantles the thing and recreates it into a brand new something.
Before we left for the store, he assembled a battle ship with all sorts of men to wait for the arrival of the new set. He explained that they were excited to watch the building. The ship is in the background of the picture, consisting of mainly Star Wars characters. The new set is a Dragon with Ninja warriors. It should make for an interesting story.
Companionship
Garden Starts
I took these pictures a couple weeks ago, when I first planted our tomatoes. There’s been a lot of growth since then – I’ll have to make a point of getting out there with the camera again soon. Tomorrow I will be out there long enough to harvest more pea pods, as the temperature will be into the 90′s early on. My blood is still much too thick to tolerate that kind of heat for too long.
We have two raised plots. Not a ton of room, but then again, we don’t have an enormous yard.
Strawberry blossoms are such a happy sight.
Cherokee Purple tomato plant.
Epazote plant, nestled into my toad habitat. We have one resident toad that we know about, although he usually makes himself pretty scarce. He either hides out in the pots, or underneath a stone in the other plot.
ZZ recreating while I garden…
…and Jazz chillin’ in the shade.
