365 Grateful

I recently ran across a project called 365 Grateful (http://365grateful.com/). The idea is that every day, you record something for which you are grateful. You can  do it in a variety of ways, but as with the creator, photography was the medium that spoke to me so I decided to try it on this blog.

I'd actually been thinking about this concept since I listened to Notes From A Small Island by Bill Bryson while I was traveling with Karis in California. In one section of the book, he talked about the British capacity for making the best of things. I think of this concept as "Ooh tea! Lovely!". (That might not mean much to you if you haven't read the book.)

So in no particular order, here goes.

I'm grateful for a freshly groomed Bravo, with his gorgeous fluffy tail and wide smile, and what Russ refers to as his "ascot".

Poor Bravo...

While at the kennel (just a few days!) he licked all the fur off 3 of his toes on a rear paw. Took him to the vet on Monday, and he's on steroids and antibiotics. But he also has to wear one of those cone collars.

He's actually gotten pretty used to it now. The first 24 hours, he had a lot of trouble with stairs - he'd catch the cone on every other step - and even just the step up to the house from the back yard was difficult. But this morning, he got up the stairs in one smooth ascent. And maybe he likes not sleeping in his crate (I figured the cone wouldn't really fit).

And he is so good about everything! Giving him medicine is the easiest thing in the world - just put the pill in a bit of butter or peanut butter, and he swallows it with no problem. I take the collar off at meal times. To put it back on, all I have to do is hold a treat on the other side, and he sticks his head right in. What a sweetheart.

Out of the freezer, into the frying pan

It was very hot when I got home today. Depending on where you looked, it was 86, 89 or even 92. I took Bravo to the dog park, but he wasn't too excited about it. He did not understand why I wanted to walk out in the sun when there was a lot of nice new grass to eat in the shade under the trees. And chasing the ball was kind of fun, but he refused to bring it back to me. If I wanted to go to him (where he was lying down, usually in the shade of a tree) he would happily chase it again. But he preferred that I didn't throw it too far.

Most of all, though, he did not understand why we had gone out to the dog park before he was fed.

Thought I would include a photo of the new 35W bridge. I went down to Nicollet Island and the Stone Arch Bridge on Saturday and took quite a few pics. Maybe I'll post more in the next few days....Behind the bridge, you can see some of the University of Minnesota buildings. Just around the corner from the red brick building on the left was the lab run by one of Russ' colleagues. It got shut down after the bridge collapse, and during the construction. For a while, there was a chance the University could lose a profitable research facility. Fortunately, though, the lab found a new home on the west side of the city.

Bad dog

Bravo is usually very good, but every once in a while he eats something strange. The first time it was ties to Russ' kumdo armor. Then it was a set of headphones from Karis' room. Last night it was a box.

I'd taken him to the dog park in the afternoon, and he'd chased a lot of balls. Then Russ and I went out to dinner - but we fed him first! Later in the evening, when Russ went upstairs, he found pieces of something scattered all over at the top of the stairs. Took us a while to realize it was a little wooden box covered in material that held those Chinese balls with the bell thing inside. Jason had left it in his room, and we'd left the door at least cracked. The balls are fine, but the box is history. Now I'll have to watch him to make sure there aren't any health consequences.

Frozen dog tales

I took Bravo walking by Bush Lake this morning. We met some other dogs (more about them later) and I let him off leash to socialize. After the other dogs left, he proved why I shouldn't let him off leash - he decided to go wade in the lake. He was surprised when the water crunched. I don't think he really liked breaking through the film of ice, because he came back to me right away. (Yes, the lake was frozen again - it was 16 this morning.)

And the interesting thing about frozen dog hair - at least when it's long like Bravo's - is that it acts kind of like velcro. It picks up all sorts of leaves, twigs, etc. I stopped several times to pull leaves off his frozen feathers, and he'd just pick up more.

About the other dogs - a German short-hair puppy and an older Golden. The puppy was really full of energy, and kind of annoyed Bravo. He'd picked up an old broken tennis ball earlier in the walk, and when we first met the other dogs, he dropped it as he usually does. But later, after the puppy had played with it a while and then dropped it, Bravo got it again. The puppy came up to try to get the ball back and Bravo snarled at her just a little. That's unusual for Bravo - he's so submissive - but I guess he'd decided the puppy needed to be put in her place.

Here's the photo I took just before all this happened - I was interested to see the slabs of ice piled up at the edge of the lake.


Have a great weekend!

Photos

I bought myself a new camera today. After taking that photo with my cell phone a couple of days ago, I decided it was time I had a small camera that would easily go with me on walks. Then I took Bravo and went to Lake Harriet and the dog park to try it out. Here's downtown Minneapolis from the south side of the lake:


I follow a blog called Riviera Dogs, and I've thought of specializing in dog photos. But I can't seem to go up to people and request permission to photograph their dogs. I took a couple of dog photos at the lake, but they were from the back, and were just bad. At the dog park, I did slightly better, capturing the cute dog below. Looks like a fox, don't you think? The owners said it was part Golden.

But even with this photo - I got it in the background of another photo I was trying to take, so it isn't the best. And I neglected to get the dog's name. I'm going to try to work on this.