Over the mountains: UPDATED w/photos

Today did not entirely go as planned... but we made it to Reno!

The majority of our plans played out perfectly. The movers arrived early and loaded quickly... Noah swept out the house and played with the dog while I slipped drugs to the cats for our first day of driving.

While waiting for the tranquilizers to take effect, I noticed a traffic alert for the eastbound 80 (which we're taking pretty much the entire way across the country). It was closed before Truckee... a diesel truck turned over and was leaking all over the freeway. Bummer... Plus, it was snowing!!

We loaded up the car and headed out,





deciding to go across on 50 to Lake Tahoe and then cut up to Truckee and over to Reno...









Bangs took his tranquilizers quietly and slept most of the 4 hours it took us to get to Reno (we had some construction traffic, too). NNK (no name kitty) protested loudly every 20 minutes or so... but I think she was better for the tranquilizers than she was without. No one threw up on anyone. Jack and Gill quietly waited for us to let them out again and Tag... well Tag is the best ever.



The room here in Reno is gigantic and we love it.... We got in around 4:30 and room service just got here, so I'm going to go eat now :)

I'm tranquilizing the cats again tomorrow. I'm hopeful that it will make the traveling easier... our longest day of driving yet!

Hopefully pictures tomorrow, too!

Some sadness and anticipation

Today was the day of packing. Moving commences tomorrow! Noah and I spent the morning wrangling details. But first, breakfast!



I packed the food for all the cats and Tag in a plastic bin:





The movers arrived at around 9:30. They spent ALL DAY packing... well... one of them did. The other one spent a lot of time talking and answering his cell phone. Almost dropped dead of boredom and stress more than once... and the animals were REALLY confused about the new guys and how noisy they were and why there were more and more boxes appearing in their home. Little did they realize...



We loaded up almost as soon as the door closed on the movers backs this evening. Jack and Gill went in fairly quietly, having no experience with this type of thing and so nothing to dread. But Bangs and the no name kitty protested LOUDLY at being shoved into the same crate.

We left immediately and NNK cried the whole way there... she crowned the adventure by throwing up on Bangs's back. Poor Bangs!

We arrived at La Quinta in Davis for our first night of hotel living... a good break in for the animals. I'm hoping the stress will abate soon, for all our sakes.

Tag is a champ. He was only a bit confused about why there were cats on his car ride. He'll get used to it.

Fed, watered, and littered, we took a little time to hang out with Leslie one last time. We discussed the finale of Lost (cue deep disappointed sigh here) and shed some tears about being parted from one another. How will we live without Leslie?



Tomorrow we drive away! So tonight we're trying to get used to hotel living. Tag and Noah and I are pros at this, but the cats... well... they are going to need some time to adjust. And by the time they adjust, I think we'll be there :) Misery loves company, so I'm fairly certain the cats will bond over this common trauma. They're already doing better about sharing space with Tag!



One thing I am wondering is how well I am going to be able to sleep with so many animals on my bed...

A weekend to celebrate the new job

We decided that when Noah got a job, we'd take a mini-vacation to celebrate. And we are celebrating... on the Russian River... in a cabin called Blackberry Bliss.

We spent the morning eating breakfast on the patio and being divebombed by hummingbirds.





Then we went down to the river, which is right behind the cabin. Tag REALLY enjoyed this.













Then we went to the beach to wear the pup out.







After that we were pretty pooped, so we came back and took a nap. When we woke up we decided to take a walk down to the bridge.







Tonight we'll probably relax in the hot tub and drink some wine... a perfect way to relax before heading back into the mayhem of preparing to move at the end of the month.

One last thing... we got a new car this weekend! Ruby* wasn't going to make the journey across country again. So we got a 2009 Subaru Outback with plenty of room for Tag and any brothers or sisters he might acquire in the future. Her name has yet to be decided, but here she is!



*Note: for anyone who doesn't know, Ruby is my 1991 Acura Integra... she has 250,000 miles on her and has served me well for the past 8 years. Now she's going to go back to her previous owner, Good Friend Dan, who will lovingly care for her until the end of her days.

Tag in the snow

Here's the cutest dog in the world experiencing snow for the first time. :)



Isn't he so cute?

Horses, dogs, and sheep oh my!

It's been a jam packed weekend, as usual. I'll start with Saturday...

I rode in a lesson on Saturday without Leslie :*( because she is in LA for spring break this week. Miss you Leslie. Debbie and I talked a lot about elbows and hands... I am having trouble freezing my elbows and not being flexible enough. This is likely because I find myself clenching to try and ward off Watson's head disappearing act (where he throws his head between his knees and trundles off to who knows where... very hard to stop him when this happens). So I went around in circles working on changing my posting diagonal and keeping my elbows FLEXIBLE.

After that we worked on a mini course with some poles and a couple of cross rail jumps. Debbie says I should ride in the cross rail class at the show at the end of May... so the challenge for me now is to see how many obstacles I can make it through before I lose my head (or Watson's). The more obstacles we do the more excited Watson is about them and the more likely he is to act up. And so I clench... and so Debbie yells at me.

Truthfully, Watson isn't going anywhere very quickly... it just feels like he is, like I can't control him... something mental is going on with me and I have to keep working on it to get it out. So the lesson today was a successful one. I learned, have more to practice, and didn't freak out.

I did miss Leslie.

In other news, Tag got to have a go at being a sheep herding dog today. Collies were bred originally to herd sheep in Scotland. They don't all have the instinct however, and so we took Tag to Performance Dogs In Action where he could have the experience in a controlled environment.





It went fairly well, all things considered. I don't think Tag is a motivated herder. He didn't try to KILL the sheep... which is a good thing... and he was mildly interested, but when he was rebuffed by the trainer for chasing the sheep, he quickly lost interest. Not his idea of fun, apparently.





It was well worth the experience, though. Now we know how he will do... maybe down the road he'll change his mind, but for now I'm going to focus on building our relationship in other ways.

A naked dog and other happenings of the weekend

Tag had a slumber party this weekend. It went well, though perhaps not as fun as we had hoped it would be. Tag's sleep over buddy was Pixel, a Chinese Crested. Yup, folks... he's naked. And he was super watchful of Tag.


After a little sniffing and some "PLAY WITH ME!!!" barking, Tag lost interest and left him alone, but the kittens! The kittens tracked Pixel from the moment he entered the house. They worked as a team! Jack would tail the strange naked creature and Gill would lay in wait, leaping out when Pixel would least expect it and causing him to screech and race for cover. It was hilarious!


In other news, I rearranged a few things in the house today. Spring cleaning if you will. I got sick of the back room (dubbed office) being so gross and unusable. We keep the litter boxes back there and a baby gate up to limit the access to the room to animals that will NOT snack on cat poo... (no names, no names)...

So I moved the desk out... and the red chair... and the shelf of medicines and whatnots... basically it's an empty room except for a couple book shelves and some cat furniture. So happy with it now! Whew! Here are Bangs and the nameless kitty enjoying the new set-up and some early March sunshine.


I'll leave you with a couple pictures that may or may not prove that my animals secretly despise me. :)

Pictures of the hairy beast

Not QUITE as much tonight as last night... but you get the idea

It's that time of year

What time of year, you ask? Why it's Spring! Or ... well, at least it's threatening to become spring. How can I tell? By taking into account the sheer volume of animal hair that has suddenly taken over my life.

I am an animal lover, a dog and cat owner, a horse rider... and each of these animals has decided that since the winter solstice has passed it must be time to shed copious amounts of hair and fur all over my clothes and my house. I brush Tag, the gorgeous blue merle collie, daily now. The hair that comes off each time we have a grooming session is enough to coat a new collie puppy! I could make doggy wigs for a hundred dogs by the time this season is over.

As I leave the house for work I look down at my clothes (to make sure I'm matching, that my zipper is up... etc.) and discover that I am covered in a noticeable layer of fuzz... especially from my knees down. Thinking back over the morning's activities, I recall cats rubbing my ankles asking for breakfast... and the world's cutest collie diving between my knees for his morning butt scratch.

It doesn't get any better at the horse barn. Watson was clipped this winter, so he's not shedding as much as some other horses yet. But he, too, has begun... and when it gets into full gear, I'll be covered there, too.

I'll post some pictures of a grooming session with Tag soon, for effect.

Have I mentioned that I HEART my dog?

I mean, look at that face? What isn't there to love?

The latest cuteness on this adorable pup has to do with his efforts to win over my cats. Truth be told, Bangs and the nameless kitty hate the dog. I mean they HATE him. I often feel a little sorry for Tag. He is a gentle sort of pup. But occasionally he deserves their ire and derision. After this past weekend, though, he'll have to do something pretty heinous, like try to maul them, for me to think he deserves it.

We have a long hallway in our house. At the end, it turns a corner to the bathroom and the "cats' room," also known as our study. There's a baby gate up in front of the study so that the cats can retreat there and so that Tag can't go digging for buried treasure in the litter box. (Yuck!)

Sunday evening, the typical scene unfolds before my eyes. Bangs comes down off the cat condo in the living room and makes a sprint down the hall for the baby gate, puppy close behind. Instead of hearing the usual noise of a cat flinging itself over the gate, though, I hear... nothing.

Noah and I get up to investigate. What we find at the end of the hall amuses us. Bangs is crouched in the bathroom next to the toilet and growling. Tag is lying down outside the bathroom, nose on the ground and stretched out towards the kitty, sniffing.

Noah favors breaking up the incident, but I want to let it play out a little. I step over the puppy and into the bathroom to sit down next to Bangs. Noah stands in the hall next to Tag. Fifteen minutes or so go past in which Tag scoots close enough to sniff Bangs and gets growled and hissed back repeatedly.

Then something happens that neither Noah nor I could have expected. Tag gets up and walks away. Bored? We hear him go into his crate in the bedroom, presumably for a toy. When he comes back, I can't tell what he has brought with him. He walks straight up to Bangs and presents him with... a doggy biscuit! He is SO proud of this biscuit. He picks it up again, walks into the hall, puts it back down and barks at it, a playful puppy bark.

Noah and I are amazed. I take the biscuit and break it so that Tag can have some and Bangs can have some. Bangs sniffs interestedly for a moment but the biscuit's been in a dog's mouth so he's not about to actually consume it. Tag happily munches his part of the biscuit and then finishes Bang's untouched bit while Bangs looks on grouchily.

I can't stand it! It's so cute how much effort he made to make friends in that moment. Of course, half an hour later, he chased the cat back down the hall and over the gate again, Bangs's tail fluffed in terror... but he's trying. And I'm hopeful that he will succeed.

Puppy Love

This is the newest addition to the Kauffman family. Tag (Montague L Kauffman or MLK) is a joy, a bouncing baby collie full of energy and love and expressiveness. We have been greatly enjoying the time we spend with him.

We've also been greatly challenged. Patience and a fine tuning of communication skills and expectations are easy to wear thin when you get home from a long day of work, or when you are the only one who has been home to clean up after the puppy. Learning how he works and what he thinks and how to teach him the ways of life in a house as a well-behaved pup has stretched Noah and me more than I expected. I'm expectant that we will come out better people on the other end of this puppy stage of life.

Keep your eye out for Tag in the future. I have high hopes for this brilliant little fluff ball. Some good training and attention should make him into quite the performer! I'll keep you posted on his growth and progress.

This photo was taken on his homecoming day, February 7th, 2009. Tag was 9 weeks old.