Straydog UPDATE posted WEDNESDAY 10/8/03 at ~8:44 p.m. CT

Bill Arnold's Daily Straydog Log

WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 8 2003

An email to Erin from Jana (Chubs and Cassie's new mom)

Erin,

After you left last night, we sat on the porch, and everyone lolled. Cassie would run down to the pond and swim and come back every 15 minutes or so.

After dinner (everyone ate fine) we went out to feed the horses, and when we got about 6 feet from the fence Chub raised his head and growled real low. I don't know if he smelled the horses or felt the body heat. Anyway, he and I stayed back, and I pet him and talked about the horses. Cassie wasn't scared and sat at the fence watching Charlie feed them.

We let the chickens out, and Cassie tried to chase them twice, but after a stern "NO! NO!" she walked right thru the herd of them and wouldn't even look at them. Chubs didn't seem to care about the chickens, other than he enjoyed finding their droppings in the grass. After that, we went to the shop and played pool while Chubs and Cassie lay around.

Oh, Cassie can see her reflection in the glass door, dishwasher, and she watched TV. Chubs was interested in the voice in the corner (coming from the TV). Last night, Chubs seemed to have some problems with getting lost in the back yard. I had a large expensive bottle of French perfume that has gotten old (my Mom saved it for special occasions), and we put drops on the inside & outside flap of the pet door, and it seems to have worked. (Keep your fingers crossed.)

Chubs and Cassie were exhausted last night. We went to bed early (nine p.m.) and didn't turn the TV on, and they slept until 1:30 a.m. when all 8 of us (Simon went too) went thru the pet door(Charlie and I went thru the people door), and the dogs tinkled and went back to bed, sleeping until 5:30 am. No crying, everyone did good and slept in the bedroom

Oh, last night we worked on kitchen manners. I made hot sauce with everyone at my feet, and Chubs tried to put his feet on the counter, and when I said "NO!" he didn't try again. Erin, Cassie hasn't been jumping up at all. They were happy this morning, but Cassie did not want me to leave.

I just wanted to share the first 12 hours with you. I'll let you know more later.

Jana

An email to Bill from Heather's new mom (from last week)

Bill,

We just wanted to update you on Heather. She is much more playful now that she has eaten. We tried some different things but what really worked was putting a little roast beef juice on her food. Thanks for the advice earlier today.

Heather is a joy, and we are very happy to have her in our home. Our girls have taken photos of her to school to share our excitement with all their friends. They have also renamed her Libby; she doesn't seem to mind the change. Libby is just happy to have all the attention.

Libby chose a spot in our family room, and that seems to be her special place. She can watch the comings and goings of everyone. As a busy family, we are tough to keep track of sometimes, but she is taking her job seriously.

The first two photos are of Libby in her special spot. Third is Libby playing outside. Next Libby is helping sister Savannah with her spelling. Then she joins Mom in quizzing Kate for a biology exam.

Thanks for allowing us the opportunity to have such a special girl!

Sincerely,
Carolyn

Several hundred mailers go to the post office every day before the 4:30 p.m. pickup

     Our mailing list is at 2,499 on the computer. When we merged old labels (from Pat's computer) with new labels (on Shannon's computer), the computer said it was stopping and questioning us on all apparent dupes, but it didn't totally work, because as I was sticking labels on envelopes the first day, I found a couple of dupes in the two or three sheets I peeled and stuck on blank envelopes, so there'll be some others out there too, and I hate to waste 37 cents on a dupe like that, but we didn't have time to go through the entire 83.3 sheets of 30 labels [up]. Some people apologize for not being able to send more when we get their checks for $25. If all 2,499 people on our address labels sent us $25, we could last 12 weeks. Please don't ever think that $25, or even $5, doesn't help. We are very grateful for ever donation. (One old gentleman sends in $3 cash each month! Pat used to buy a specific doggie toy or treat with that $3, and she would give it to a special dog like Old Sassy Katie on a special day for Katie.)

Thanks to Ofelia for helping out for several hours on the mailer today

     Ofelia sat at the round table and helped work on the mailer and got a ton of the pieces finished this morning, and we thank her a lot!

     With just our people we should finish up by tomorrow afternoon at 4:00 p.m., and I'll drive the last batch in two big plastic baskets to the post office.

We got diabetic Julie one of those blood sugar reading machines

     We're getting a reading before each insulin injection, and if the blood sugar is low, we skip the injection, and an hour or so later, we check the blood again. We'll tell you more about it as we go along.