In honor of all the snow we've gotten in the past 5 days....

Dog tags ring, are you listenin'?
In the lane, snow is glistenin'.
It's yellow, NOT white - I've been there tonight,
Marking up my winter wonderland.

Smell that tree? That's my fragrance.
It's a sign for wand'ring vagrants;
"Avoid where I pee, it's MY pro-per-ty!
Marked up as my winter wonderland."

In the meadow Mom will build a snowman,
following the classical design.
Then I'll lift my leg and let it go Man,
So all the world will know it's
mine-mine-mine!

Straight from me to the fencepost,
flows my natural incense boast; !
"Stay off of my TURF, this small piece of earth,
I mark it as my winter wonderland

"A moment I've been dreading. George (Bush Sr.) brought his
ne'er-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a
job. Not the political one who lives in Florida. The one who hangs
around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is
already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I'll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they'll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work."

-- Ronald Reagan in his recently published diaries*

written May 17, 1986

We had two birthdays this week! Clio was 8 years old on Wednesday, and Arlo is a year old today! I can't believe Clio is 8 already, it seems like just a couple of years ago that we drove out to NY to pick her up. She still has that funny, lovable face. And as for Arly-Barley - that little fluffball will always be a puppy in my mind.

We ended up with about 10 inches of snow, and Biz was not amused this morning when he was put out in the pen to do his business. The snow was so deep that he had to run around and pack it down so the snow wouldn't touch his bum, and he found that to be quite disgusting. His expressions are priceless!

Today we are getting our first major snowstorm of the winter. The dogs think it is great fun! Me, not so much . I don't think any of the schools in the state even opened this morning - at least none of them in our area did. It was a good call because the snow started shortly after 10 am and was coming down in sheets. I swept off the back stairs about every half hour, and shoveled out the driveway around 12:30 pm. By the time I got to the bottom of the driveway, the top was already covered with snow again. The heck with this! Marc has 4WD on the Tahoe and didn't have any trouble getting up a snow covered driveway.

The highways are a mess and tractor trailers were just ordered off the highways by Governor Rell (I just love her, despite her being a Republican ) because she doesn't mess around and worry about hurting someone's feelings - the highways are unsafe, get the darned trucks off of there that are jack-knifing all over the place!

This should all wind up by about 10 pm, but the rest of the shoveling can wait until tomorrow morning. No need to shovel in the dark!

Here is old Jellybean, who still loves the snow. Isn't she cute?

I don't often rant, but today I have to, so click off the page now if you're not interested.

I do breeder referral for my all breed kennel club. I enjoy doing this for the most part. People call and want referrals for reputable breeders of specific breeds, and I can usually pull up local breeders or a fairly local breed specific rescue for them if they prefer an older dog. It's rewarding to help people learn what they should be looking for in a breeder, what tests they should expect the sire and dam of their pup to have had, and answer general dog care questions. Sometimes they want information about specific breeds, and I can help them out with that, and refer them to breed experts if necessary. Most people are very happy to have someone to talk to and I'm happy to be able to help them.

Then there are people who are beyond stupid. I have spent hours with some, helping them find a breeder in the general area (the chances of finding a reputable breeder of a specific breed in one's hometown is slim to none), answering questions, often guiding them through the grief they have gone through having just lost a dog, etc...only to hear from them a week or two or three later to find out they just COULD NOT WAIT and ran to the nearest pet shop and bought a puppy!

Did nothing sink in or are they just beyond stupid? What galls me the most is when someone has already had a bad experience with a hastily bought pup and tells me they want to avoid having that happen again, then they can't wait two months or even two weeks for a well bred puppy from a breeder that will stand behind their pup and give them guidance through its lifetime, they go to a pet store or someone who is selling pups for Christmas money, and make the exact same mistake! What is wrong with people? Can't they control themselves? Is the instant gratification so overwhelming that they forgot all the heartbreak they just went through with the last poorly bred dog they bought?

Mind you, I am not speaking of shelter puppies which we know can be a gamble, but a pup that they have paid a minimum of a thousand dollars for from a commercial breeder in the Midwest...a pup that the middleman paid about $50 for when the pup was 5 weeks old and it was ripped away from its dam and littermates.

So I sit here and shake my head and know (because its happened before) that I'll get yet another call from these folks, crying and upset because their new puppy has either an infectious disease and it cost hundreds of dollars to save it; or it has seizures; or it has bad hips or knees or a heart problem....all these heartbreaks that could have been avoided had they simply WAITED and gotten a pup from a reputable breeder. Sometimes I just want to throw the phone through the wall!