Category Archives: Quigley

Redbone Pirate

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This is not Quigley, but he looks a lot like Quigley (Well, they’re the same breed — Quigley doesn’t have all that white on his chest and has a handsomer face).  A friend of ours, who is also a hound enthusiast and an animal talent agent (and dog trainer) sent it awhile back and I got such a kick out of it I knew I wanted to share it on the blog some day. Quigley would never allow all that stuff on him for even as long as it took to take the picture and that parrot would only get near enough for him to grab it and run! 

Anyway,  Bear used to wear a bandana for his movie star tricks, so today I tried one on Q. Last night I put it on myself and he went bananas. Had to jump up to try to pull it off me (though gently — he’s getting much better). Then I put it on him — around his head and told him to “Leave it” which is a command he knows. He did leave it — more or less — long enough for me to show Stu. Then he tore it off himself and ran away. This morning I tried again, but put it around his neck this time and told him to leave it (treat in hand) and he tolerated it for our entire trick session.

Progress.

Another Update and Quigley

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Last week I hit the ground running after returning from Northern California. Tuesday my mother had her PET scan — that’s Positron Emission Topography.  She got a radioactive tag molecule infused into her blood that accumulated in the tissues and emitted positrons that the device picked up and rendered into a picture of what’s going on in her body… no other cancer besides the tumor they already found which is very good news.

[Quigley is standing beside me as I type this, staring at me…

Quigley Nose2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[He’s been overly ignored lately, and isn’t taking to it too well — digging holes in the back yard, trying to start fights, stealing stuff out of the recycle bin… last week he stole the electric bill off the table while I was trying to listen to Bible class and started chewing it up. I found him before the bill was rendered totally unusable, but did have to tape it up a bit.]

Wednesday, the day after the PET scan, I went across town to pick up my new glasses; Thursday there was another doctor’s appointment (radiation oncologist) where we found out about the PET scan. Friday, first rehab appointment and then saw the orthopedic surgeon. That was also the day the car started acting up… lurching and bumping along, spewing smoke and a strong exhaust smell, acting like it might stall out at any moment. So we had to leave it off at the service center. Its fate will be revealed tomorrow…

I’m going over to my mother’s house twice a day now, morning and evening to help her with her rehab exercises and do the watering. More appointments are laid out for this coming week. Some days there are two of them. On Wed we’ll find out whether she’ll be starting radiation Thursday, which means appointments Thurs and Friday… This is busier than I thought it would be, but it’s all working out and she’s getting better. Moving better, though we learned at the rehab evaluation that she’s lost an amazing amount of strength in her legs, particularly the “involved leg” as they call it on the exercise sheet.

When I broke my arm I was astonished at how fast muscles atrophy. But I also know they come back and hers seem to be, ever so slowly, though not fast enough to suit her (she’s the woman who said she never feels bad longer than five days so was expecting a complete recovery from the surgery by day five). We also saw the x-rays of the titanium rod they put into her leg and it’s quite a bit bigger than I imagined. It really is like rebar, but without the rings. She won’t have to worry about breaking that bone, that’s for sure!

In the middle of all this, I have been acquiring things I want to blog about… finish up Lone Survivor, write about One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, which I just finished, and now The Black Swan, which I just started. I read 14 pages of it and ended up dog-earing nearly every one of them. Fascinating book about… well, randomness and knowledge. Here’s a quote:

“The first leg of the triplet (of opacity) is the pathology of thinking that the world in which we live is more understandable, more explainable and therefore more predictable than it actually is.”

But that’s for later. First I want to finish the others.

And then of course there is Sky, which I’ve worked on minimally. I read through material while waiting in the radiation oncologist’s office Thursday, but beyond that, not much. Or maybe God is preparing me in ways I have no idea about. I hope to slide a bit more in next week.

At least I’ve done THIS post now, so I will go have strawberries and ice cream, then go to bed…

Back from SoCal

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Navy jet 2croppedLast Thursday we left for our second “vacation” of the summer, this time to Southern California, first to see our son and his fiancee in San Diego then to all drive up to Long Beach to visit with my 88 year old stepmother.

Prior to leaving there were all manner of distractions and diversions, which impacted our ability to plan. One of those was that while in Utah we had all gotten spider bites. Mine was first to appear on the Sunday we left Moab, a three-inch diameter, very sharply edged swelling on my thigh, with a dime-sized red spot at the center. I put Vitamin E on it for a couple of days and it subsided.

Stu’s appeared two days later, same presentation except that his was on his calf and did not go away but got all red and began spreading up the side of his leg. He had to go to the dermatologist to get some steroid cream to put on it, which cleared it right up.

Meanwhile Quigley had all sorts of bumps, some of them about the diameter of quarters. One on the front of his left shoulder particularly stood out and on the Monday before we were to leave, I was examining it and realized it was matted hair which fell out as I touched it leaving a swelling that, while much smaller than mine, looked very much like it, complete with the red spot at the center. Fearing it might do as Stu’s had done, we called the vet on Wednesday and got Q in. No problem, and we could use the same steroid on him that Stu used. But it took up a lot of time.

Anyway, work responsibilities did not allow us to leave for San Diego until about 4:45pm Thursday. Then after about an hour on the road, Quigley acted like he HAD to get out of the car and go to the bathroom, but once we stopped he just walked around and smelled things. We encountered  two border patrol stops, one of which took about half an hour to get through. We also drove through a massive cloud of flying insects (termites?) that nearly occluded our windshield and coated our grill with smashed insect bodies. And, being unfamiliar with the route, we almost ran out of gas in the middle of nowhere some time after midnight.

But we made it, checked in to the hotel which took pets and crashed. The next day my son and his fiancee took us to breakfast, then to Coronado Island for a walk and finally to the dog beach there which is situated right at the beginning of the  Naval base’s air field. Two Navy jets (I think they’re F-18’s) came in to land just as we were arriving, coming over us super close. I was going bananas (I love military aircraft) and my son caught a couple of photos with his phone for me. (since we forgot the camera)

As for the dog beach, Quigley found a friend, ran and played in the surf and was even caught from behind by a wave that dropped completely over him. I was alarmed, but he emerged unphased, intent on catching up to  his new (female) friend who had not been caught by the wave and was still running up the beach.

It was a fun day. Here’s another picture of the jet, complete with vapor trails from its wingtips:

Navy jet 1cropped

Back From Utah

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Q and MeLast Thursday we left for Moab, Utah to visit some of my husband’s relatives and celebrate his aunt’s 90th birthday. It was Quigley’s first road trip and he did splendidly!

We stayed in a condo in Moab, with a grassy area in the back were we could walk him around and that’s where this picture was taken.

We weren’t sure how well he’d travel and he was kind of restless at the beginning — we brought his crate but had it broken down for the trip up so he wasn’t confined. He got the idea pretty quickly.

Our first night we spent at a pet-friendly hotel in Flagstaff — his first time ever in any inside “home” but his own. He went around with his nose glued to the floor inch by inch. Made you wonder what was on it. 

Q down stairsNext day we drove through Monument Valley (pictures will come in subsequent posts) and on to Moab. The condo was wonderful. Almost too nice for our big dog and the fine, red dust/sand that got all over him every time he went for a walk or run anywhere not on the grass. (My husband took him every morning for several-mile runs). But it worked out fine.

It had stairs! Quigley’s first…Here’s a picture of him after  he’d learned to come down them in other than a controlled crash. He really liked the stairs and went up and down them on the slightest pretext.

Q checks vaseHe also had to check out the entire condo, all the floors, behind all the furniture, under the bed, in the bathrooms, in the closets… wherever he could fit and even where he couldn’t. He also checked out the vase on the mantle… Very carefully he jumped up and put his paws on the mantle to examine the object. He is such a hoot!

We were there for a couple of parties at different places as well as several sessions of visiting not too far away, so it worked out well for us to return regularly to the condo to let him out of the now-assembled crate we kept him in while we were away. We worried he might bay and fuss with us gone, but he didn’t. And we gave him lots of walks and time to just hang. He did really well —  though on our last day there (Sunday) he balked at getting in the crate when it came time for us to go to breakfast.

Fast food drive-thru windows were quite exciting for him. Why was this person suddenly hovering in the air before the driver’s window? With both windows open and food being handed over. The first time he nearly jumped out the window greeting the worker.  Then he decided he should bark.  But by the end he was handling it all with great aplomb. We were even able to eat our food in the car unmolested!

We spent the last night in the same hotel in Flagstaff we’d stayed in the first night and this time there were lots of dogs. We were in the room when one of them barked somewhere, also inside, and I heard a woman tell him “No!”  Whereupon Quigley had to bark and I told him  “No!”  The only other time he barked was when some women stopped in the hall outside to have a very loud conversation at midnight. Other than that, he was great.

Amazing. I kept marvelling at how well he did, given how hopeless it once seemed he’d ever be able to do anything like this.