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It’s been a busy couple weeks around here.  Summer is in full fling with all the associated projects and outings and work is fun, but keeping me on my toes.

In no particular order here’s what’s been happening:

• Ollie is getting bigger.  He’s just over 4 months now and stands taller than Sophie and his head is about twice the size of hers.  I’ll have to post some more pictures and videos soon.  We still don’t have any idea what type of dog he is, but we have really been enjoying him.
• This weekend the fish club got together for a home show and competition.  I volunteered to travel around with the group as a judge and we spent Saturday traveling all around the Seattle area.  It was a lot of fun to meet everyone in their homes and get to see all the tanks they’ve been working on for so long.  There was lots of amazing stuff out there.
• Beth and I finally had a weekend day off together.  We went for a great little hike.  The dogs were really pooped by the end.
• I’ve got a new boss at work.  So far he seems to be getting along well.
• The media PC died last week so we haven’t had the easy access to all our TV shows that we’re used too.  We ordered a new one and it’s scheduled to be delivered tomorrow.  I still can’t believe that the entire PC costs less than I paid for just the processor of the previous one.  That, and it’s going to be 4 or 5 times faster.
• Beth and I have bought our plane tickets to Europe.  I’ve got some training in the Czech Republic in August, and this time Beth is going to come along.  We’re going to add a week of vacation on to the end of it and spend some time traveling around Austria as well.

Well, that’s it for now.  Get out there and enjoy the sun!

You can’t live with them, and you can’t eat them.  I do have to say, non-porous surfaces are a god send for potty training.  But I understand the sentiment on days like this.  When you’re a walking sponge, it’s really a toss up whether you would rather go outside into the absolute downpour or stay inside and risk a beating.

I dusted off the motorcycle this week and have started riding again.  The replacement grips came in last week and they’re working like a charm again.  I also have a couple new things on the way.

In recognition of the type of weather that I typically get to ride in out here, I’ve ordered a type of bag that is probably new to the motorcycling community.  You can see them in the picture on the left.  You might be more familiar with these bags if you have spent any time on the water in canoes or kayaks.  If they can be dropped into the ocean and still keep your stuff dry, I think they’ll probably work fairly well for my gear as well.

Even more exciting for me though is I finally broke down and ordered some parts to upgrade the airflow for my motorcycle’s engine.  It’s going to take a little work to put it all together, but it’s really going to sound great and make a huge difference for performance.  And hey, I don’t need that gas economy anyways!

Took Ollie to the vet today for his shots. He’s officially 7.4 lbs. That’s 10% bigger in one week.

The two mutts seem to be getting along well. A little bit of shared ringworm proves that, right? Oh well, that just means they’re extra special friends.

Here’s another video of them playing this weekend:

Sophie and Ollie seem to be getting along okay:

Meet Ollie, our new puppy. He’s about 6 weeks old now, and we have no idea what kind of dog he is. It looks like he’ll probably get quite a bit bigger than Sophie at this point. But for now it’s just time for a little bit of playing, a little bit of pooping, and a lot of sleeping.

Apparently upgrading Wordpress to 2.7.1 has totally hosed my front page.   I don’t know why nothing is showing up there.  I’ve poked at it a little bit, but obviously not enough to fix it yet.  I’ll probably need to just build an entirely new front page that doesn’t use the wordpress backend at all. Sigh…

But, I should have plenty of time to look into that next week.  I’m going to be back in Eindhoven for another week of training.  As always, that means a couple long nights where I can’t sleep.  So, I should have lots of time to rebuild the front page.

In more interesting news, Sophie (our puppy) is trying to learn how to stand on the back of the couch so she can get closer to the fish in the living room tank.  Some things are funny enough to just let them happen.

Note how nice the tank looks with the new plants in it. Thanks a lot to Eric from the GSAS for donating those to me.

Cody got attacked and I got yelled at. Apparently it’s impolite for your dog to defend himself and win the fight, of all things.

Our mutt needs regular exercise. Lots and lots or regular exercise. What that means for us is the choice of taking up running or going to the dog park a lot. Personally, I prefer the dog park.

It has become our daily, or twice daily, routine now to go and take a couple laps around the park. I enjoy it. It’s a nice point in my day to get some fresh air and chat with some new people. Though it’s getting to the point that these aren’t new people anymore, but actually familiar people that we know in the community.

Most of the time I’m quite impressed with how much attention these owners pay to their dogs. More than just feeding, walking, and playing with them, they also seem to understand their behaviors and moods. Generally this also includes an understanding of normal behaviors at the park, and fights from time to time.

Unfortunately, today I met one of the owners that doesn’t fall into this category.

First off, Cody isn’t an angel that can do no harm. For the most part, he’s a pretty good dog, but his play can get fast and rough at times. An added concern to this is that he doesn’t always take breaks from the play, as other dogs do, to let the tension drain. So, if we’re not watching, the play at times can escalate into a fight.

This leads to today. A woman arrived at the park with two dogs. Cody started playing with one of the dogs and it was getting a bit rough. I was watching, but I wasn’t really concerned at this point. Both of the dogs were taking breaks from the play and then coming back to it together.

The woman’s second dog apparently didn’t approve and started being aggressive towards Cody. He would run up and hit Cody with his body, cutting in between the two playing. The first couple times this happened Cody just ignored him and the two dogs went back to playing. But the new dog wouldn’t let it be and eventually pushed Cody to the point that he turned around, put his hackles up, and gave the dog a good snarl and bark.

Here’s where the other dog really started in on Cody, ultimately to his detriment. It was a quick fight, and no one got hurt, but Cody was pretty obviously the winner.

To this point I had just let it all be. From my point of view, Cody was being picked on by a bully and had stood up for himself. Apparently the other owner didn’t see it that way and started screaming at me to control my dog, without actually doing anything herself to end the fight.

I put my hand on Cody’s collar and walked him away. A few moments later, once the other dog had been walked away a bit, it was back to play as usual.

Sigh… another day at the park.