5-23-01

Today was one of those, "will things ever be normal again" days.   We are almost 6 weeks post TPLO. It's been a long 6 weeks in a way, yet it has also gone very quickly. Some days are just very slow, hard days. Today was one of those.

Steve's parents called this morning to say they were coming over. While, I don't mind them coming over, I knew it would be hard to keep Magnum quiet with company here. When they came in, Magnum was whining, barking and jumping up on the back of the couch trying to get to them. He is so happy to see anyone, he forgets about everything else. My mother -in-law came over to say hi to him and he finally settled down a little but it didn't last. He kept whining and dancing around while I was trying to get lunch together. I finally had one of the kids lock him in his crate. It even took him a little while in his crate before he finally settled down and slept for a bit.   Then he was up whining again.

After the inlaws left, I had Erica let Magnum out of his crate and had her sit with him. He was still antsy so she sat and brushed him for a while and that seemed to help for a bit. I came in and sat at the computer to get some things done and he comes over and flips my arm off the keyboard and starts circling around under my arm, petting himself! GRRRRRR!!! I finally got up and took him out for a potty walk. He did go potty but he still wasn't happy when he came in so I resorted to giving him half of his dinner early. That got him settled down enough to go lay in his crate. Whew!

I took Erica and we went to run some errands (all critter related). We picked up some guinea pig shavings and got some more little trainintg bits. Then we went to Woodman's. We got a monster bone for $6, which is a very good price. Petco wanted $13 for the same bone. We also got him another octopus since he liked his last one so much, they are pretty cheap and it lasted a while. It also has a tennis ball in it so there is a toy left even after he "kills" the octopus. Then we went to the meat department and got a package of 3 marrow bones.   We also picked up a couple of people things and came home.

We gave each dog a marrow bone and it kept everyone very happy for a long time. Yes!!!! Peace at last!   :-)    We gave Magnum the rest of his dinner, which he did stop chewing his bone long enough to eat, and then we finally got to eat our dinner. Pepper was pretty naughty with his bone. He growled and snapped at the kids if they even came near him while he had his bone.

When I called Magnum to go out for his potty break tonight, he grabbed his bone and was going to take it with him. We took it away, got him outside and he did his business and wanted back in. He remembered to stop by Erica and pick up his bone. :-) He chewed a little while longer, played with his octopus, actually he "killed" his octopus; total annihalation of the octopus, got the tennis ball out and finally went to his crate and went to sleep.

The house is finally quiet again, kids and dogs are all sleeping, until my husband gets home. Then the dogs will *have* to bark to let me know he is home and say hi to him.

Me thinks we better work on obedience tomorrow with Magnum. He's getting way too demanding. I have noticed his hearing has become more selective lately.

The countdown counter on my links page says 14 more days to the 8 week X-Rays. Can't wait. We get our next set of x-rays June 7th. *Hopefully* we will get the o.k. to go for short walks. *If* we do, we will walk down to the lake and let him swim. So, the next big milestone will be the 2 month x-rays on June 7th. Until then, we'll just try to keep him quiet and keep our sanity. They're a little ahead of 2 months, but that's o.k.