Ann’s Weblog

I promised that I would publish pictures of my Great Dane guest.

I’m surprised that the pictures give little indication of this dog’s enormity; he is about 200 pounds and VERY tall (I’d go measure him right now, but he’s sleeping peacefully). Otis also looks THIN in the photo, and he is most certainly NOT thin; his ribs and backbone do not show when he’s standing; he’s in GREAT shape. He obligingly crept up onto the sofa when I asked him to, and though he mostly covered the breadth of TWO cushions, he still doesn’t look so big in the photos. I guess nothing looks that large when it’s folded up! He is a gentle giant.

The medium-small dog who lives with Otis was rescued/adopted from a BEACH in Mexico about a year ago. The family named her “Chica Bonita”, and this sweet gal had a litter of puppies very soon after arriving in Canada at her new home! The owner took some care to tell me a few of the dog’s idiosyncracies, but she, too, has been a model guest. After a day in our home, I could see why the family fell in love with her and removed her from an uncertain, feral life.

We have what we consider to be a “full house” in the Pet Hostel at the moment. Most of the canine guests are accustomed to sleeping indoors at night, and so that is how we care for them here. There are more dogs coming before and for Christmas, and most of the ones we have now are going to be gone. There’s something new every day around here, and it’s a delightful business to me.

Aside from the kennels keeping me busy, I have Raggedy Ann doll orders to fill. I have most of the five bodies made (two still need their torsos stuffed), and about half of the clothing. I’m running out of time, but I might be able to complete the dolls by Monday or Tuesday and send them by expedited mail. I have not promised these dolls for Christmas/Hannukah delivery, but that’s what I’m aiming for.

Thank you, dear reader, for being interested in my weblog. Will try to write again soon. ~Ann

Because my husband Gary needs to gain some weight, I have been making him some milkshakes and “smoothies” to supplement wholesome meals. We’ve experimented with several kinds of yogurt, and, because Gary’s not lactose intolerant, I’ve used milk, cream and ice cream in some of these culinary creations. I add frozen berries and/or bananas, and then whey powder and flax oil for their health benefits.

Many months ago, I bought flax oil from our local health food store. After mixing it in a salad dressing, I decided I didn’t care for the taste of it very much, and the bottle ended up, forgotten, in the back of the fridge until Gary suggested that he should have flax oil in his health regime. So… OUT came the oil, and I’ve been adding it to the shakes, all the while convinced that it nearly spoiled the lovely creamy fruity taste of those treats.

This afternoon Gary picked up the bottle of flax oil from the fridge (I assume to either read whether it was organic, or to decide if we should BUY more soon)… and noted that the “flavour” that I’d chosen was GARLIC and RED PEPPER! I’d been adding this savoury blend to all the lovely smoothies and other concoctions!

Certainly led to some understanding why the flax oil seemed too strong to add to the sweet drinks!

So… this was the laugh of the day, on myself.

Thank you for stopping in.

~Ann

Today, and for the next 12 days, I’m boarding the biggest dog that I’ve ever had at the Pet Hostel in my 21 years in business. Otis is perhaps the biggest dog I’ve ever seen, and we’ve seen and/or boarded St. Bernards, English Mastiffs, Irish Wolfhounds and other dogs of the “giant” breeds.

Otis is a quiet soul in an enormous (200+ pound) Great Dane body. He’s three years old and has been given loving instruction from his human family, so he knows how to behave always, including in the house. His head is at counter height in the kitchen, but so far he hasn’t helped himself to loaves of bread or pounds of butter. If he did, I’m sure it would be because he thought it was left for him there.

With Otis came “Chica Bonita” a medium-small dog of mixed breed who was adopted, evacuated and integrated from a beach in Mexico. She was pregnant at the time, and very soon had puppies at her new home. Now Chica is a cheerful, well-adjusted house dog who occasionally, her owners say, exhibits some feral behaviour. These two dogs are the closest of canine buddies, and I’m glad to be able to watch over both of them.

Over the next few days, I will try to make time to photograph Otis and Chica, and post the pictures.

Have been reading the book “Shake Hands With the Devil” by Romeo D’Allaire. I borrowed the book almost a year ago, but hadn’t started it. A few nights ago I watched the movie “Hotel Rwanda” which portrays a small part of the complicated politics and horror of the 1994 Rwandan genocide; then I was moved to retrieve the book from the shelf and start reading. It is very intense and disturbing to read about and reflect on: why didn’t the world care about what was happening? I saw very little in the news about those events, and during that time, I found a friend, a Hutu, who had grown up in Burundi, the country to the south of Rwanda. Steve, of course, told me that the massacres occurring then were unspeakable, and we never spoke of them again. I didn’t understand any of the politics.

I must get through the book soon, or put it aside, as I still have some Raggedy Ann dolls to finish for Christmas orders. I’ve completed and delivered five of the dolls, and have five more to do.

Gary and I attended a pot-luck dinner at Nick’s house last night. There were about 16 people there and PING PONG games were on the agenda. Some people (ages 4 to 60) were ping-pong players regularly, and some hadn’t played for 30 years. It was all fun to watch, and I found myself wanting to play but I felt too shy; perhaps another evening I will find someone else who hasn’t played for decades and a smaller AUDIENCE too.

I probably could babble for quite some time, but am anxious to get at my book. Probably I will fall asleep before I get through many pages.

Thank you for visiting my weblog. Take care, my friends.

~Ann

When we went to the Bar Mitzvah at the end of October, Gary accidentally left his favourite pillow at the home of daughter Susan, in North Vancouver.

Susan didn’t have time to mail this item, but three weeks later, had to make a trip to a town near us, and she brought the pillow! I met her in Valemount, and proudly ferried the pillow back to Gary, who was duly grateful.

The pillow smelled a little stale, and so we thought we’d wash it. I simply threw it, with a few items of my clothing, into the automatic washing machine at the local laundromat (why we don’t have laundry facilities here at home is a different story). It BURST.

I had a washing machine load of feathers and clothing to deal with. Ever resourceful, I got bags and, first extricated the jeans, shirt and pillowcases, then, handful by handful reclaimed the wet feathers into a different bag. I confessed to the laundromat owner, and then I ran to my hair appointment.

My hairdresser, who is also a friend, greeted my pillow story with peals of laughter. She said, “Ann, I’m afraid that you’ll just have to consider it GONE and LOST. It will NEVER feel the same or smell the same, no matter how you rebuild the pillow. Don’t even try; it will not work!

Undaunted, I stopped at the fabric store and found feather ticking, and some piping, as Gary’s pillow didn’t have just PLAIN seams. At home, I emptied the feathers (a sticky, heavy mess) into a large cardboard box and set that by the wood fire in our basement. My clothing that was washed with the feathers looked like it would never be the same… solidly covered with feathers and tiny particles of same, impossible to pick or vacuum off.

In the following days, I stirred the feathers several times per day and was delighted to find that they were drying well and smelling less and less like wet geese, or what I imagine wet geese smell like. One evening I sewed up the pillow covering, using measurements from the old pillow that I had also saved. Since I knew that a few handfuls of feathers had been lost, I reduced the measurements slightly, so that the “loft” of the new pillow would be the same. The contrasting “piping” around the edges looked quite smart. I felt quite smart.

And when I presented Gary with his new pillow, he seemed pleased. You know, it isn’t a “security” thing, he explained, just a comfort thing; he finds other pillows too stuffed and they hurt his neck. He told me that he had liberated this pillow from his family’s cottage MANY years ago, and that his GREAT-grandmother had sewn it.

I would say that if I had realized that his great-grandmother had made that pillow, it MIGHT, just might, have occurred to me that it would not survived the automatic washer treatment!

All’s well that ends well.

~Ann