Rescue Me # 2 (and a year in review)

We have decided to end the year here at Jowls of Fury on a high note. So let us introduce you to our second 'Rescue Me' hound.

His name is Livingston, and he is being taken care of by Hounds Haven Basset Rescue of Iowa. He is a 4 year old handsome boy who is looking for a forever home and a gotcha day to celebrate forever and ever.

How can you not love this face

My lady hound heart got all aflutter when I read his page. Mr. Livingston was found in rural Missouri - where I live! - running around as a stray dog. He had a really bad eye infection and the vet determined that his right eye doesn't produce any tears. This means he needs to have eye drops put in them to keep it moist and healthy. My heart breaks for this poor hound, because I hate medicine and the very idea of them putting it in my eyeball makes me want to bite someone. Livingston looks very rugged and in need of a lady hound's attention in that photo, squinting with his one eye that needs the eye drops. He is also afraid of people but loves little kids, kind of like Breezy. This means he was probably abused as a puppy. If he were around I would give him kisses and take care of him. But I'm sure he will find a good home with such a sweet face. If you would like to know more about Livingston you can find his page here, and you can find Hound Haven's page here.

So now on to the year in review! We have had a really busy year here at Jowls of Fury. We started new traditions like Famous Basset Hound Friday, and the other dumb ones that cats do. We tried to win prizes for Mango Minster but we weren't successful. We survived Snowpacolypse and we gave Breezy her gotcha day (although I didn't like her much at first). We had to deal with extra cats coming in the house and then we had to take the blog back from evil cats. We got to see our Michigan family this spring, and we got to go swimming at great-grandma's house and see our other family there. We didn't care for the swimming part. We had a basset GQ page (and hopefully we'll have another one soon), and we went on many car rides. Unfortunately I had to go to the vet's twice this year and I hope I never have to go again. I discovered how tasty cicadas were even if they were really noisy, and I rediscovered my dislike of daddy's walking habits. We began our HOSA dog training and we went to our favorite basset party event in the world, the waddle! We moved into a new house, one without so many steps! We visited a new dog park and we will be visiting it a lot in the future.

Oh and check out this really neat basset statue we got from Aunt Melissa, Uncle Zane, and puppy cousins Chopper and Aksel.

We have good puppy cousins

Plus grandma got me some new toys for Christmas, a new squeaky pig and a new ball.

Rosco is trying to steal my ball

Oh and Breezy is a big wuss about snow, it is the best part of winter.

I am in my element

But at some point you get cold and have to run inside for the heat!

OK enough of this, basset power activate!

So all in all it was a good year. We had our ups and downs but we ended it with a nice time and lots of love and family. We would be remiss not to remember the hounds we lost this year, so we dedicate our last blog post of 2011 to our hound friends (like Woody, Romeo, Cleo, and Flash) who are at the bridge waiting for their people to join them. If we forgot any other hounds who went to the bridge this year we apologize - please leave their name in a comment, we don't want to leave anyone out.

Famous Basset Hound Friday # 39

Oh boy! It's getting to be Christmas time! That means they will get out a tree with lots of little toys on it for me to play with! And we get to see our family again, including puppy cousins like Aksel and Chopper and Max and Maggie and Griff and Remy! And the kids! And a ten-hour car ride to see them all! And the Christmas Pig!

In case you can't tell I like Christmas time. But I'm not so excited about the Christmas Pig...

Anyway - it is in the spirit of Christmas time that I present to you our latest famous hound. Only because it is Christmas time, I actually present to you TWO yes TWO famous hounds! It's a two-for-one hound sale at Christmas time! And it's brought to you by the store Target. Now unfortunately there is a lot of other foolishness in the commercial they appear in, but the most important part is between 13-14 seconds in. That's where our famous hounds (we don't know their names but we must assume this is Santa and Mrs. Paws) come in!

Oh little hound of Bethlehem

But wait! Santa Paws has lost his beard! I wonder what happened? I grew a beard once...

Done!

Evil Uncle Casey

Well what an interesting few days it has been. We got up very early the other day and went for a car ride. It was pretty long, and we went to grandma's house. Only this time it was my other grandma, and her house is different from the grandma's house I am used to. The first thing I smelled when I came in were cats, and they are all hiding upstairs still. I think this is pretty cowardly of them, they should come down and meet their hound cousins. Daddy tells me there are five of them here, just like at our house. But these cats are all like Nibbler, they are afraid of us hounds, even though we just want to chase them and pin them down and sniff and lick them.

Then later that day my puppy cousins Aksel and Chopper came over. Now as you may remember they can be kind of mean to me, but this time after a short round of howling they remembered their manners and were actually trying to play with us. Chopper likes our toy duckies and piggies and we all played chase and fetch and chew-squeak-squeak. Aksel though... well I guess Aksel is afraid of us for some reason because he always growls and shows his teeth when he gets near us. He has to wear a collar that pokes him in the neck to remind him we are peace-loving hounds. We all went on a walk together yesterday and he was fine outside, it's just inside that he is afraid of us. Hopefully he will get over that.

Then last night I met another uncle I have. His name is Casey and he seemed like a nice enough uncle at first. We all had Thanksgiving turkey and pie and other goodies and then we fell asleep on the couch watching football. I got up this morning and did my morning necessaries like eating and pooping, and then wanted to get up on the couch to have my morning nap, when I discovered this.

What is the meaning of this?

... what is going on here? Is this how Uncle Casey treats guests in grandma's house? Rosco, Layla and I got up and gave him the customary basset hound nudge, as if to say "Hey get your lazy butt off the couch, that is our job". He responded by petting us and pushing us down onto the floor. Well! Of all the nerve!

We are guests here, so we tried not to get too upset about this. Rosco tried to jump up on him, thinking perhaps he wanted us to snuggle with him some. We just met and all so I was not too comfortable with the idea. Well as you can see below Rosco didn't get to stay up there very long, he got pushed onto the floor again.

So much for that approach.

So at that point Uncle Casey had to get up and do his morning necessaries, and we took that as our sign that he was up and was going to be doing the important human things that humans normally do. I saw an opportunity to inherit a warm spot and I wasted no time.

There, that's better.

But I was wrong. Uncle Casey came back and kicked us off the couch so he could lay down and play video games. I gave up at that point, and then I remembered something I had been hearing on TV lately - it is Black Friday, the day that evil-hearted people spend the entire day pursuing unimportant things and ignoring the needs of basset hounds. Thus I have seen the true nature of my Evil Uncle Casey.

I guess this is how we treat basset hounds when we are Evil Uncle Casey.

Famous Basset Hound Friday # 36

First of all: Happy Howl-o-ween! Second of all: it's another Famous Basset Hound Friday! Third of all: the weather has gotten colder here, and it's time for my winter coat to grow in!

But enough of the pleasantries. This week's hound is famous for her awesome greeting card, and it is Howl-o-ween themed to boot! She's also famous because she got some peanut butter to get her picture taken. Her name is Stinkerbell and she is only pretending to be a poodle - there are no basset costumes that are that good.

I wish we had peanut butter pumpkins here

Stinkerbell was a winner in Hallmark Greeting Card's contest, along with some other cool dogs and a few rotten cats. You can see her winning page here. We did not even know about this contest, because mom and dad don't ever take us anywhere on car rides anymore. The only reason we found out is because our Aunt Melissa sent us this card along with greetings from our puppy cousins Aksel and Chopper. Also I guess we have cat cousins over there but we have never met them - probably for the best, as most cats are rotten. But Aunt Melissa is very nice and she loves on us and tells us how beautiful we are. Chopper and Aksel are a bit too rough sometimes, but that's only because they are about twice as big as me. If they were my size I would totally kick their butts!

Anyway Stinkerbell is our newest famous hound!

The perils of cathood

I haven't written on this blog in quite awhile. The last time I did I was extolling the virtues of Cathalla. I haven't been able to take advantage of it for some time. It's been really hot lately, we knocked our water dish over the other night and I was pretty sure mom was going to kill Bunsen for it, the sink broke and we weren't allowed to explore the cabinets beneath, the dogs (especially stupid Breezy) keep chasing us, our dog cousins (Chopper and Aksel) chased us (and they are a lot bigger than the dogs that live here), we aren't allowed to go outside, and worst of all, I have cat bowel problems.

Don't laugh.

Cat bowel problems are not fun. I end up running for the litter box and sitting there for a long time before the problem goes away. I also end up having to take tons of different pills and medicine and eat all kinds of different food. It hasn't quite progressed to a vet visit yet - they took me there once and the vet told us to try different food and medicine - but I am getting the feeling it will turn into another vet visit soon. So I have been hiding beneath the bed a lot lately.

Kind of a boring post, I know. I will try and escape into the yard again and find an adventure for my next post!

I have many grandmas

Wow who had any idea there could be so many grandmas? I got to meet my one grandma a few months ago in Michigan, and then I got to meet my other grandma last month at the lake. But here is where it gets slightly confusing - there is a THIRD grandma, and they say she is a great one, who lives at the lake. So that is two regular grandmas and one great-grandma. It sounds confusing but I have a little trick to help me remember:

The regular grandmas both have many cats, and each of them brings dogs with them too (Maggie and Max for the one grandma; Chopper and Aksel for the other). But the great-grandma doesn't have any dogs - I think she has a cat but I can't tell. Most of her house is off-limits so a cat could be hiding (and you know how dishonest cats are).

The best way to tell the difference is whether there is a big lake or not. The great-grandma's house has a huge lake. I am not a fan of lakes, they remind me too much of baths. Some of the dogs in our family like lakes though - I think probably because they have been dropped on their heads or something.

As you can see I am pretty nervous here.

Anyway, we went to the great-grandma's house not too long ago, and we all wore our swimming gear. I don't know why they make us wear that stuff, none of us like to swim and all we do is run around and look stupid in it.

These are not very flattering

Plus the lake is way too rough for swimming anyway:

No thank you! Even the gentle stream at the other grandma's is too wet for me (but not for Griff, that big dummy):

Plus our puppy cousins make me nervous - they are much bigger than me and one of them (Aksel) gets really overprotective and bitey. He bit my ear pretty hard last time! I barked in his face and Chopper's too and I showed them who was boss!

They're afraid of the gates, the big babies!

Anyway, despite all that I like my great-grandparent's place. Great-grandpa knows how to talk to a lady hound and he gives me lots of love and attention. And there are good puppy treats so you know it is a good house!