Merrylog

Merry, once again “shaking a paw” in exchange for a treat. Note the long tongue in anticipation of said treat. She’s so adorable – and so treat focused – that there are days when I think we could literally teach her anything!

The expression on her face was so priceless I had to share it with you. ;) However, this photo also really nicely summed up my feelings about waking up before 6 am on a Saturday just so I could go down to Toronto’s biggest farmer’s market and beat the crowds. I love the food, love the market, but oh my gosh this is an ungodly weekend hour!

The princess received some great news yesterday – she has healed enough for us to allow her some playtime with one of her uber squishy and soft anemones. It’s not quite fetch, but it is progress! We’re all thrilled and relieved to be able to give the pug something to do other than walk, cuddle and sleep.

A lot of people in a lot of places made changes to their lives in late September of 2001. Even folks in different countries – like Canada – were given a good kick in the pants reminder about mortality and the fragile nature of life ten years ago. While I had already decided that I wanted a pug I just wasn’t sure I could handle the work and effort required to raise a pug on my own. But the events ten years ago were definitely a kick in the pants for me. They made me realize “what are you waiting for, exactly?” – and I started calling pug breeders that very week. By September 30th, I had found and fallen in love with a little four month old pug named Merry and cajoled the breeder into allowing me to buy her instead of keeping her for breeding stock.

It was one of the two happiest decisions in my life (the other being marrying the fantastic Hubby).

As you can see, the puglet still isn’t very photogenic yet (every meagre photo I find time to take in between eye drops looks just like this one – cone head supreme) but I am happy to report that she is healing wonderfully and has a disturbingly healing gloop of red over her right eye, which the doctors assure me is good and blood heals things but mostly I just think it looks sore. ;) We’re hopefully a month or so from being able to remove the cone (!!) and look forward to the day when the princess can start navigating without it!

If yer Irish (or just Irish for a day, like the pug), we wish you a happy St. Patrick’s Day. The pug will even get a taste of the Irish treats gracing our table tonight – colcannon and pork chops. However, the chocolate Guiness cupcakes with Baileys cream cheese frosting will be strictly off limits. ;)

She is so cute when she howls in the middle of playtime – even cuter when her ears fly up like that. Merry, silly pug, you’re such fun to play with. :)

Nine and a half years later, the pug head tilt still slays me.  I’m going to have to make it a category in this blog so that you can find all of the other pug head tilt photos. :)

The princess looks terrified, doesn’t she? Scared, perhaps of all the spooooky (and yet sparkly) spiders crawling over her skin?

Not to worry, folks – she’s by no means scared. I just woke her up out of a dead sleep to get this shot. Okay, so she was probably a little startled. But I gave her lots of tummy rubbins afterwards. And yes, there is no “g” in rubbins. True.

Actually, I find it amazing that I was able to sneak up on her at all with  the camera – the first few shots I got, she was still sleeping. See what happens when you retire from modelling? Suddenly the camera shutter no longer rules your life! (I’m hoping this means amazing sleepy girl shots over the winter, which I’ve rarely had the chance to practice!)

The princess and I are heading out to a Pug-o-ween later today, so expect many more Halloween-y themed photos for the next week or so.

And Happy Halloween to all of you! :)

This is a very rare photo for two reasons. One, it captures me in a pose that became my natural state during 8 years of running Pampered Puppy – holding up something for the dog to focus on while I get the photo, covered in dog hair. Two, it was taken by a wonderful lady (and incredibly talented photographer) who sadly is no longer with us today. She was a fantastically gifted, wonderfully warm and giving lady who didn’t deserve the long and brutal battle with cancer that she drew as her lot, and finally lost yesterday. She was a mentor to me who helped me find my artistic eye, who gave me the first photography lesson I ever received that really took, she taught me about fine cooking and how to eat asparagus and figs and inspired me with my first Donna Hay cookbook – which eventually led to me becoming the world-beater cook I am today. She had a wonderful laugh. She will be missed.

She gets soooo excited when I play fetch with her, especially when I hunker down on the floor and really give her a good run for it. It’s been in short supply this week, though – between a cold that doesn’t seem to want to quit, a wedding anniversary (can you believe it’s been a year since The Hubby and I got hitched?) and a business trip to Montreal, there hasn’t been a whole lot of time for me to get on the floor and play with my best girl. It’s something I intend to remedy tonight!

It never ceases to amaze me how long the silly pug’s tongue is (and how, with such a long tongue, her face isn’t cleaner instead of needing to be cleaned out twice daily). ;)

She’s been a very good girl this week, taking care of me while I slept and sneezed and coughed my way through a wicked cold. She’s the best pillow and couch cuddle bunny you could ask for!

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