Merrylog

Just a week or so after I posted last, Merry started squinting with one of her eyes. We took her into the eye vet to see if something was wrong… and the news was not good.

She had an ulcer on her eye and it was fairly deep. The eye vet felt that surgery was probably the best option – go in and essentially “scrape out” the damaged parts and then sew up her eye for a month and see if it healed – if not, another surgery to remove the eyeball itself.

You can imagine how well this went over with Merry’s Daddy and I.

The thing is: this little pug means the world to us. She’s only 10, but that puts her at greater risk for surgery; so does the simple fact that she’s a pug. Add in a slight arrythmia in her heart and it all adds up to major risk for surgery… to save an eye.

We asked for options.

The eye vet reluctantly told us that we might be able to heal it with drugs but it would be unlikely. I said I wanted to try for a couple of days anyway – I asked if there was MORE risk to her eye in waiting a couple of days and just treating with drugs, and the vet admitted no… so that’s what we tried.

What followed was a crazy month of being at the eye vet’s 2-3 times a week, a crazily rigorous schedule of drops and ointments that included waking up in the middle of the night to administer them, and a very lethargic and at times completely stoned pug who loved to scare the hell out of us by lollygagging around and not wanting to do anything. In between she developed glaucoma in her eye, spent a scary two days in the vet’s offices and will now be on meds for that for the rest of her life.

Whee!

Luckily, I am happy to report that the puglet is healing. Her eye seems to be stable and healing slowly and so long as everything cooperates, with any luck she’ll be out of the cone in a month or two and ready to take on the world again. Her energy is mostly back though she can’t do much with it since she’s not allowed to play yet.

For those of you still following along at home… that’s why you haven’t heard from us lately. :) Saving that sweet little eye has been our #1 priority and as a result, the blog has languished. But I hope to have more lovely conehead shots to share with you soon!

Oh, the princess was a cuddly one this weekend. :) It was like having a furry leg warmer – wonderful, really. Since her retirement, the princess has become cuddlier. My guess is because she needs more reassurance now that she doesn’t have “a day job” – i.e. all that daily attention. Poor pug. Yes, there are days I still feel guilty for going to my own day job and leaving her behind! (Does that make me crazy?)

As our regular readers know, I’m a big fan of the bench shot. So when I saw this fabulous blue bench with a field of yellow stalks behind it, I had to take the shot.

Past bench shots, for your delectation:

• pug & mom time
• bench outtake
• YABS (yet another bench shot)
• bench girl
• and a really old pensive on the bench – Merry looks SO different here, doesn’t she? My how she’s changed.

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. :)

I couldn’t resist sharing just one last photo of the lovely princess in her Halloween costume. We went over to the park to hang out earlier that day and this was the result. She garnered a lot of “awww”s. :)

Welcome to the new Merrylog.com! The design of the site isn’t much to write home about, I don’t have a Blogroll up and running or the images of Merry all categorized up the way I’d like, but at least all of the links and images work, which means for better or worse… we’re here. :)

The princess misses all of you dearly, and can’t wait to tell you about her newest adventures. But first, she wanted to treat you with her head-tilt-butter-wouldn’t-melt-who-me-bark-at-something? pose, which is her all time favorite pose to strike around the house. *laughs*

I planned to do an Easter-themed post, I really did. I had new props (courtesy of Merry’s Grandma) and everything. But it was so crazy insane around here the past week that this is the best I could do: a shot of what Merry really did this Easter weekend.

Our little family has a tradition every Easter: I cook up a big ham, and while it cooks, the kids and their Dad and I sit around and play Monopoly. Why not? The roast needs usually two to three hours, and it’s one of the few times of the year we can get the kids to sit around the table with us playing games for hours on end.

As usual, the pug did lap time. Here she is on my stepdaughter’s lap, checking out the game board and helping her to strategize.

Hope everyone had a great holiday weekend!

My poor princess. I feel like a terrible pug mommy. I was sooooo busy this weekend, and for once not with work but with bargain hunting (I’m planning a fairlyland garden entertaining space in our backyard and trying to do it on a shoestring budget) and farmer’s markets and a big Earth Hour concert downtown and house chores and… whew. I think I sat down for an hour or so at some point, but don’t hold me to that.

As a result, I have a very needy pug at home who gave me this look this morning when I went to drag her out of her nice comfy bed (a.k.a. ours!) this morning. Poor baby girl! I’ll play with you a little tonight, promise!

You know, Merry really never was a big “talker”. She’s more vocal now that she’s blind, of course – especially when playing fetch in the house. (Sometimes I long for earplugs.) But she never really did the kinds of vocalizations I’ve seen with other dogs – all kinds of pips and sounds.

Does your pooch “talk”? Did you teach them this, or do they just do it naturally?

Oh, the tilted head. I swear that you have that little head tilt expressly for the purpose of getting more treats out of me, your dad, and the rest of the world.

Insider note: I usually ask Merry one of three questions to get that head tilt:

1. Where’s Grandpa?
2. Where’s Daddy?
3. Want some pizza?

I’ll spill the details about the pizza thing soon – want to get a photo to illustrate!