Been really busy!

Like usual, the blog has been neglected due to sled dog stuff. Mainly the multiple feet of snow that we got over the past week and a half or so. Shoveling, plowing, shoveling and plowing, some more shoveling and more plowing... You get the idea. (And there is still more to do.)

Anyways...

Conker just loves the snow. He thinks it is amazing, even when he jumps off the pathway or plowed section and vanishes into the fluffy white stuff.

I haven't done a whole lot with Conker lately and it's annoying me a bit, but he does not seem to be too affected by the lack of constant attention that he was previously showered with.
He's grown an incredibly soft and thick coat and doesn't get cold as long as it's above -10 now. Colder than that and he needs his sweater.

It's been relatively warm, 20's and such, but it's going to cool down again tonight. I just hope it doesn't do what it did last time and not get above zero for several weeks straight. That was really a pain in the ass.

Conker being a punk to Juneau

Juneau is the Cutest Dog Ever, remember? She is the only dog that I actually like the "in your face giant nose" type pictures. All the others... Meh.

Aywho, unfortunately for Juneau, Conker is a jerk and loves to pick on her. She puts up with it, I don't know why. Sasha doesn't and that is why he does not harass her like he does Juneau.
So here is some Conker being a punk to Juneau. In the snow.

Asshat.

Juneau is the cutest dog ever

Taken last February.

So um, how about that weather?

It's been odd this winter. Very odd indeed. It's been "mild" with moderate temperatures (most of the time) and very little rain. To top that off, it's snowed FOUR times. Four! That's four more times than normal.
This time the snow was about 1.5 - 2 inches deep, which is a lot for in town. It stick around for a good part of the day too.

Conker had a ton of fun messing around in it. Like he always does. I need to live somewhere with regular snow so he can burn off energy without me doing much.

Little brother came out with me and Conker to have a snowball fight. It was much fun, and Conker was a good distraction.

KILL IT!

This snow happened yesterday.

Even the Girls got to run around in it a bit. Not for long though, they tend to not stay in the front yard and will run off to do their own crap. Conker doesn't do that.

We are still depending on wood to keep the house warm. Which doesn't quite work, since all the heat stays in the front room. So I basically live there instead of my room and spend less than two hours a day on the comp compared to my normal time of "roughly the entire day".


So today, I took Conker to the dog park since I was sick of being in the house.

There was nobody there, so Conker sniffed some mud.

Got a couple treats.

And surveyed his kingdom. With a smug look on his face. Like always.

Snow Day Take 2

We got another bout of snow last night and a bit this morning (all melted now) so like I did last time, I got up early and went hiking. I was stupid and wore the old black boots I haven't worn since last August and now have a big painful sore on my right Achilles tendon. Yep, not doing that again.
I took the Girls along this time. It was somewhat chaotic.

There was lots of derp.

Lots of running around off-trail.

 Conker being last on recall every time.

And a bit of cool scenery.

More pictures will be posted once I have a working computer with photoshop installed. Until then, this is all you get.

Funny that the furnace goes out the week it decides to snow. It's freezing in this house.


It took a hour to download the pictures onto my harddrive (it's external so all my files are safe) and more than TWO HOURS to rotate about 100 pictures on this damn computer. That is very agitating, and I wasn't even running any sort of editing program! All that took maybe 10 minutes on my currently dead piece-of-shit that ironically, was much more efficient than this one.

Snow Catch

This is Conker's second favorite snow game. Or leaf game, or water game, or dirt/sand/whatever game. The first is always the run-around-in-x substance-like-he's-on-fire game.

Okay, I think he's had enough.

Snow Day!

We haven't had one of these for... a whole year! Conker was psyched last night with the snow, and even more excited today on our morning hike. (Morning? Yes, I did get up before noon for the first time ever.)

And now, the evidence.

On the way to Cathedral Hills, JPR (lameass local public radio station) played Winter by Antonio Vivaldi (how cliche) but hey, it's not like we get snow much so I guess it was alright. I actually really like that piece, it's my favorite of the Four Seasons.

The first thing Conker did when we hit the trail was take off off-trail somewhere. I don't know if he was chasing something (looked like it) or was just OMFGSNOWGOTTARUNOMGOMGWTFRUN! I imagine many other Shiba owners would have had a miniature (or major) meltdown at the sight (or lack of) their Shiba running off into the snow-covered forest. I just walked around a bit then stepped off-trail and hollered at Conker to get his scrawny butt back here, and he did, so we began our snow hike.

I, like I usually do, overdressed a bit. Though snow was on the ground, it was a relatively "warm" 36 degrees or so. I had on long johns with waterproof (but not snowboarding, I almost but didn't wear those) pants, my nasty-ass shoes (smell like the pond I went into to fetch my Coots), two pairs of socks, a scarf, and my favorite jacket that I always wear. And a raccoon skin hat. With a tail.

Conker blew his coat early this year, thanks to the trip to AZ for Christmas. He didn't seem to notice though, and the lack of undercoat didn't slow him down one bit. Sped him up I might think, actually.

Obligatory Shiba-on-the-pick-nick-table picture.

There was some pretty spiffy scenery too.

Some parts of the trails had more snow than others. My guess is that something around 2 inches fell in Cathedral Hills which is only a little over 5 miles from my house. Funny how much of a difference about 100-300 feet in elevation makes when it comes to this. (Other places not-too-far-away got 6 inches or more.)

 We played Conker's second favorite snow game. (More pictures of this will be posted later.)

Overall it was a really nice hike. We did about 3.75 miles, not too bad, but I'd like to start making these hikes 5+ as the average instead of slightly over 3. We only ran into one other person, a man and his Basset Hound who got along with Conker nicely.


After driving back home, I took all three dogs to the dog park. That short hour between when I left and got back resulted in almost all the snow in town being melted. It's almost all completely gone now.

All dogs did a lot of running around and getting muddy.

I think Juneau had the most fun out of the three.  She got the most mud on her and her harness. The thing finally looks like it's been used now.

Haven't experienced this for a year!

I'd be running around like a dumbass too. Oh wait... I did.

What is that?

Look at that mountain. Look at the white stuff on it.

OMG SNOW!

Not in town though.

More snow.

It snowed about eight inches last night, more in on the way.  At first Conker didn't like how deep it was but now he loves to hop through it.  It's pretty funny looking and fun to watch.

Christmas!

Christmas was good, Conker loved all his new toys, treats and food.  He spent most of the day working on his new 12" bully stick or chasing after one of his plush toys.  (penguin, bone and moose are his favorites.)

In other news, Christmas was Conker's first day of raw food!  He didn't get any breakfast in order to be sure he'd eat his first hunk of bone-in chicken breast, but that wasn't an issue and he went right at it as if he'd been doing that his whole life.  I held onto it just in case he was a gulper but he chewed every piece he ripped off, no matter the size.

At first he avoided the bone but after he figured out it was also tasty, he crunched away until he was finished, leaving only a few ounces of chicken for leftovers. 
Hopefully he'll adapt quickly to eating raw.  He's had a few occasions where he's come running up to one of us and let us know that he needed to go outside right-now but nothing horrible has happened yet.

Extra picture.

SNOW! (Saturday, December 11th)

  I really didn't think it was going to snow in St. Peters this early.  I'd been watching the Weather Channel the whole day and they kept saying that we were only going to get a tinsy bit of snow.
Well, around 6 at night the snow was beginning to fall, barely enough to see but enough that one could spot it blowing across the road in car headlights.  By 11 at night there were gatherings of snow on rooftops, cars and patches of grass.  By 2 AM the ground was covered.  We decided to go out at 3.  It was so bright due to the snow in the air we didn't need lights.

Conker had never seen snow before.  At first he didn't want to come off the steps or touch the snow but after a bit of coaxing, he jumped right in.

Conker decided the snow was the best thing he'd ever seen.  He constantly ran around, jumped and rolled in it and chased the large flakes blowing in the wind.  I was surprised at how quiet he was, normally he makes a lot of noise when he plays like that.  I was glad he didn't bark since our neighbors probably wouldn't have liked that.

We decided to go for a walk around the complex.  Conker wanted to stay in the large grass area and run some more.  He was on a 30 foot lead and surprisingly had no urge to run off.  Though he didn't want to leave the grass area, he followed after he realized we were leaving.  He stayed close the entire time.

Conker would trot ahead of us and sniff the snow then run to catch up after we had passed him.  He liked to jump onto the "planters" with grass and bushes and sniff at whatever was under the snow, but for the most part he stuck to the snowy sidewalk.
We spent a good 45 minutes walking around the complex.  Conker slipped on a patch of ice that I, immediately afterward, slipped on as well but I caught myself before I landed on top of him.  Conker really enjoyed his late night in the snow, but we were getting tired so we decided to call it.

The snow was still there the next day and had added an inch or so, bringing the snowfall to around 3 inches.  We took Conker out for a quick 20 minute 30-foot lead walk then had breakfast/lunch.  After that we walked to the treat store and bought him some more Orijen and a few treats.

Letting Conker run around in the snow on the 30-foot lead did something to him.  He is a MUCH better dog on the leash now and understands that when we grab the big lead he gets to run and play and when we grab the short lead he needs to stay close.  The better he does on the short lead means more long lead time.

The snow is still here.  It's kinda odd for me seeing snow outside every time I look out the window since I grew up in Phoenix Arizona and snow doesn't exist there.  For Conker it seems like he's known about snow for his whole 5 1/2month life.  He loves the snow so much, it's kinda sad to bring him back inside.