My New Shoes

Those shoes I ordered online and have been talking about?  They arrived today.

Yes, I got toe shoes, and yes they are totally kickass.

Want some toes shoes of your own? Visit this site to enter a contest for a free pair!

Best search term so far

are shiba dogs stupid


To answer the question, Shiba dogs aren't generally stupid.  They can appear to be stupid because they are incredibly stubborn.  They are actually quite smart and are very mischievous.  They know how to manipulate you to get their way.

Black, White and Orange

I might make this a recurring thing.

Hiking days are Tuesday, Thursday and maybe Saturday or Sunday.  Other days are "rest" days where we walk 2 miles or more in urbania and go to the dog park.  I much prefer hiking days but I cannot afford to go everyday.  Today was rather warm on the trail but we still logged a little over 3 miles.
Conker saw, for the first time ever, a deer.  It was all "Ooh lookit me just BOUNDING RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU!  I'm so great, I just know it la la la la la, la la."  Conker stared like mad but didn't try to chase.  I could tell he wanted to, he was almost shaking he wanted to that badly, but he didn't. 

My Pictures

They are back.  Wooooo

I think I'm gonna buy some Honest Kitchen.  Just have to actually get myself to do it, since I've got this spiffy $3 off coupon thing I should probably use before it expires in two days.  I really hate ordering stuff online though, especially if it comes with a tracking number since I obsessively check it's progress like I've been doing with my shoes.

Off-Leash Derps

Went hiking today. 

And brought all three dogs with me.

This could easily have gone terribly wrong since I decided to let all of them off their leashes.  Much to my complete surprise, Juneau responded faster than the other two.  Sasha just derped around and Conker was his normal Shiba self who contemplated commands before obeying them.

We only hiked about 3 or so miles on the Outback Loop and Bridges trails.  It was still pretty fun and thankfully we didn't run into any people or the two horses that were on the trails. 
Juneau was a bit scatterbrained when it came to smelling critter trails and shoving her stupid face into the burr grass and getting burrs stuck allover her dumbness, but she was good enough that I never had to permanently put her back on the leash (me holding it).  I think with a bit more training that she could be a good off-leash dog, but for the time being she gets to wear the leash and just drag it around since she is a lot better with it like that.

This picture took more than 10 tries to get.

Dirtyface

In other news...
Conker doesn't really fit into the basket on my Mom's bike but after he refused to trot beside it, he had no choice but to squeeze his butt into the basket and ride home that way.  He was in no manner pleased, at all, but stayed in the basket the whole time.  I hope he won't continue to dislike being around bikes, I really want to do some trail riding at Cathedral Hills sometime soon and it'd be a shame to leave him at home.  (And take Juneau instead...)


In other other news...
Breaking Bad is a good show.  Go watch it if you haven't yet.  Now.

Went hiking again

We went back to Cathedral hills for the third time this week.  I really like that place, it's a lot of fun.  This time we went on the Backside Loop, W Trail and Wild Rose Loop.

It's cooling off really quickly right now.  It was about 86 earlier today then the temp dropped to 83, and in the past two hours it's gone down to 74 and there is a thick bank of clouds rolling in.  There is supposed to be rain in them clouds, and I don't doubt that it'll drop on us.  It's forecast to rain almost all night and day tomorrow, then stop for a bit then start up again.  After that it looks like the temperatures are going to stay in the mid to high 70's for a while.

No Pictures, But I've Got a Video!

I am still trying to figure out what to do over my loss of photos.  The blog is really kinda boring without them.  In the meantime, here is a video I took yesterday while on our hike.

WELL...

I have apparently exceeded my photobucket bandwidth.  Since I'm cheap and will not pay for such services, I guess the blog will be lacking photos for the rest of this month.
Sorry about that.

Edit:  Just figured out why my pictures aren't showing up... I wasn't paying attention while uploading photos and went over by one on my limit.  Oops!   I guess they punish you for doing that by taking away viewing capabilities of your pictures for the rest of the month.

More Cathedral Hills

We went back to Cathedral Hills today.  Hiked about 5 or so miles on the Outback Loop, Manzanita Tunnel (not a tunnel), Timber Ridges, Skycrest and Skycrest Loop trails.  Had lots of fun, only ran into a couple people and Conker behaved around them.

Orange Bandanna

I bought Conker an orange bandanna at the Blondie's dog thing.  I forgot about it the first time I went to Cathedral Hills but stuck it on him today.  Not only is he much cuter with the bandanna (oops) but it serves two purposes:  One is to make him more visible as fall approaches, so no hunter-types will pop out of the bushes say "Oh, I thought your dog was a fox!" Also, since it's still quite warm out (86 today) it doubles as a cooling thing.  Whenever we stopped for water I'd dunk his bandanna in the water then put it back on.  He seemed to like how it kept him cooler and he appeared to have more energy than he did last time.

Dumbass

Somewhere in the middle of the hike we found a pick-nick table. Conker got up there and posed like a dumbass with his ears all super upright and aimed out.

We saw some more neat scenery. (This time I remembered that the leaf rustling was squirrels and they didn't freak me out when I heard them)

The Skycrest Loop was my favorite part of the hike.  It's a short loop (duh) that is more like high desert than Northwest forest.  Being a desert person I highly enjoyed the exposed, sun-drenched and hot hillsides a lot more than Conker who quickly ducked from shady patch to shady patch.  This is where his wet bandanna came in handy.


In case you didn't know, I've been going barefoot since the beginning of April (almost six months!).  This trail feels awesome on my feet which don't really like the rough sidewalks we've got here.  I can't wait for my new shoes to get here so I can walk around "barefoot" on the sidewalks and when it gets colder without loosing my nice leathery feet.