Strong Willed Corgis

I've mentioned before that my corgis have very different personalities. In fact, when I talk to other corgi owners, I sometimes think that mine must be on opposite ends of the personality continuum. Princess is 'off the charts' independent, bossy, opinionated and strong willed.

Dee Dee is usually very compliant and easy going .... but now and then she exerts her will, and when she does, it's usually pretty funny. When getting ready for a trip, I can count on Princess to attach herself to my heel as soon as she sees the suitcase come upstairs, the camping equipment go in the trunk or the cooler in the kitchen. She is going to make darn sure that she doesn't get left behind. Dee Dee is more complex, because, while she doesn't want me to go off and leave her, she really would rather that we all stay home.

We had decent weather on our vacation overall, but the first few days were cold and stormy. The first night in the tent went well, as we had just a light rain that is actually a very soothing sound on the tent. The second night out, we weren't so lucky. Thunder, lightning and eventually hail pounded the tent. The hail was just pea-size (if that) but it sounded like baseballs on the tent. Dee Dee could not get out of the tent fast enough. I waited until there was a bit of a lull in the storm, and then I took her to the car and sat there with her until the worst of the storm subsided. (Princess was in the tent alone ... sleeping soundly.) After that, Dee Dee steadfastly refused to go back in the tent. In some ways this was nice. She slept in the car, and Princess enjoyed having me all to herself in the tent. But I felt bad for her, all alone in the car. Still, if she felt safe there ... then that was a good thing. So all was well until the second to the last night of our trip, which was a few days before July 4. Some kids in the campground decided to get a jump start on the holiday and were shooting off fireworks.

There is nothing that freaks Dee Dee out more than fireworks. I tried to cover the noise by putting the radio on in the car, but it didn't help her much. After that, she just couldn't find anywhere that she felt totally safe, and she became downright ornery. Both of the girls (and me, too, for that matter!) were getting pretty tired by that time and were ready to go home, but Dee Dee's logic played a trick on her. She wanted to go home; that was very clear. But she was tired of the car ... of riding in it, and of sleeping in it. With limited understanding of how a car 'works', she knew enough to realize that if she sat ON the driver's side floor, we weren't able to go anywhere.

And so each time I left them in the car to go into a store, bathroom or to snap a picture, I came back to find Dee Dee sitting right on top of the gas pedal. I told her to 'come'. She looked at me like I was crazy. I tried to grab her collar, and she dug down and arched her back. Dee Dee is strong when she needs to be. (Just ask the groomer who cuts her nails.) It was funny and frustrating at the same time. The first few times it happened, I was able to coax her out of the car with a piece of turkey, then pick her up and put her in the back seat. But she got wise to that, too, after a while. She really can be a character! By the time we crossed the Red River into Minnesota, we were all worn out, and happy to be home.

Big Sky Country

We had a wonderful trip last month to Glacier National Park in Montana. Camping with two dogs is fun but also takes some planning. We generally try to go early in the season before it gets too hot, because there are obviously times when I have to leave the girls alone in the car. If it is too warm, that really gets to be a problem.

I remember one time a few years ago where I stopped at a rest area and made a mad dash in and out because it was in the 90's and even with the windows open, it was just too hot to leave the girls alone for more than a minute. I've also been known to take them with me into public restrooms ... not very often, but I've done it. Anyway, we were very fortunate with this trip because, although it started out cold, windy and very rainy, by the time we got to our destination, the weather improved greatly and was perfect for the rest of the week. The US National Parks don't allow dogs on the

hiking trails due to the crowds, and, in places such as Glacier, because of the threat of bears. Bears see dogs (especially small dogs) as prey, and I cannot even imagine what I would do if one ever threatened one of my dogs. (It's one of those things I can't even think about.) It was cool enough to leave the girls in the car while I did some morning hikes, and the scenery that exists in the national park, also exists in areas surrounding it (national forests, state parks, etc.) where I can hike with the dogs.

One of my favorite parts of the trip was the drive home along Hwy 200 which goes through a very sparsely populated area (i.e. no towns!!) I wouldn't want to have car trouble in that area, but fortunately that wasn't an issue and I just loved watching the sun go down over the vast, open ranch land with the mountains off in the distance. Our last stop was Medora, and the ND Badlands.

We took a day trip outside the park and around Flathead Lake one day, and it was beautiful! We even found a designated dog swimming beach at Yellow Bay State Park on the east side of the lake. That was fun!

Happy Independence Day!

Happy 4th of July. We are spending a quiet day at home, as we just returned from a wonderful camping vacation to Glacier National Park in Montana. Truthfully, this is the girls' least favorite day of the whole year ... especially Dee Dee's. To say she hates fireworks would be an understatement. She spends a lot of time in her kennel and I leave the basement door open so she can retreat down there if she hears too much action and needs a safer place. MN is a state where fireworks are illegal, except professional displays, but we seem to hear plenty of them anyway.

I will post a couple of photos from our trip today, and more in the coming days. The first part of the trip was tough ... four days of rain and cold ... and getting kicked out of a bluegrass festival at Cross Ranch State Park in ND because dogs weren't allowed. I had called specifically to ask about this when I made my reservation and was told that dogs were OK as long as we sat towards the back. When I got there, I was told the same thing at the gate ... and we went in and sat down .. only to be kicked out by the ranger 10 minutes later. The girls were snuggled up beside me and not bothering anyone, so it was very disappointing to have to leave.

The rest of the trip was great. The weather improved and Glacier was fabulous. We also had a wonderful campground with WiFi internet (yeah!!!!) and we were able to connect with my brother Dan as he traveled from Seattle to Denver. That was unplanned, and a wonderful bonus to the trip! The girls had a great time, but were getting pretty tired by the end of our time there. I could write a book about Dee Dee's antics

on this trip ... maybe I'll limit that to a post. She was one worn out dog by the time we got home!

"Wabbits!"

It is Memorial Day weekend and we're getting two out of three nice days, which isn't bad, although it is a little discouraging that I still have to run the furnace in the morning to warm the house up. We're supposed to get heavy rain tomorrow, which will probably cause the river to rise out of its banks again, but hopefully only for a short time. We've been below flood stage for about five days now! We drove to Sauk Centre yesterday to connect with some dear friends from North Carolina who are in Minnesota this weekend. It was a wonderful day and the girls got to go swimming, and even chase a few ducks. Princess, especially, thinks that is great fun. I still remember the first time I took her to Lake Michigan (where my family lives). There were flocks of herring guls all along the beach and she would charge towards them until they took off. I'm not sure if they enjoyed the game, but she sure did!

In my last post I showed Dee Dee trying to find rabbits behind the computer monitor. These pictures are of her looking for the 'real deal' under my deck. There is at least one nest there ... maybe a couple. I'm not sure. But she sure tries hard to get them. Last year she got at least four baby rabbits ... which was kind of hard to watch, but she shook and killed them in almost an instant, and all my neighbors cheered. Our neighborhood is over-run with rabbits. I don't even try to have a vegetable garden, but I do get pretty frustrated when they eat my tulips and hostas! Our black lab friend next door is envious of Dee Dee's ability to get under the step (it's so funny because she has to back out) . They are all learning that patience is a virtue!

Getting Back to Normal

Things are slowly getting back to normal around here, as the flood waters recede and we begin a massive cleanup campaign. And I do mean massive. Think 5.5 million sandbags, and something like 70 miles of temporary earthen dikes. There were times when I wondered if we'd gone dike crazy, but the determination to save our communities was pheonomenal! As the dikes are torn down, a layer of slippery mud is left behind. It's a mess. But the river continues to drop, and we are looking forward to the day when the bike trails are clear and we are able to enjoy our parks again.

My sandbags were picked up yesterday .... my grass is turning green ... and my tulips have pushed up through the soil. They should be quite pretty in a week or two if the rabbits don't get them. Speaking of rabbits: enter Princess and Dee Dee. Especially Dee Dee. She is obsessed with rabbits!!! There is often a nest beneath my deck and she is fixated on that whenever she goes outside. I mentioned that during the flood, I kept the girls with me - not wanting to get separated from them. I decided to tease Dee Dee one day. I went to YouTube and pulled up a picture of a rabbit ... and then a squirrel .... and then lifted Dee Dee up on my lap so she could see them. It drove her crazy!! She could see them, but she couldn't smell them. She jumped up on my desk, determined to find them!! Surely they must be behind that monitor!!

The Red River Valley Flood of 2009

I’m not a mathematician, but after experiencing my second 500 year flood in 12 years, the formula of probabilities seems skewed to me. The past three weeks have been a blur, as we’ve experienced a blizzard, an epic flood, another major snowstorm and now await the second crest of the Red River. It’s not often that we pray for cool weather in April, but right now that is what we need, as it allows the river to drop before the next big run-off, which is currently forecast to begin next week.

Compared to other kinds of natural disasters, a couple of things stand out about a flood. One is the fact that floodwater is not covered on a regular homeowner’s insurance policy. Flood insurance is available through FEMA, but it is very expensive and it only covers the structure of your home; none of your furnishings or belongings. The other thing about a flood … at least about this kind of flood, is that you have time to prepare. That is both a blessing and a curse. It is nice to have the opportunity to move things to higher ground and build sandbag levees around your home, but the exhaustion that comes with that – especially when it drags on for weeks – is unimaginable. The fatigue and the stress, added together, really start to take a toll.

This flood, also, has had the added dimension of being historic. No one has lived through a crest of the Red River above 40 feet before. We are at the bottom of a huge, giant bowl (the prehistoric Lake Aggasiz) and when you get this much water trying to drain at the same time, it does some quirky things.

I live 2 blocks from the river on relatively high ground (keeping in mind that no ground in the Red River Valley is very high!) During the Flood of 1997, I focused on helping friends and the community at large – something I have done again this year – but with the added concern of how it was going to affect me. In 1997 I was never in any real danger. This year I was. I worked several nights (10 p.m. to 2 a.m.) at the Flood Call Center (a centralized dispatch center for the community), helped build sandbag levees in my neighborhood and baked quite a few Papa Murphy’s pizzas for those whose bodies held out longer than mine did on the sandbag line! I placed sandbags around my basement window wells and back door. I moved as much of my basement up to the main floor as I could, and shook ice out of my sump pump hose every three hours around the clock. Travel in and between the cities of Fargo and Moorhead has been extremely challenging, to say the least! All but two of our bridges are out of commission, and the entrance ramp that I normally take to get on the Interstate has an earthen dike across it. My normal 12-15 minute commute has turned into a 45-70 minute trip, and there was one day that it took me 2 hours and 40 minutes to get home! We’re not used to that in this part of the world!

Some of the poignant memories that will never be forgotten include parking my car (facing forward) at the edge of the driveway in case I needed to make a quick escape, having my dogs leashed 24 hours a day so that I could quickly grab them if we needed to leave, getting a Reverse 911 call at 6:30 in the morning advising us to evacuate, the sound of Blackhawk helicopters dropping 1-ton sand baskets on a school campus that had a major breach, and the sound of emergency vehicles screaming as they raced to patch a leaky dike. (The coordination of emergency, military and law enforcement personnel - as well as disaster relief services – has been stellar!)

I have been very blessed. I never lost electricity, and other than some seepage caused by an ice jam in my downspout, did not take on any water. With basement drains plugged to prevent sewer backup, I never felt in any imminent danger. But with a river flood, it’s pretty much an ‘all or nothing’ deal, and I’m well aware that one major breach of the dike protecting my neighborhood, and we would all find our homes filling with water, as happened in Grand Forks/East Grand Forks in 1997. Because of that, the city has built a number of contingency dikes behind the primary structures. Unfortunately, one of those contingency dikes is being built right down my street, and I’m on the wrong side of it. It’s tough to think of your home as a possible sacrifice to save the rest of the city. Things are looking good right now, and I have confidence that we’re going to be just fine.

Another anomaly of the Red River is that the crazy thing runs north into Canada, eventually emptying into Lake Winnipeg. That creates another interesting set of problems in the spring when the southern valley typically thaws before the northern valley, resulting in ice jams along the river. It’s also why, when we had over a foot of heavy, wet snow a couple of days after the first crest, we were even more concerned about the fact that areas to our south had two feet!

Princess and Dee Dee are great stress relievers and they’re always happy for snow, no matter what the date! Since I live on one side of the river, and work on the other, I have not wanted to get separated from my girls. I have kept them with me throughout the flood and have been very grateful for a boss who not only has understood that need, but actually enjoys having them around. I’m sure that they have picked up on my stress at times, and they haven’t been getting as much exercise as they normally do. Frankly, there aren’t a lot of places to walk right now! The sidewalks and streets are an icy mess, and almost all of our parks are along the river. In addition to that, since my neighborhood was officially an evacuated area, security was pretty tight. Sunday, March 29 was the day the river crested, and I decided to celebrate by taking the girls for a long walk. We were not more than 2 blocks from home when I was stopped and asked to show identification. Fortunately, I had stuck my driver’s license in my pocket before we left the house, and there was no problem – but one does have the feeling, at times, of being in a war zone. There was such an eerie quiet that afternoon as we walked up the street …. no cars, no one out in their yard … just the sound of pumps running, helicopters overhead and emergency vehicles off in the distance.

With Easter weekend upon us, I am reminded of God’s many gifts. The gift of life and the gift of community are particularly meaningful to me right now. Many passages of scripture have encouraged me over the past few weeks, but this one – Isaiah 43:2 – stands out among them.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.

A Ten Year Old Princess

My sweet Princess is 10 years old today! The years are flying by much too fast. We are going to go play in the snow today (LOTS to play in ... but it is starting to melt ...) and then will go to the Moorhead DQ for a treat. Our DQ is one of the oldest in the nation and still the kind where you walk up to an outdoor window and order. They open March 1st of every year, and it doesn't matter how cold it is, there are always people in line! (One year there were literally people standing there ... ordering a blizzard ... in the middle of a blizzard!) We are hearty folk; that's for sure! Either that, or crazy. Probably a little of both!

Princess is still able to jump up on my bed quite well, but when she's really tired, she will stand by the foot of the bed and make a little sound (soft but audible to me) that lets me know she wants me to lift her up there. The girls go to work with me on Fridays (a special treat that they love), but they are always quite tired that night as they don't get their usual long naps in. For some reason, they were especially tired last night. So I put Princess up on the bed about 8:30 and she was 'gone'. A couple hours later, I pulled back the covers to get in and it aroused her slightly; just enough to make her stretch ... and then 'thump' ... she rolled right off the foot of the bed! I jumped up to see if she was alright and she was on the floor, snoring. She never even woke up! She seems none the worse for wear this morning.

Saturday mornings are our grooming time; the girls get brushed, nails trimmed, a mini bath, teeth brushed ... and then at the end, they get a Greenie (their favorite treat and too expensive to give more than once a week ....) The only part of the grooming that they really hate is having their nails cut. Dee Dee still fights me terribly ... (often ending up in a muzzle) ... but Princess has gotten quite tolerant of it. This morning, however, she just didn't want them cut. After all, it's her birthday! She does something that I find absolutely fascinating, when I'm calling her to 'come' but she doesn't want to 'come'. She knows that what I'm calling her for is something she doesn't like. She also knows that if she doesn't come, she will get a spanking. And she also knows that my lap is a safe place ... the place she goes to when she's been naughty, or when she's hurt, tired or otherwise needs comforting. So, when I call her for something that she doesn't like, she will slowly approach me, and then when she gets just about to the spot where she doesn't want to go, she will jump into my lap. It's like she thinks if she can just get onto my lap, then she'll be safe and I won't cut her nails. Once I realized what she was doing and how important it was for her to have my lap as a safe place, I made sure that if I needed to do anything unpleasant to her, I did it off my lap and then she could come up there to be comforted afterwards. I want my lap to always be a safe place for her.