Edgar Walking by the Cottage Grove Lake

On hot days the place we rent heats up like an oven. So sometime we will go out and walk by the Cottage Grove Lake with Edgar. This time I remembered to take my camera with me. He was happy as a Lark sniffing around, getting his feet wet, and peeing on everything.

The water is getting slowly let out for the winter season.


I was really surprised that he actually willingly put his feet in the water without me trying to push him in.


Edgar is probably wishing that a fish would jump out of the water here and into his mouth. Preferably Salmon.

Condo Kitten Picture Roundup

Well, the condo kitten is hopefully settling into her new life, but I'm just now dumping out the photographic evidence regarding her disruption of ours. This picture of a rare quiescent point in our household is worth examining:

Which of these kittens does not belong? Hmm ... is it this one?

He's angry. None of the other cats look angry. He's solid orange. That's different too. Then again, he has teeth:

All the cats have teeth. Also he's huge ... and everyone knows our cats are huge. No, he must belong. So if Jasper is supposed to be here, what about this one:

He looks utterly mindless. None of the other cats look mindless. He's got large sections of white (rendered extra bleached with my image processing) and none of the other cats are white. But wait, he's huge! Okay, Daniel must belong too. So this brings us to:

Hmmm, gray ... other cats are orange. Tiny ... other cats are huge. Active ... other cats are slugs. Okay, she definitely doesn't belong! She doesn't even have a name! But here's more kitten pictures anyway:

And, a more active picture which is representative of what she was actually doing all the time-scurrying all over everything and everyone:

Yes, she was very cute. It was a fun experience having her, and reminded me of some of the fun when Edgar was a puppy (minus the whizzing accidents everywhere). If one of our cats kicks it (Daniel perhaps .. o.d.'ed on kitty biscuits), we'll have to find our own little condo kitty.

Abandoned Kitten

Lee went out walking with Edgar on Sunday on one of his daily potty breaks when he found an abandoned kitten. No one in our condo complex will claim her so we think someone dumped her. We put up signs all around for a 'FOUND KITTEN' and posted about her on craigslist. No one still wanted to claim her. So tonight we found a home for her. We are going to be doing a meet up and drop off in a parking lot. Only now I am a little worried because one of Lee's work mates said she is going to be snake food. I am hoping since she is already spayed that it is a person who wants her for real and not just for a munchy snake.

We decided that she probably got dumped because of her constant meowing. If she isn't meowing she is making love to you when you are trying to do something. Which is also annoying when say you are trying to type and all she is doing is throwing herself at your face and hands purring her little head off. All in all though she is a really nice kitten and I imagine that we would have kept her if we didn't already have two cats. Hope her new home works out!

Memorial Day Trip

Lee, Jessica, Edgar and I took a very last minute trip this holiday weekend. It was quite fun. After this trip Edgar has been in five states. He is getting to be well traveled.

We started Saturday out by driving to New Mexico and taking a stop in White Sands National Monument.


Edgar is very excited to get out of the car.




Okay maybe we are all happy to get out of the car besides just Edgar.


So pretty.


Sandy hills as far as you can see. All you need now is an ocean and it would be perfect.


Trotting along feeling very fine with himself.


Windy cheeks.




Yeah, this is one happy dog.


Edgar suddenly forgets how to use his legs and can't walk down a sand dune. He requires assistance from Jessica and Lee.



Cool ripples in the sand.


Blowing sand.


Who's the king?





Lee and Edgar play a little chase.



Lee's sandals got taken off right away as it was impossible to walk in the sand with them.


While my shoes weren't hard to walk in they collected sand like buckets.


Yes I was there too.




The next day we go to Guadalupe Mountains National Park in Texas. There was only one small trail that we could bring Edgar on. But that was okay as we were all tired from the long drive the night before.

"What do you mean I'm in Texas now?"


"Guess they weren't lying."


Walking the trail with Edgar looking for promising peeing spots.


So hot and so dry.


More rock formations.


Flowers. Guess just because it's hot and rocky doesn't mean there aren't any blooms.




That night we went to a drive in movie and brought Edgar with us. Jessica and I sat in the front seats while Lee sat in the back and hugged Edgar/scratched his butt for an hour and a half.

Monday we went to Carlsbad Caverns. Oh yes even Edgar came with us. We boarded him at the caverns for five dollars. Pretty cheap. Since he didn't go into the caves with us I will refrain from putting up pictures of the cavern formations.


"Oh no I'm stuck in the car again!" Anybody out there ever try sharing a back seat with an Old English Sheepdog? Talk about seat hogs. It looks like he should be laying in the seat by himself but he is actually sharing it with Jessica at that moment. Monday afternoon we start our long drive back home and get in around 1:30 in the morning.

Off Raw

Edgar keeps having on and off diarrhea while on the raw diet. Since we are in a vacation condo for a few months that is fully carpeted we decided to take him off it. Once we get to a more permanent location, (that isn't fully carpeted) I am going to put him back on it. Then mess around to see if I can find out what is disagreeing with him on the raw diet. Otherwise Edgar loves the raw food and it has helped SO much with all his itching allergy problems.

Our Short Adoption Experience

Lee and I adopted an Old English Sheepdog from an rescue dealing in that breed. We decided to name her Emma to go along with Edgar's name. She was seven years old. This is a picture of her on the day we brought her home.



Emma learned how to sit, come, her name, and was working on down. Every time she would see you or catch your eye her butt would start wagging a mile a minute and up she would come to see you. I have never met another dog as friendly as her before.

After having her for about 25 days she counter surfed while we were out one night and ate most of a loaf of bread. That morning after realizing something was wrong we brought her into an emergency vet. There we were told that Emma had Bloat. We made the decision to put her down.

This is the last picture I took of her 16 days after the first one. She was all happy because I came out while she was sleeping in the hallway.

Organ Meat

Edgar's raw diet is still going good. He love, love, loves it! Only thing he hates is chicken livers. Cow livers though get eaten in a flash. While the Sprouts thing never got off the ground we did find another source for organ meat. There is a store here called Food City that is cheaper and caters a lot to the Mexican cliental. You can find all sorts of meat types that you can never find in any of the other stores. Like how often do you walk into Safeway and find cow brain for sale? NEVER! So we bought five pounds of cow livers for .99 cents a pound. And found chicken giblets and tripe for cheap. Tripe, thats another thing I have never seen in the stores around here.

Chicken Organs

Edgar ate a whole piece of chicken without it being ground up. This was a first. We had been buying pre-ground up chicken at whole foods that had the bone and other good stuff also in it. Well we ran out of that and went to Sprout's to buy a whole chicken hoping that it would have all the organs in it.

It didn't have the organs but we talked to the guy behind the counter and he told us to talk to the manager and it shouldn't be a problem. That would be nice because we don't have a close source for this type of thing. Chicken is fine but good luck trying to find organs in the store. So tomorrow I am going to call the manager to see about setting up a order of chicken organs every week. The Sprout's meat guy said that they just throw that stuff away anyways. I so hope this works out.

Raw Diet

Edgar is LOVING the raw meat. Glad it's him and not me. I was wondering how he would take to it and there was not a problem at all. This might be because we are buying ground up chicken stuff for pets from WHOLE FOODS. Today when we were at WHOLE FOODS we did buy some chicken liver for him and there was a little confusion with him on how to eat it. It went some what like this ... lick, lick, look up at me, lick, lick, looks at me again, lick, pick up, drop it, looks at me, lick, lick, etc.

Lee finally hand fed the liver too him. Edgar can't resist anything presented in the form of tug.

So while dinner was pretty much ecstasy for Edgar to start with it is now a whole different category of happiness for him.

Afternoon Walk

We went to the Riparian Preserve in Gilbert while we were kicked out of our house for a Realtor showing. Lee took the afternoon off and Edgar came along so he wouldn't eat the realtor or the people looking at our house. It was quite fun and relaxing waking around looking at all the different birds, wild life, and plants in boom. While we were there we saw 4 bunnies, a turtle, 2 catfish, and tons of different bird varieties. I would go back again in an instant.

Starting off we saw ducks.


Then Edgar kept looking at the ducks.


Some grasses looking out up to the library. It was very pretty.


Edgar looking at more ducks. And feeling pretty pleased with himself as he is walking on water without getting his feet wet.


Lee calls this my Hollywood duck because it has sparkles all around it. I thought it turned out pretty nice myself.


Still feeling happy about the ducks.


Plants were flowering everywhere in the preserve.


I find this picture funny as I don't think you would see a Old English Sheepdog naturally walking around through cactus.


These plants were blooming everywhere.


They seem to be looking at different things. Obviously what Edgar is looking at must be more interesting.


Some more plants that were in bloom through out the preserve.


This was like walking down a hedge of the orange plants pictured above.


Edgar checking out the water. As we all know he is a wuss and doesn't have a clue what to do with wet stuff living here in the desert.


Edgar likes public benches as he is allowed to get up on them. It makes him feel very special.


Some of the trails we walked through.


Can't seem to be on the same page. Each one is still looking at something else.


And another park bench. This time they are looking at the same interesting thing.