Best Laid Plans Often Go Awry ....

Hello all! This is Mom. We all went back to Houston this weekend to let me train the new person for my old job. We also wanted to wish my parents, the dachsies' Grandma and Grandpaw, happy 57th anniversary! It was today and we were glad we could be there with them.

We headed home about 6:00 and got here about 7:30. As I was driving, I was thinking I should feed the dachsies when we get home. I'd unload the car first. Then feed them. Then get online, post some pictures and make an entry so you all know that Roxie is home and doing well and, except for three (yes, she got bit twice) fang marks on her pretty muzzle, she is back to her old self. Then I would read Mona's blog and call her mom.

It was a wonderful plan.

It didn't happen that way.

As I said, we got home about 7:30. I know the dachsies were tired of being cooped up in their crates after 90 minutes of driving, so I put them in the yard to run around while I unloaded the car. I had made one (just ONE) trip when I heard the dreaded "we have found something" bark. I threw the next batch of things to carry into the car and, since the dogs were on the other side of the house, I stopped long enough to get the shotgun and shells before I went around back and found them all facing the same direction in the same area where Roxie got her copperhead bites last Wednesday. I yelled for them to get away and they did. As they passed me, I saw that Andy had a bloody spot on his nose. I would like to tell you that I thought "Oh no, not again?" but my reaction was a little stronger and probably not something my mother would be proud to hear me say ... Anyway, yes, the copperhead was back, Andy was bit and I was armed this time. I blew that sucker away. He won't be biting any person or dog ever again. One shot; one dead or dieing snake. Just call me "Dead-eye". I have not a shred of remorse. I called my dad and asked about the best way to transport an almost dead copperhead (carefully and locked up) to the vet. I called Texas A&M Small Animal Hospital (more on this later) and took Andy in. You know all that money I've made helping my old company? Guess who has it now!

You know you have been to the ER too many times when you identify yourself and can say the dog that wasn't bitten before got bitten tonight and the person who answers the phone says "Oh, no, Andy got bit?" They had the paperwork ready for me to sign when I got there. Poor Andy, he wasn't feeling good at all but he is in good hands. Sammy did this in May and Roxie did this on Wednesday. They both got through it and Sammy's scars have even healed up. The whole crew recognizes me now. Soon I should qualify for volume discounts.

Oh, and yes, it was a copperhead and it was dead. I had transported it in a locked cooler and, when they brought the cooler back to me, they said the folks in the back were admiring my efficiency. I guess they won't come to visit unexpectedly.

I will try to post some pictures that I took of Roxie when she got home and was still swollen. I'll take some pictures of Andy too. I don't feel like posting pictures tonight. I hope you'll forgive me.

Oops, we did it again ....

Hello all! Andy here. I just put Mom to bed. She has had an eventful day.

But first, I want to thank everydog, cat and person for remembering my adoption day. You know how to make a day really special. And thank you for remembering Sammy's adoption day. Mom feels bad about not making a special entry for him. It's been four years since he was adopted and he thought Mom should have made a little more effort to tell everydog. Oh well, at least our friends remembered! Mom says she does have an excuse ... she was working for her old company. They contracted her to come in and take care of things that haven't been looked at since she left four months ago. Now she can buy us some really nice dog biscuits. She said she bought us tires for the dachsie-mobile.

Hey that reminds us, we saw the Oscar Mayer wiener mobile. It would have been a little more exciting if it hadn't been on the flat bed of a tow truck. But, hey, how many of you can say you have actually seen the wiener mobile? Thought so!



Oh yeah, we were discussing how to spend the extra money that Mom made ... well,tonight Roxie probably arranged for Mom to spend the rest of it. We found another copperhead snake. Yes, we got too close. And yes, it bit Roxie in the muzzle. And yes, Roxie didn't feel good so Mom packed all of us up and took us to the same Texas A&M Small Animal Emergency Room that Sammy and Roxie went to last time. Roxie has to spend the night. Sammy, who got bit in the lip, didn't even act like it bothered him but they gave Mom some antibiotics for him. I, of course, was smart enough to stay back and bark. That's twice they have been bitten and there ain't no bites on me! (I wanted to add a picture of a copperhead snake here but I decided Mom had seen enough snakes for this week.)

Anyway, like I said, Mom is tired after an eventful day. She got home and was here about an hour before she bundled all of us off to the ER. Last time, Mom and Grandpaw took Sammy and then Grandma called and said Roxie was swelling up. Mom didn't have anyone at home to watch us so we all had to go with her. We want to say that ALL vets offices smell the same and it is not a good smell!

Don't worry about Roxie. They said she is doing fine and one of the vet students already thinks she is pretty and sweet. Mom will probably bring her back home tomorrow.

Boy! We really like living in the country! There are so many things to bark at and to do. Getting bitten by a snake is kind of low on the "things to do" list but sometimes a dog has to do what a dog has to do.

I'm dog tired too. I think I'll call it a night and make sure Mom is sleeping soundly. Hopefully, Mom will let you know what is going on. She has been really lax about keeping up with our blog or reading anyone else's blog. To all of our friends, we still love you. We will get back into regular blogging soon ... we hope.

Fathers Day and ... Guess What We Did AGAIN!

Hello everydog! Gosh, it has been almost two weeks since we blogged last. We have been pretty busy chasing cowdogs and keeping the yard safe.

Last weekend was Fathers Day in the USA so we went to visit Grandpaw. We gave him lots of cuddles and tried to give him lots of kisses but he isn't a big fan of doggie kisses ... and we thought he was perfect. Oh well, he's not a dachsie so we shouldn't expect him to be perfect.

Grandpaw just put up a new fence in his backyard. We inspected it and we discovered doggies on the other side. Well, you can imagine how we reacted to that! We stayed busy most of the weekend telling those other doggies to stay out of our Grandpaw's yard. Our Aunt Lexie even joined a few times. Aunt Lexie is 13 so she doesn't run around anymore. She likes to sleep, get treats, and bark. Hmmm ... come to think of it, WE like to sleep, get treats and bark too! It's good to know we will still be able to do our favorite things when we are 13!

We had to leave Grandma and Grandpaw's house on Sunday. Mom said something about needing to get back so she could earn more dog biscuits. We don't want to run out of dog biscuits so we agreed that it was a good idea to come back to the country.

We figure most of you remember our excitement from May when we played with a mean old copperhead snake. Well, those of you with weak hearts may not want to read the rest of this entry or look at any of the pictures.

Now that we have the cowards out of here ... we found another snake! Mom had gotten home and let us out. She was putting our dinner together when she realized she was hearing the same kind of barking she heard when we found the copperhead. She came running outside and, sure enough, we had another snake surrounded. She yelled at us! We were mighty hunters yet again and she yells at us to get away and get into the house. For some reason Sammy ran to the door and went right inside. Andy was the next one to listen to her. Roxie was stubborn and stayed a barked a little more.

Here is a picture of the snake.



Mom looked up the snake pictures and decided it is a speckled kingsnake ... which not poisonous. But it is pretty big!

Mom took a couple of more pictures as it was leaving.



And there it went around the corner of the house. It was so afraid of us it ran away!



When we came back outside he was gone.

Hunting and Healing

It has been absolutely beautiful the last few days. It has been a little windy but other than that the sun has been shining and we have been sniffing around. We were in the back yard and checked out some of the logs laying around.



Mom was brave and didn't chase us away from the logs. She thought about it but figured if a snake was there, he would have a chance to get away from us.

We moved on to another part of the yard.



But Andy got a little side-tracked. We weren't sure what he found to sniff but ...



before you knew it, he was roaching! Doesn't that look like a fun thing to do on a sun-shiny day?



Sammy thought it looked so good he joined in!



And he roached some more!



Roxie didn't roach because she is so delicate. Maybe one of these days Mom can catch Roxie enjoying a good roll in the grass!

Hey, do you remember how Sammy looked right after the snake bit him? You can really see the bite next to his right eye.



Well, this is how he looks now! He still needs to heal a little bit more but he sure looks a lot better!



It's a lot easier to heal when you have friends sending prayers and good thoughts and "Sibe Vibes"! As you can tell, we are back to enjoying the good life!

Battle Scars

Hello friends! Roxie here.

We understand that Mom was kind of stressed out on Monday night when she wrote about our little escapade. We don't know what the big deal was about. We were gonna kill that snake. He had used up his venom and we were still circling. You would have been proud of the organized attack that we were launching. There were three of us and that stupid snake could only face one of us at a time ... and we are fast! Okay, maybe not quite fast enough or we wouldn't have gotten bitten. But, hey, now we have honorable battle scars!

Here's a picture of my battle scar ...



Hmmm ... not much evidence left on my face. If you look real close, you can sort of see a bump on the right side of my muzzle.

Here's Sammy's picture. You can still see where he got bit close to his left eye.



The doggie doctor was worried the snake might have damaged Sammy's eye but the test showed that the cornea was intact. Mom is worried that he may end up losing some of the skin around his eye since the venom didn't have a lot of skin to go into so it probably saturated that area. The doggie doctor said it could happen but he used some fancy word ... necrosis. We guess we just need to wait and see.

Mom gives us our medicine twice a day. She is really tricky because she wraps each of the pills in its own clump of canned dog food. That food is so yummy, we just HAVE to eat it - which is a good thing because we probably need the medicine to get all better and we sure wouldn't take it plain!

Anyway, just wanted to let you know we are almost back to normal. We can't thank you enough for all of your support. Mom was really scared and you helped her feel better. That and us coming home!

Roxie and Sammy Need Your Prayers

Hello all. This is Mary ... or Mom as the dachsies call me. I know we haven't blogged in quite a while. Between the new job, sharing a house with a 20-something boy who loves my Internet connection (so he uses it) and getting used to a laptop, it just seems easier to do something else. But tonight I need you guys. Around 8:45 this evening, the dachsies were circling something so I went to investigate and found a very angry snake! Fortunately (since the 20-something boy has gone home for the summer) my parents were here and Dad killed the snake. We watched the dogs and Sammy's face started to swell. We rushed him to the Texas A&M University Small Animal Clinic Emergency Room. (For those who don't know, A&M has a highly respected veterinary school.) While my dad and I were there with Sammy, my mom called to say Roxie's face was swelling. So we rushed back to the house and made another trip to the ER. Roxie and Sammy are staying overnight for observation. We took the (dead) snake with us and it was a copperhead. While not the most poisonous snake, it is a viper and it's venom can kill. Anyway, please take a moment to say a short prayer for Roxie and Sammy to get through this crisis. It's 1:04 AM right now and I still don't know if I'll be able to sleep. I feel better knowing they are in good hands and our friends are wishing them well.

I'll keep you posted. Thank you to all of you.