When a Friend Dies

We have not posted in a long long time.  It's been a long number of weeks.  On November 4th, my brother, my only sibling died.  It was a total shock.  And like some space ship in a sci-fi movie, I feel untethered to my past and a little nervous about my future.

Then the election.

And today.  Today we learned that a friend we know only through wonderful, mirthful, imaginative postings on Facebook and Instagram, MoMo Brown, died.  This was a Wirehaired Pointing Griffon who broke record books on Facebook.  The postings of her antics, her love of life, her perspective on the world, and love of all things Chicago made many people's days.  She was instrumental in me thinking about, imagining, and finally deciding to bring Molly into our lives.

We can only imagine what her person must feel.  We have been down this path, especially recently with Sage.  But each dog is unique, each dog has a purpose in our lives, and this dog, this rescue, this wonderfully animated wild beast in the heart of urban life...she had a purpose.

We mourn, we ache.  It's been a very crappy several weeks.

Most of All She Loves the Fall

She is growing.  And her nose is working.

She simply loves the fall.  And in high grass fields, she loves to flush birds.

So now the next thing is to get her to what upland game hunters call "whoa" and those of us who live bifurcated lives of country and city call "wait."

She gets that when we are in the city.  Now the test is when a covey of quail are near-by!

Murphy's Day.

Training Day

Sorry we have not posted in a long time.  We have been busy.  Scratching our heads, reading books, searching the Web....this is the first honest to God real life bird dog we have had and we are determined to train her as a bird dog.

We are thinking we are the only people in our zip code who order from Gun Dog Supply, much less order quail and grouse scent, check cords, canvas bumpers, whistles.

And our swanky Seattle neighbors are probably extremely nervous when they hear me say: "find the bird, Molly," thinking I am sending her off to grab one of their chi-chi chickens.

But in the field she is a bird dog.  She gets excited when she knows we are about  to go out looking for her scented bumpers.  She responds to heel and "find the bird."

Stay with us, we will be better about keeping you up-to-date on training a dog who wants to have her mouth full of quail.

Murphy's Day.

Learning

Yesterday the "gang" went on a hike to one of our favorite high alpine lakes.  A fair distance, so we watched the pup carefully, with plans to turn around if she began showing any sign of fatigue.

No fatigue until we reached the truck after hiking almost 8  miles and some serious romps in a meadow!

She is learning how we roll around here and seems to be happy.

That is a good thing.

Murphy's Day.

Adjustments

Well, memories are getting foggier...we certainly didn't remember "puppy energy."  We fell into a quiet, bookish, cerebral life, with a few ball throws and runs.

Holy cow!

Murphy's Day.

Molly Brown

We get a sense she will arrive fully loaded.  Montana's Unsinkable Molly Brown.  Mighty Molly Mo. Molly Oly.  Any dog that already had nicknames is doing ok.

We pick her up on Sunday.

Murphy's Day.

Perfect Toy

We went to Petco this weekend, picking up a few things for the puppy.  And later this week I will make a quick trip to a local chi-chi pet store for 'healthy chews" for Annie Oakley and Willa.  The pet industry is thriving with toys, chews, special foods.

But when it comes to the girls, the perfect toys are always the most loved and frequently hand-me-downs from me.  They have probably read Velveteen Rabbit too many times.

I walked out of the house yesterday morning and this was on the back porch, perfectly placed so Annie could find her soccer ball when she got up in the morning.

What is not to love about that?

Murphy's Day.