Gus is home - and now there were 3....

Last Friday night, Gus went to his new home in Mississippi. Last I heard, he was doing very well. His new Mom and Dad loved him from the get-go and he will surely be spoiled.

I must admit, I do not miss him as much as I thought I might. As I have said before, he may not have caused any trouble and my hounds did not mind him, but he was not right for our pack. He is a greyt boy, but never to be my greyt boy. When they left with Gus, my 3 immediately went to sleep. It was like a weight was lifted from them. The last few nights, it is not a mad dash to get in the bed and everyone doesn't have to sleep with us. It's just no big deal. That goes back to me saying he did not really "fit" here. My hounds are not "needy". They all like attention, but none of them are velcro dogs. Gus is. He wanted to constantly be in contact with SOME human. Mine normally do not, but became jealous because he got all this attention. This bothered them and I ended up with a house full of velcro dogs! No one ever got snippy or anything, there was just always a hound there. I am by no means suggesting my hounds are not spoiled rotten and the center of attention in my house, but it's just different. Some of you will understand what I mean.

Either way, Gus is in a happy home. My home is settled again. Life is greyt!

Gus is going home!

Gus is being adopted! He goes to his new home in Jackson, MS on Friday! We love him and will miss him, but I am so happy to see him go to his forever home and know that we played a role in that. It is greyt news! I'll post more about it after we meet his new family.

Greyhound Crafts

So, lately I have been looking around greytalk and the web and checking out all the greyt greyhound related crafts that people are doing. I am an artsy person, so I think I need to do something too. I'm going to have to try out some of the things I have seen lately. I'm not sure where to start or where any of this will lead, but it's been a while since I've done anything artsy other than some photography. I have a few non-greyhound things I need to do. I think I might get the pups to paint something. I've got a pretty good idea about how to do it now. I think it would be neat. I'd also like to make some Christmas stockings for the greys. I saw some on greytalk that someone did and I think I could do something similar. I already can make coats. All mine have coats already. I need to make some new beds. I'm pretty much just rambling now. :o) I'll figure something out.

more life with the hounds... more Gus

I really don't have anything in particular to write about, other than wishing that I could commit to writing something regularly, even if it was about nothing.... We still have Gus. On the 20th, he weighed in at 72 pounds! We just finished a round of de-wormer today. Nothing major. He is doing well. He is very stubborn sometimes. Loves attention of all kinds and follows whoever comes to the house and leans on them. He is very sweet. Tomorrow we will have had him 6 weeks. He is a greyt dog. This is where the questions really start to come in about, "Why don't you keep him?" "How can you let him go, he is so great!?" And so on. We get this with every foster. Seems to be more with Gus since we have had him so long. He is a fine greyhound. He does well with our hounds and they don't mind him. I love him to pieces and treat him like my own, but he isn't. I don't feel compelled to keep him, I mean there are times, but generally, I don't feel like it's right. It's one of those, I wouldn't mind if he stayed, but it's cool if he goes too. We have had a foster that we were so glad it left. Others, we have liked a lot, but didn't go well with our hounds... the situation is different with every hound. Gus is special. He has his sad story, but that does not compell me to feel any different with him as it does/might some people. In the end, he is just like any other greyhound. He really is. He is just your average goofy boy greyhound. At this point, he looks like a hound that just left the track not long ago. You would never know what he has been through. You know when the hound is right. Most people don't really get to "pick" so to speak as we have. We adopted Berry White and Anna in "love-at-first-sight" moments and Dax was only from a picture and a description. I knew when I saw him that he was different and would take work. He was so shy, and still retains some of that. BUT he is my boy. My boy. Gus is not my boy. And I know that every dog you have isn't. I will let him go. I will let others go. Maybe 3 is our comfort level. I don't know. Four for this long has not been hard. I think the reason we have no fallen head-over-heals for Gus is because he is too needy. Clyde was KINDA like this, but not as much. As T (my husband) said the other night, Gus needs more love than we can give him. He needs to be with another dog, but maybe just 1, so he can get more attention. Something. Gus is a greyt hound, but he is not our greyt hound.

Gus is still here...

Just wanted to give an update. Gus has been with us for 3 weeks now, and we MIGHT have a home for him.... (fingers crossed) He is doing very well. No accidents. We are moving out of the crate as we speak. We still have to keep him under wraps when we feed all the hounds. He started stealing some stuff, but has not hurt anything. He stretches, plays with the hounds, plays with toys, snuggles, climbs up in our laps, he is just all around a FANTASTIC hound! If we only had 2, he would so stay! Our house just can't handle 4 on a permanent basis. He is just such a love and will be the hardest to let go. He is up to 65 pounds! Which is about a 10 pound gain for him. He looks and feels much better. We are working on walking on a leash, which is his only problem right now.... he pulls quite a bit. He is just so loving and affectionate! A near-perfect hound! I hope the potential home works out, as he has a few restrictions on him: must have another dog, preferably a grey, and must have a privacy fence. No 4' chain link - he would probably climb it (as he climbs baby-gates like no one's business, when he feels like it). Otherwise, he is fine with cats (as we have 2) and should be fine with small dogs... just curious. He doesn't need a crate. He's a good boy. If anyone is nearby and interested, he is available...

I have included some updated pics...

Hurricane Gustav - Post 4 (several days later)

Okay, so we lost power at around 2pm on Monday September 1. I took quite a bit of video. Things went as good as could be expected. The winds got pretty high and it rained a bunch. No damage to our home or property. The hounds took it well. Didn't get too hot, because it was raining and windy.

On Tuesday, it continued to rain. And rain. And rain. And then came the flooding. First the street started holding water as did the creek that runs behind the houses across the street. Then, the pond at the end of the street (to the right in the pictures) began to fill up. As it continued to rain, the three began to come together. Neighbors began scrambling for sandbags. The house to the right of the pond flooded a little, as well as at least one house in the neighborhood that backs up to ours. It came very close on about 4 other houses along our street. Our house is the highest on the street, so it never came too close to us. And of course, I had to go and play in the rain and show how deep the road was at that point.... not as deep as it got. The hounds still did okay this day, once again, rain and wind kept the temperatures down.

On Wednesday, the tide began to turn. The clouds began to break and the temperature rose as the rain left. The daytime was relatively bearable, but the night was terrible. We had all the windows open, which we now know was a mistake. It was so humid. Humidity is something we are used to here, but not at this level of constant exposure. It seemed like we could not get the dogs to lay down and relax. We were all so hot. I think Berry White was beginning to distress a little in the night. Tim said he almost sent me and the hounds to my parents in the middle of the night. They had a generator and a window unit. We made it though. No breaking of curfew necessary.

Wednesday night, very late, my grandparents got power back. So, on Thursday morning, the generator migration began. We left the hounds with the evacuee/friend we had at the house and set out to help move the generator. We met my mom and grandmother at her house, loaded up the generator and they followed us back. We set it up and ran it on and off throughout the day. It was nice to move some of the humidity out of the house. If we could not have gotten the generator at this point, I would have had to take the hounds to my parents house.

Thursday night, we sent the temperature to 60 on the window unit and let it go all night. It got the temperature in the front of the house down to about 70 by morning. Tim slept on one couch. Dax slept on the other. Anna and Gus ended up with me on the mattress on the floor, UNDER the covers. Berry White slept on a dog bed, above my head, UNDER covers. My sweet babies. I much preferred to see them all cool and snuggley over the panting they had done on and off for the previous 3 days.

This morning, Friday, the alarm went off at 6 am. Tim had to go in today. I was supposed to, but no power. I could not leave the hounds in the house alone with or without the generator. Too risky. Tim showers and then comes into the kitchen and begins making breakfast. He turns a lamp on (plugged into the generator) and gets out the milk and then THE LIGHTS AL TURN ON! I was never so excited to have power in my life! We turned off the generator, cranked up the A/C and started the day. I went in to work for a bit and then brought work home, just in case anyone needed the generator that we had or needed any help. I came home and started working. Then all of the sudden, the cable comes back on, along with the phone and the internet. We are back in business! So, all is mostly well now. My parents are still without power. All friends are pretty much accounted for. Some have some damage, but everyone is physically okay.

I took videos throughout the storm (well the first 2 days) and they can be found at: HERE

I am just glad it is almost over and things are starting to get back to normal. I will say there has NOT been enough nationaly media attention. Most people we know STILL do not have power 4-5 days later. Just because the levees did not break in New Orleans, does not mean that nothing happened. We are here. People are in need. There is a lot of damage in Baton Rouge and outlying areas. I hope everyone can get back to normal soon. That's all for now. I will write more as I have stuff to talk about. Sorry for the hurricane hijacking the greyhound blog, but it was a big deal in our lives right now and it affected the hounds as well. All four are fine and enjoying the A/C!

Hurricane Gustave - Post 3 (Monday Morning)

Well, It is morning now. We had some rain overnight. Definitely raining now. Wind is picking up. We obviously still have power. They say it has moved a little west and won't be as bad here as it was expected. But we will still have HOURS of wind and rain. So far so good. I think it will be fine. We are watching the trees sway across the street. When it gets stronger, I'll take some video. The pups are all still calm. I think it may be because we are letting them stay in the bedroom if they want to. So far, all have chosen to. Go figure.

And by the way..... today is the 1 year Anniversary of us moving into the new house. It is also 1 year today that Dax came home. Happy 1st Gotcha Day my blue boy!