Another Friday arrives, and another installment in my ‘Remembering Roxy’ blog post series. Last week I reminisced about one of Roxy‘s nicknames – Bear-Pig, which followed the inaugural post on Roxy’s talent for Circling the Wagons. This week I decided to focus on Roxy’s first trip to a dog park. If I remember correctly, this trip occurred before we rescued Apollo.
A friend of ours had suggested taking Roxy to the off-leash dog park at Shawnee Mission Park. This never occurred to us, being residents of Leavenworth County, more than twenty miles north of the park. We made a family outing out of it. Even though the park allowed dogs to roam leash-free, we kept Roxy leashed until we were certain she would behave around other dogs. She roamed free and played with many other mostly smaller dogs for a few minutes. Then we put her back on the leash and headed to the beach.
Roxy, and all of our previous Rottweilers, did not care for water or being wet. Yet Terry thought it would be a good idea to take her down to the beach, where we saw retrievers and labs and Newfoundlands cavorting in the water just off shore. The shoreline included several large, flat sandstone boulders. Terry led Roxy up onto one of them, hoping to entice her into a quick dip with the other dogs. Another dog snuck up behind Roxy, eagerly sniffing her nub of a tail, and accidentally (or intentionally depending on your perspective) goosed her. Roxy leaped forward landing four-square in the shallow water, almost taking Terry with her for a tumble. Terry managed to salvage his balance while Roxy just stood there, standing completely still, looking aggrieved and resigned to the fact that she was, indeed, now soaking wet.
We took Roxy back to the field above the lake and let her roam free for a few minutes, mostly in an effort to dry her coat. As the sun began to set, we returned to our car and made the drive home to Lansing, convinced we would return in the near future for more fun in the sun with an unfettered Roxy.
I decided Apollo and I needed some physical therapy to deal with an entire week of rain which prevented either of us from enjoying the newly arrived spring conditions. The last time we walked happened to be exactly one week ago. To make up for six sedentary days, I decided to traverse the entire sidewalk system of West Mary Street in Lansing.
We set out at a quarter to nine and headed west from home to First Terrace, where we crossed to the other side of the street and headed north towards Olive. We passed a flowering red bud tree (see photo at right). We continued north towards Nina, where we dog-legged back west to First Street, which parallels very closely with Main Street (aka as US-73/K-7). While on Nina, a small Benji-like dog attempted to intimidate Apollo from behind a chain link fence. We’ll revisit this canine curmudgeon on the return trip.
Apollo always does well waiting to cross the busy intersection at Mary and Main Street. We proceeded west along Mary street, staying on the north sidewalk. I only spied one other person walking their much smaller dog ahead of us, but they turned onto the Town Centre boulevard that connects the terminally undeveloped land between Mary Street and 4-H Road.
West Mary Street makes several sweeping curves through the wooded hills and creeks as it meanders between Main Street on the east and DeSoto Road on the west. We passed by a muddy construction site for some additional multi-family housing, within easy walking distance of the nearly new Lansing Elementary School (in the background in the photo above).
We passed one walker and were passed by four joggers on our jaunt westward along Mary Street. I saw my first cardinal of the year, but didn’t attempt to photograph it with my cell phone. I prefer to have my good digital camera with my telephoto lens attached to photograph birds. We finally arrived at the top of the long hill, where Mary Street dead ends against DeSoto Road at a quarter after nine. I finally achieved my goal of a minimum hour long walk, since the return trip would take at least thirty minutes. I took the following three photos while letting Apollo catch his breath and cool off (being a black dog means he absorbs all the sunshine and it’s accompanying heat) from the top of the hill.
West Mary Street Meets DeSoto RoadTop of the hill - northboundTop of the hill - eastbound
I crossed to the south sidewalk and Apollo decided he should become a hunting dog on the return trip down the hill. He foraged through the tall, wet grass, determined to pull me with him into the mud and the woods in search of deer. By the time we leveled off, his snout, paws, legs, underbelly and first third of the leather leash were soaked with dew. Several times he nearly pulled me off the sidewalk while sniffing and snuffling through the dew-drenched grass and soggy ground. I saw ample evidence of the presence of deer by the tracks they left in the mud. The wooded areas along West Mary Street team with them and I often see them emerge at dusk when Apollo and I venture out on sunset strolls.
I sighed with relief as we approached the construction site because the fence prevent Apollo from straying to far off course. The construction materials seemed to have other ideas about the fence though. The rest of our walk along Mary Street proceeded apace and without further forays into non-sidewalk environs.
We crossed back to the north sidewalk just before crossing the highway and continued back to Nina Street. Once again the Benji-like small dog charged the fence, snarling and barking and this time Apollo caught me completely off-guard. He lunged to meet and greet the dog at the fence. I temporarily suffered a wrenched left shoulder, elbow and thumb and had to scold Apollo for his un-gentleman-like behavior. I guess it’s time for some remedial obedience training with the large pinch collar instead of the small choke chain Apollo usually wears. My elbow didn’t stop aching until we crossed Olive and walked under another beautiful flowering red bud tree (see photo above).
We turned the corner east onto Fawn Valley and walked the half a block to our yard. Just one of the advantages of owning the southwest corner lot on Bambi Court. Apollo waited patiently on the porch for me to disentangle him from his leash (he set a record this walk, although I lost track of how many times) and open the door. He rushed to his water bowl and then collapsed for a nap under the table at my feet while I composed this blog post. I noted the time (ten o’clock) and took off my pedometer, which had recorded 7,695 steps (is that’s 15,390 for Apollo?) taken on our one hour and fifteen minute Sunday morning walk.
I can thank my son, Derek, for coming up with the nickname ‘Bear-Pig’ for Roxy. Back in 2005, Rachelle was a sophomore in high school and Derek attended a local community college but still lived at home. By then he had moved into the basement (don’t all young adult males thrive in those environs?) and only came up for air when he needed food or to leave for work or school. I often referred to him as ‘Derek the Destroyer who lurks in the Mossy Catacombs (or Dungeon).’ At that time, Roxy didn’t have a playmate or companion dog to annoy (we would rescue Apollo the following year).
Derek and Roxy in a Stand Off (Aug 2005)
Derek loved to tease and harass Roxy. She would wait for him at the top of the stairs when she heard him rising up from the basement. He would lean forward on the stairs from the lower landing so he was eye level with her and start making strange noises at her or woofing at her. Roxy replied with her own strange sounds, which reminded Derek of the sounds a bear makes. He would get her so worked up she would start to lunge at him. Then he would egg her on more by chasing her into the great room and wrestling with her. Roxy didn’t stand a chance by then, since Derek is an expert in nearly all forms of grappling – wrestling, judo and jujitsu.
That explains the first part of the nickname ‘Bear-Pig.’ The second half has more to do with Roxy’s typical Rottweiler appetite and the fact that when she sniffed around the house for anything remotely resembling a snack, she sort of looked like a wild pig. At least she didn’t ‘oink oink’ while she was rooting around for treats.
After spending a very lazy Saturday avoiding the invasion of little green men from the Emerald Isle by baking bread, reading about life under Mao in China and watching action flix, Apollo and I took a long walk Sunday morning under an increasingly gloomy overcast sky. Oddly, we saw only one other dog, which looked like a miniature version of Apollo. Only three other people were walking during the nine o’clock hour yesterday. We passed by two clocks on our walk, both of which are broken (either not telling time at all or completely incorrect in their display). Here’s a couple of shots of the clock at the north end of Lansing’s long undeveloped Town Centre street:
South sideNorth side
As Terry and I were about to leave the house in the early afternoon, my father stopped by on a surprise visit, mostly in response to a status update I Tweeted late on Saturday. He wanted the nitty gritty details concerning my success in updating my Autostar hand-held computer control device for my Meade ETX-90 telescope.
A couple of weeks ago, I had downloaded the most recent Autostar Updater software from Meade and finally remembered to attempt the hardware portion of the update. Hardware and I have a long history of adversarial confrontations. Basically, I used several different connector cables between my laptop and the Autostar device: 1) a serial to USB convert cable, 2) a proprietary Meade serial to Autostar cable (looks very similar to a phone jack, not nearly as big as RJ-45 though), 3) the Autostar cable to connect to the Meade ETX-90 and 4) a universal 12 volt transformer and power cable to supply electricity to the telescope. Once all the connections were in place and secure, I fired up the software. I did an auto-detect on all available COM ports and the software found the Autostar on COM5. Then, I instructed the software to download the most recent firmware version (43Eg … an increase of nearly 20 versions over the 26Ec firmware that came on the Autostar when I received it) from Meade and proceeded with the download to the Autostar at the astronomically miniscule data rate of 9600 baud. The update amounted to about 36 kilobytes of data. I have text files that are larger than that. It took fifteen to twenty minutes to complete the transfer. Man, has data transfer come a long ways in the last decade or two.
I gave dad the bread I had made him Saturday, as well as the Netflix envelope with The Adventures of TinTin sealed in it so he could watch that movie and then return it for me to Netflix in a second unsealed envelope I sent home with him.
Without further ado, Terry and I headed to the Plaza branch of the Kansas City Public Library to attend a lecture and presentation by John Carter Tibbets billed as “From Africa to Mars! 100 Years of Tarzan and John Carter.” We arrived just in the nick of time and parked in the tenant parking garage, since I remembered to bring my security badge with me. I happen to work in that same building. As a result of the lecture, I decided to add the DVD of Greystoke to my Netflix queue. I remember watching it in the mid 80s, probably on a VHS tape, but decided now is the time to see it in wide-screen via DVD. I also acquired a movie poster for the John Carter movie, and other memorabilia, courtesy of Tibbets’ recent private screening of the film at a special showing to a select group of Burroughs aficionados. Tibbets closed the session with this wonderful quote from C.S. Lewis, summing up the why behind the timeless popularity of characters like John Carter and Tarzan:
To tell how odd things struck odd people is to have an oddity too much: he who is to see strange sights must not himself be strange. He ought to be as nearly as possible Everyman or Anyman.
— C.S. Lewis, On Science Fiction
On the return trip home, Terry and I detoured to Mission Med Vet to pick up Roxy‘s remains. We spent the drive home in silence, cherishing memories of her and missing her deeply.
Roxy with one of her indestructible ring toys (May 2007)
I have many great memories of Roxy to share. I hope most of them make you smile. Some of them may even make you laugh out loud. All of them will be bittersweet for me, but still precious. So, I plan to share them with you on a weekly basis, probably on Fridays, as I will have the hardest time getting through a weekend without Roxy to cheer me up.
I dreaded walking up the fronts steps these last five days. Apollo met me at the door, but his tail didn’t thump-thump-thump against the dividing rail between the entryway and the dining area. He wagged his tail at the sight of me, but he wasn’t crowded out of the way by Roxy. She usually stood front and center, eagerly gripping her ring toy in her mouth, dancing back and forth in front of Apollo. I usually had to order them both to back up so I could squeeze through the screen door.
I would carefully thread the needle of swirling Rottweilers and unburden myself of my purse and laptop case in the great room. Once my hands were free, I could pet each of them, although Roxy would continually circle around me in an effort to head Apollo off from getting too much attention.
If I decided to sit down, Roxy would either approach me and plop herself down on my feet, facing away from me, or continue circling the great room with her ring toy. We affectionately called this parading around ‘circling the wagons.’ Sometimes Apollo would stealthily attempt to snatch the toy from her jaws and then the fun really began.
Roxy, being the nearly full blooded Rottweiler, could easily keep Apollo, the half-breed, from her toy. Her jaw strength and stubbornness exceeded his. But Apollo never played fair and used stealth and guile to trick Roxy into dropping it. Sometimes, he would even go so far as to lay on the ring toy, which drove Roxy into a fit of apoplexy. Eventually she would start circling him faster and faster and even go so far as to bark repeatedly at him. Unless Terry or I told Apollo to get up, he would ignore Roxy’s tantrum.
Roxy’s ring toys sit idle in the great room. I’ve tried a couple of times this week, as has Terry, to get Apollo to play catch and fetch, but Apollo only made half-hearted attempts. Apollo would much prefer to play tug-of-war with Roxy. He still doesn’t understand why she’s gone. If only I spoke better dog, then I might be able to tell him what happened. Perhaps it’s a blessing for him that I can’t.
The very last photo I took of Roxy (Fri 9 Mar 2012)
Terry and I are devastated. We lost Roxy yesterday, unexpectedly. I decided to stay home today and try to deal with this loss. So far, I haven’t slept much and I miss her terribly.
So if you don’t see much from me here for a few days, don’t panic. I’m just mourning the loss of my favorite ditzy Rottweiler.
Roxy and Apollo visited a new home away from home last weekend. I planned the day trip to Abilene not knowing exactly when we would get home. Without having a large pet door installed at our house, I can’t leave them at home, trapped in the house, for twelve or eighteen hours. Sometimes, if the weather’s nice and I know we won’t be gone for long (like over night or late into the night), I leave the back patio door cracked just enough so Apollo can nose his way out if he feels like it. But Saturday’s forecast didn’t call for temperatures to climb much above freezing, so I went searching for an alternative.
The place I normally board the dogs doesn’t encourage pickup of pets on Sundays and doesn’t provide the normal bath their slightly inflated prices for boarding include if you pickup on a Sunday. I drive by the Safe Harbor facility twice daily to pickup and drop off one of our vanpool riders. She has mentioned several times how much she likes the place and that they board their dog there frequently.
I called and spoke to the owner and got all my questions answered. Safe Harbor’s boarding rates were much less expensive than my usual boarder in Leavenworth. And, since Safe Harbor allowed me to pickup the dogs on Sunday morning, I only needed to board two dogs for one night (instead of two dogs for two nights). I had her fax me the forms to fill out. I contacted our vet to get them to fax Roxy and Apollo’s records to Safe Harbor, only to discover that Roxy’s three year rabies shot had expired two days before. I didn’t earn myself any favors with my husband when I asked him to take her up to the vet that very afternoon and get her re-vaccinated.
Bright and early on Saturday morning, we loaded up Roxy and Apollo and headed south to Basehor. Safe Harbor opened at 7:30 a.m. and we arrived shortly thereafter. Roxy and Apollo were eager to meet the owners and some new pet friends. I arranged to have Apollo bathed and left the Rotties in good hands while we continued west for a couple of hours to Abilene.
Sunday morning, I wiled away the time reading two books (alternating between the non-fiction The Devil in the White City and the scifi space opera Honor Among Enemies). I left Lansing shortly after 9:30 a.m. and headed south on K-7 to Basehor to retrieve Roxy and Apollo. I paid the boarding and grooming fees and wrestled the Rotts back into the Bonneville. Safe Harbor sent them home each with a bag of doggie treats and, in Apollo’s case, in squeaky clean splendidness.
I liked their location, their facility, their prices and their service. Apollo and Roxy will definitely be spending more time at the Safe Harbor Pet Boarding and Daycare.
What's Left of the Street I Used to Live On (no longer has access to Main Street at the top of the hill)
I work up early Sunday morning. Nothing unusual for me, really, I try to wake up at the same time every morning, regardless of whether I work or not. I flipped on the Wii to do my morning weigh in. I’ve discovered in the last couple of weeks that contrary to my own belief, I eat less on weekends than weekdays. Perhaps because I’m more busy or distracted by housework and errands or fun stuff (like the benefit concert Saturday night). I am steadily losing the pounds, slowly but surely (or safely as both the Wii Fit Plus program and SparkPeople website reassure me). I decided to adjust my Yoga and Training routine to shorten it, with a goal to do roughly fifteen minutes every morning after my weigh-in. I’m finding it very easy to insert my cardio into my daily routine. It’s the strength training that’s tougher (in more ways than one).
Since I thought Terry had had a rough night with no sleep since he crawled into bed after five in the morning, I let him sleep and opted to attend church remotely via WFC‘s online campus. The lead teach pastor started a new sermon series last week urging us all to know Jesus (as opposed to knowing about Jesus). The second sermon of the series focused on Jesus as Creator. My notes haven’t made it online yet at my other blog, but will sometime today. Our plan had been to attend church at WFC’s Speedway campus, which just happens to take place inside the Legends 14 Theater. We prefer the praise band that leads worship there and had hoped to take in ‘We Bought a Zoo‘ at the first showing of the day. As I learned when Terry woke up around ten o’clock, we could have gone had I woken him up. But I did not know that he had actually slept most of the night in front of the television. Oh, well. We can still see the movie on Monday.
I started preparing the marinade for grilling our chicken. Since the temperature outside approached the unheard of lower sixties (in the middle of January in Kansas … beyond unbelievable), we decided to fire up the outside grill. Or rather I did. Terry supervised since he’s still only got the use of one arm for the next few weeks. After the chicken had marinated for over an hour, I placed it on the preheated grill and lamented not purchasing some asparagus while at the grocery store Saturday afternoon. Steamed broccoli and a spinach and baby spring mix salad would have to do. Thirty minutes of grilling later, we had perfectly cooked Honey Garlic Chicken to savor.
Terry and I had started watching a Christian movie I had sitting in our Netflix streaming queue while cooking lunch. The Encounter proved disappointing for me at least. Terry expected company to arrive soon after we finished, so I decided Roxy and I would go for a walk.
I walked at an easy, slow pace to accommodate her arthritis (and the fact that she hadn’t been walked since Rachelle returned to Texas last week). We crossed Main Street and headed west on West Mary Street, but rather than continuing west, I turned right on a newly re-installed access road that cut parallel to Main Street back north to Kansas Street, crossing over West Kay Street, and the house we rented prior to purchasing the home we now own on Bambi Street. We turned around at Kansas Street and decided to climb the hill back up to Main Street via the abandoned West Kay Street’s crumbling pavement (see photo above).
Roxy did very well walking on my left, even with cars and trucks whizzing by her not ten feet away. Of course, by that time, she just wanted to get back home and take a nap on the memory foam topper on the hideaway bed. She perked up and even pulled me most of the way home because she spied another woman with two dogs (one small dog and a medium-sized dog) about a block ahead of us. I even thought about taking both Roxy and Apollo to the dog park, but worried that Roxy always overdoes herself chasing after the little dogs and the younger ones. It usually takes her a day or two to recover from her dog park adventures.
After Terry’s friend departed, we sat down to watch another movie, this one a foreign film called ‘Point Blank.’ I liked it and did not realize that French films could be just as good as an action flick produced in the States. A good story (if predictable) but better than average acting (even having to read English subtitles). I’ll write a separate review later today.
For dinner, Terry wanted to use the last of the chicken pot pie filling and gravy. I had another tube of croissants (of a different type) so I improvised some turnovers by placing the filling (without any extra gravy) in one triangle and placing a second triangle of pastry over it and pinching the edges together. I had enough filling for four turnovers. I popped them in the oven for twenty minutes at 375 degrees and warmed up the gravy when I took them out of the oven. Not bad. For our after dinner movie, we watched the re-broadcast of the Hallmark Channel’s most recently original film: ‘A Taste of Romance‘ – better than average and a bit of a tear jerker a couple of times.
I checked my e-mail and social networking sites before heading off to bed, noting that before dawn on Monday I had an interesting conjunction of moon, planet and star I could witness. I stepped outside this morning, first through my front door (but couldn’t see the moon at all from that vantage point), then out my back patio door and looked directly south. And what did I see? The same exact thing displayed in the graphic to the right. Saturn, the quarter crescent moon and the star Spica. Sadly, I couldn’t locate my binoculars nor did I have my tripod available (it’s in the trunk of the car). Not that attempting to photograph the moon (always too bright a light source) with the dimmer planet and star in the same from would have resulted in any post-worthy photographs. A grand sight to behold first thing in the today on such a clear, still, not-quite cold morning in mid-January.
I said goodbye to my daughter early Thursday morning because by the time I returned home from work, she would be waiting to board her plane at KCI. She did send me a couple of photos of the sunset. She brought the warm Texas winter temperatures with her in late December, and now as she flies south for the rest of the winter, she seems to be taking those milder temperatures with her, at least for one day. When I got in the van this morning, the thermometer registered barely ten degrees.
I came home to an empty house. Roxy couldn’t be bothered to stir from the hideaway bed and Apollo wouldn’t budge for Roxy’s dog bed on the floor. My dad called me about the sunset, as he and Terry were returning from KCI through Platte City and Leavenworth. While I was on the phone with him, my daughter sent me the above photo text message. No sooner than I hung up with dad, than Rachelle called to ask if I’d received her photos. So, I got to speak with her one last time before she boarded the plane. I asked her to call me as soon as she landed at Love Field in Dallas.
Terry made it home safely (this was the first time he’d driven himself since before his surgery in late December). Roxy perked up as did Apollo but neither Terry nor I could be bothered with cooking dinner. We opted for a quick supper at Pizza Hut, which was deserted. Terry ordered honey barbecue boneless wings and I ordered a thin crust Hawaiian personal pan sized pizza (of which I only ate two slices). We were back home by 6:45, ten minutes before Rachelle’s flight was scheduled to take off.
While I did my Wii Fit fitness routine, Terry returned a call to a friend who had left him a voice-mail message while he was driving back from the airport. Terry retired to the band room while I beat his score on Advanced Step and improved my Island Cycling and tried Rhythm Boxing for the first time.
We sat down to watch the latest Bones episode and got about halfway through it when Rachelle called me. It was only 8:10 p.m. (her flight was scheduled to land at 8:35). Obviously, the north wind helped send her back to Texas. Terry and I finished watching Bones and then the Rotts and I retired for the night. They both wanted to be near me because they already missed Rachelle, just like Terry and I do.
May is so far away. That’s the next time I’ll see her, when she performs her senior recital and graduates from the University of North Texas.
A friend of ours had suggested taking Roxy to the off-leash dog park at Shawnee Mission Park. This never occurred to us, being residents of Leavenworth County, more than twenty miles north of the park. We made a family outing out of it. Even though the park allowed dogs to roam leash-free, we kept Roxy leashed until we were certain she would behave around other dogs. She roamed free and played with many other mostly smaller dogs for a few minutes. Then we put her back on the leash and headed to the beach.
