Howie - Our Photographic Challenge!

Photo by Fotomom.

While Maryann AKA Fotomom was here visiting last week she took a really sweet picture of Howie in our kitchen.  After she got home this week, she took some time to dress up the picture and wrote a lovely blog post about him and how she made the great picture!

Photographers have been challenged many times with Howie.  Here are a couple of the not-so-great professional family pictures with Howie.

November 2002.

October 2005.

Howie does a good job with sitting still and letting the camera do his thing (hint: just say the magic word, "WALK?" and he'll look right at you attentively!), if only he showed up better-looking...Maryann got it right by taking advantage of the white-colored setting.

Oops He Did It Again...

Our poor little Howie tore his other rear CCL this past weekend. Nearly 2 years after he ruptured the left one. We don't know how he did it this time, we came home from a bunch of errands Friday night and Howie wasn't putting weight on his right rear leg.  He might have been chasing squirrels (which always seems to get him into trouble)...we have squirrels here, and Howie still will run after them.

From 2010 05 29 Black Hills Day 2 Mt. Rushmore/Crazy Horse

We took Howie to the animal emergency room in Pensacola on Saturday to rule out anything broken, and the vet could tell right away it was his other CCL.  He's 11 years old now, his (suspected) breed mix is predisposed to this issue, and once you repair one CCL, the chances of the other CCL failing are increased.

This morning we followed up with our own vet and she suggested using "cold laser therapy" to trigger scar tissue to grow in quickly and we can reinforce the torn ligament precisely enough so Howie can get his mobility back without surgery!

This wasn't presented as an option in 2009, perhaps because it's wasn't widely available 2 years ago.  Our options here are much easier, we only have to travel as far as Pensacola, instead of Manhattan, KS to do the most intensive of our repair options.

Dave and I took a few hours to learn more about the procedure, ask questions of our vet and pet insurance company and we were happy with the pricing, the procedure, and the ease (almost too good to be true!).  We decided not to waste any more time and scheduled Howie to start the first of 8 treatments this afternoon.  He'll need up to 8 treatments without more than 3 days between the treatments.  It's aggressive, but since I live 5 minutes from the vet (it's just past the boys' school), it's easy enough for me.

Enjoy some recent pictures of Howie.  These are all from AFTER his first CCL repair.  He was hiking and climbing like he was 2 years old last summer!

From 2009 12 08 SnowDay!

From 2009 12 08 SnowDay!

From 2010 05 30 Black Hills Day 3: Custer State Park & Hiking

From 2010 05 30 Black Hills Day 3: Custer State Park & Hiking

From 2010 05 31 Badlands National Park

From 2010 05 29 Black Hills Day 2 Mt. Rushmore/Crazy Horse

Jacob's Video of Howie

Jacob asked me to share this with you. Jacob thinks that Howie seems to perk up at the word "Rhino"...and he does. But I'm not sure it's the word as much as the inflection in his voice.

Jacob enjoys watching funny dog videos on You Tube. His favorite series of videos is of Mishka the Talking Husky.

He asked me to upload this to You Tube and has been tracking the hit count all day. We're up to a whopping "7" as of this writing. Help us up the numbers some!

Howie Likes the Clean Carpets

Had to shampoo carpets today. They were quite gross.

Pictures from After Howie's Surgery

I've corrected the coding errors. Sorry 'bout that. Click the link in the lower left to see a better version of the photo album.

Howie

So many of you know and love our Howie-the-Wonderdog.

From Howie

From Howie

Howie apparently blew out his knee while running around in our backyard on Tuesday night. We’re guessing he was chasing squirrels, they are the bane to his existence! He was hit by a car while chasing a squirrel in 2002. He now cannot put weight on one of his hind legs. We ended up cutting our weekly webcam session short Tuesday night when the boys alerted Dave that Howie was walking funny after coming in from the yard.

Dave took Howie to the vet Wednesday and was told that Howie’s knee was “blown out” and he’d need surgery to repair it. The vet used an ACL injury analogy that you often hear associated with professional football players.

And even with the repair, we will have to be careful with him for several months.

I talked to Dave on the phone today so he could explain to me with more detail what’s going on…he’s scheduled the surgery on Monday. Dave will also have to explain to the boys what will be going on with Howie, and that it’ll be very very important that he not exert too much pressure on his sore leg after the procedure. Dave will have to carry Howie quite a bit.

I’m very distraught that this had to happen while I’m away…I’m definitely hoping for the best, from what the vet has said, this is a routine injury and is a routine procedure to repair him. Dave seems to have the situation under control…I wish he could just have a normal week. I don’t think there’s been a week without crisis, illness or injury since I’ve left just after New Year’s!

Howie, My Forgotten Baby

I just realized that I never blogged about Dave's and my first baby, Howie.

From Howie

The day we got him, he had to wear the leash for about 24 hours straight and the crate was his home for the first 18 months or so.

Or Howard.

Or Howie-the-Wonder-Dog.

From Howie

Howie is our 8 1/2 year old Lab-Chow Chow mixed breed puppy. We got him in August 2000, just after our 5th anniversary, from a shelter in Kettering (near Dayton), Ohio. Dave and I were grad students at the time, and it wasn't hard for us to spend enough time at home to help housetrain Howie. We also had ample time for some good training early on, which is probably the best time investment you can make in a pet

From Howie

We were hoping for a big, Lab-sized dog with Lab-length fur, and we ended up with something closer in size and fur to a Border Collie. Howie is a very calm dog, rather quiet, and chasing rodents is his #1 downfall.

From Howie

This is the scene that Dave and I faced when we'd head out the door to school in the morning...Howie with a toy in his mouth, making us feel SO guilty for leaving him for a few hours.

Before we had human babies, Howie was the one we would spoil at Christmas, he'd come with us everywhere, and before the quarantine rules changed, we were even convinced that we didn't want to get stationed in Hawaii, we couldn't bear to have to quarantine Howie for a number of months!

From Howie

Howie would jump the gate when it was just one gate, so we had to use two baby gates.

Howie is the most laid-back dog you'll ever know. In fact, he's more like a cat in so many ways! He enjoys sitting at a window looking out at the world and he's a very picky eater. He doesn't play with toys the way other dogs do -- Howie has his favorite stuffed dinosaur and bunny rabbit (from his puppy days) but otherwise he enjoys chasing squirrels in our backyard, and nipping at loose pant legs.

From Howie

Howie lounging on his "Civil War" dog bed, which I made from leftover material from reenacting costumes I'd made.

So many of our boys' friends, who previously may not have liked dogs, ended up loving Howie to death and would start bugging their parents for pets of their own (sorry Wendy and Julie!)

From Howie

Howie (left) playing wth his two dog friends in Florida, Jerome (right) and Moxie (top). We 3 families would trade around dogsitting in FL. This was in Florida, but Jerome and Moxie are now in Ohio.

(Okay, so I'm a little biased!)

From Howie

Over the years, Howie has had to take a back seat to the boys. I feel badly at how often we have to leave Howie out of a family outing because having the boys with us was enough trouble. Howie was subjected to years of having toddler boys around, each of our boys had a good 18-24 months of "Don't pull Howie's tail!" or "Don't sit on Howie!" or "Please leave Howie's dog food alone!".

From Howie

Howie is keeping an eye on the construction workers while we had tile floors put into our FL house, late 2004.

This past summer, just before we left North Carolina, we took Howie for a checkup and our vet deemed Howie a "senior dog". Howie had put on some weight in North Carolina, and he had the worst allergies...his gorgeous coat was definitely compromised while we were living there. I wanted to cry at the thought of our first baby now being a "senior".

From 2007 06 17 Family Reunion PA

One of Howie's favorite things to do, chase the hay wagon at the Vollmer family reunion!

So here are some pictures of Howie for you to enjoy...when I talk about how much I'm going to miss my boys when deployed, Howie is among my boys!

From 2007 05 01 Howies Birthday

We had a birthday party for Howie in 2007, Jacob said that Howie needs a cake, so we made one for him, and Howie even got to enjoy a big piece! (No chocolate!)

(See how grey he's getting around the muzzle? Sniff sniff!)

From 2007 06 17 Family Reunion PA