With an election year coming up it became clear that I had to make a decision - do I run or do I sit, stay?!  Well… I am not one to use my website and blog to preach my political views but I feel that it’s necessary to set the record straight.  I owe it to my best friend, mankind, to help guide this country in the right direction.  A lot of great dogs have gone before me… Checkers, Barney, countless others. 

I am formally announcing my candidacy for the dictatorship of America.  Please understand that I have yet to pick a running mate… although I’ve been told to choose a lab (Max or Murphy perhaps?!) to attract a wider following than my German heritage… yes, Dachshunds are of German descent.  So is the Arnold… and he married a Kennedy and is now Governor of California.  Let me also just say I am saddened by the great loss of trees out in California.

I’m told that all of the great politicians were good at shaking hands (still working on that) and kissing babies (got that one nailed).  Here are some pictures from my recent visit with Rob, Tricia, Andrew, and Aggie.  Andrew is the little tike in the pictures.  Aggie was not present during the photo session.

 Here i am greeting one of my supporters, Andrew.  I call him my biggest little fan.

 I think I won over this future voter.  Man this political campaigning stuff is hard work!

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Master had a birthday and his good friend Jessica came to celebrate (even though deep down we know she was really just looking for a reason to come see yours truly!!!)

In my recent post about Labor Day I commented that I finally didn’t blink or flinch when they took my picture (rather the human blinked instead) and now I have to post this picture below where I was distracted by Jessica’s perfume!

I simply couldn’t hold the pose any longer, I just had to lean up and lick her ear.  Apparently female humans really like that because she squeeled when I did it… or shreeked… either way it evoked a big reaction.  Oh, and sorry about how blurry this one turned out.  Thomas would have you believe he was rushing to put down the camera to pry me off of Jessica but I think he was distracted.  I worry about that boy.

Here’s a picture of all three of us, just before Jessica decided to use my stairs to get off the couch.

Good job getting about half of me into the picture Thomas!  Sorry for the really awful glare from the sunlight in the top of the picture… if Thomas had held the camera down a little lower (and therefore gotten me in the picture) the light reflecting off his balding head wouldn’t have been nearly as bad!  But anyway, this picture turned out ok.  At least we’re all looking the right direction and no one blinked!  It’s the small victories in life that make me happiest. 

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So my master leaves me alone for 9 hours while he’s gone at this place that he commonly and affectionately refers to as “the rock quarry”, “BARK”, or “work”…. and while he’s gone I am left to entertain myself.  No problem, I have my blankie, my food bowl, my rubber steak, and my rubber newspaper… I use to have a stuffed duck, may he rest in pieces. 

So on 9/10/07, I take it upon myself to see how many pieces I can shred my squeaky toys into (and let me tell you, it’s somewhere around 86 pieces)… well that game was fun, but I know I’d better have this cleaned up before Thomas gets home or he will rant on and on to no end about how he was at work all day and while he was bringing home the bacon (which for some reason I NEVER see) all I did was manage to destroy stuff. 

So I tried stuffing some of the pieces down the air vent.  No dice, didn’t work.  You can only sweep so many of them under the blankie, and that just makes blankie all lumpy.  So I proceeded to eat these pieces.  Hey, if you weren’t suppose to eat it why make it look like (and in the shape of) a steak!

Well, Thomas gets home and I’m not feeling so hot.  Apparently rubber steak doesn’t agree with my stomach as well as the real thing.  Oh how i crave a good steak right now.

So I got to go visit the vet at 9:00 pm on Sept. 10th… and I got to spend the night!!!  Luckily they didn’t have to operate, and unfortunately I wasn’t able to get the x-rays to scan so I can’t post the cool pictures of my insides on the website.  But here are a couple pictures of me taken on 9/11/07 a few hours after I came home.  Notice they shaved my left arm to put the IV in me.  Definitely a reminder not to eat rubber squeaky toys ever again… although for some reason Thomas doesn’t give me those anymore… hmph.  What a wimp. 

By the way, I’m pretty sure it’s this face right here, and only this face that I’m making in this picture, that kept me from being shipped off to the pound or even worse, encouraging Thomas to have my kabobs cut off while we were already at the vet.  This defeated look is probably the only thing that saved me from punishment after Thomas got the $340 vet bill!

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So on September 1st, my master tosses me in the truck and tells me we’re going to visit the family in Columbus.  Totally caught me off guard.  I was expecting a nice relaxing day around the house, possibly even a trip to the woods…

for you regular readers you have probably come to know that as Winton Woods.  For those of you that are new… when I say “the woods” I mean Winton Woods… ok, back to the story…

Instead of a nice relaxing day around the house I had to ride shotgun for nearly 2 hours (hey, master drives fast what can I say) to Columbus, Ohio.  Upon arrival I had to take Aunt Emily and Niece Nutters out for a brief walk.  Em and Nutt had been in the car for nearly a couple hours as well but they were driving down from the Cleveland area.  Anyway, Nutters and I both accomplished the goal of the walk, which was to pee and poop.  Emily apparently didn’t get the memo that this was the purpose of the walk.  She is the only one that did not go while we were walking. 

To the people at 8379 Olenbrook… sorry.  After a two hour car ride you simply can’t hold it any longer… wait, let me rephrase, we had stopped at a rest area on the highway so it was actually after an hour I couldn’t hold it any longer.

Needless to say the day was exhausting!  I had to travel to and from Columbus and I had to walk my family, too!

Well, I guess it wasn’t ALL work… I did get to be held for a little while.  And notice the nice stuffed version of me in the background!  Oh, and this picture is funny because normally I am the one to blink, but instead we caught Master T’s mother off guard. 

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… But if I did have thumbs, they would be green!  I got to help with some yard work on 8/18/07.  Thomas and his lady friend - Ariane - decided they could do it and Home Depot could help.  Well, Home Depot wasn’t much help so I had to step in… here I am helping to get the bucket ready to plant some flowers.  I got to add the fertilizer. 

Oh, and the flowers that were planted in that bucket are now dead. 

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I recall I was going to post some more pictures on here!!!  Well, first of all… let me apologize for how long it’s taken to get these new photos uploaded.  I know, I know… bad dog, etc.  Go ahead and scold.  I will be posting them within the next few days (so perhaps you should say Good boy instead).  I have photos dating back to August so please bear with me.  I’ll try to explain some of them as I go along. 

I helped do some yard work on 8/18 so those pictures will be uploaded first.  Then on 9/1/07 I got to visit my favorite baby human, Audrey, and the rest of the family in Columbus for Labor Day weekend. 

On 9/10/07 I thought I would see how many rubber dog toys I could swallow… it turns out the answer is 2.  That led to an emergency trip to the vet at 9pm.  Pictures from 9/11/07 when I got to come home and recover.  Arf. 

Then there are some pictures from my master’s birthday, which we celebrated with his friend Jess. I didn’t dress up for Halloween this year.  But I am going to help Master Thomas with Christmas cards this year I promise… so stay tuned for more on that.

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