Monday, January 26, 2015

Caption This #353

Looking forward to your captions in the comments.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

Blind Benefit

As we have recently shared, Henry is unofficially completely blind. While he may be able to tell if his space is bright or dark, he cannot see shapes, objects, movement, etc. He is working on mastering our home and relearning the neighborhood. We are sure this is through mostly smells and hearing (although his hearing is not that sharp, either). It is relieving to see that a few of his whiskers, all of which were lost during chemotherapy, are now starting to grow back. This allows Henry to get just a little less close to a wall, table leg, chair, etc. Having whiskers help animals navigate and when Henry lost his, it put him another step behind the 8 ball.

But what we really wanted to share, was that now that Henry is blind, he can cruise with us through the car wash. He doesn't see those big scary brushes, rags and soapy slather. He just hears it now and that part doesn't seem to bother him. We tested this last week. The car was in need of a wash, so we threw caution to the wind and took him with us. His little ears perked up at the wacky sounds but he didn't flinch or seem to be at all bothered. So, NOT being able to see all of this has now benefited us. Henry can go through the car wash with us anxiety free. Who says no vision doesn't have perks?

Thursday, January 22, 2015

My Funny Little Valentine

Over the weekend we were out running errands with Hank. One of our stops was the pet store. Usually Henry would go in the pet store, but he was already pretty tuckered out from a long walk, so only one of us ran into the store.

At the checkout, were super cute Valentine treats. Valentine's Day is still a few weeks away, but I couldn't resist picking up a sweet treat for Henry.

Of course he smelled it as soon as I got back to the car! We gave him a small little bite and saved the rest for later.

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Showing Off

The other day, right after I got home from work, I was prepping to take Henry for a walk. Well, we were out the door and I thought I had everything but I forgot one of the most important things: poopy bags! Knowing the bags are stored just inside the front door and that Henry would be a good boy and patiently wait for me as I popped back inside then out again, I left him there for a quick second and told him to wait. He did. (Uh, that is because, HE IS SUCH A GOOD BOY!)

Anyway, I did not realize it at the time but we had an audience observing this. Our next door neighbor (the ones who got a puppy over the summertime) saw this. When I was back outside and we were on our way, he commented in amazement about his dog would NEVER have completed such a feat of patience.

I winked at the neighbor and told him that it had been all the years of practice that we had on that command. And I patted Henry and reminded him that he was truly a good boy. As we walked, my heart filled with happiness knowing that Henry does truly know his basic commands and is a pretty good listener. He had always been the smart one. And this day proved it Not only #HenryStrong but #HenrySmart!

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

More Modifications

As Henry's vision worsened, we realized that we needed to make more and more modifications. Of course, he only has one eye and while that eye is not very useful for sight, we do not want it to be harmed or injured, of course. So, have needed to find a way to protect his eye from one of the most immediate dangers that he faces. This would be our agave plant.

It is not uncommon for us to hang out in the driveway and surrounding front yard areas. We would do this often when we had the 3. While off leash, we found it still to be a safe time since we live on a very quiet street, they were beyond chasing bikes or squirrels and surprisingly they were pretty good listeners and knew their boundaries (for the most part--not saying they were perfect angels but overall we could not complain).

Now, things are little different. When Henry likes to roam around outside now we need to keep him on a leash. Even blind, he is still quicker than we are and this means that he can run full steam into nature (and houses) around us before we can catch him and save him from his crash. The good news is, though, is that he is starting to slow down since he now realizes that low speed bumps hurt a little less than high speed collisions.

Anyway, back to the agave....running on only one kidney (and just general old man disease) has made it such that Henry needs to pee a little more often than he used to have to. And it is not uncommon that he is up 1-2 times in the overnight. When this is the case, he wakes me, I let him down off the bed, we plod outside to the front yard and he does his business. Going out it is all well and good, but it's the coming back inside that is bigger challenge. For some reason, at that particular time of day, Henry typically loses his bearings. Instead of the straight shot back to the front door, he often side tracks towards either the garage door or either of the 2 windows that flank the front door. And in the process of finding his path again, he bumps into the agave. The thing about the agave is that this is a very mean plant. It has very sharp barbs along it's long pointy leaves. So, if Henry were to get his eye poked by one of these fronds he could do some serious damage to himself.

Thus we have placed a small picket fence around the agave in order to help Henry redirect when approaching the dangerous plant. So far we have not receive hate mail form our home owner's association (they are kind of sticklers). If we have to take it down we will work on another solution. But for now, it is working (plus we are still there to help nudge him in the right direction).

Monday, January 19, 2015

Caption This #352

Looking forward to your captions in the comments.

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Lakeside Stroll

Despite the fact that Henry can not see, he has been enjoying his walks. We have been walking him around the neighborhood each evening and getting him used to certain navigation cues. As he has been getting better and better walking on the leash, we have been venturing out to some of our favorite parks.

Last weekend, we enjoyed a leisurely walk around the lake. Henry loved getting out and smelling all the smells. So many trees, so little time!