We hope everyone had a safe, happy and reasonably healthy Halloween. This year, with Henry again being the lone pug and defying many of the predicted odds, we opted to have him dress as UnderDog! There's no need to fear! UnderDog is here!
We feel he is the epitome of an underdog. Defined by Google as "a competitor that has little chance of winning a fight or contest." The way we see it, Henry's cancer was caught by accident and thus, without this dumb luck he would have left us the way Solsey, Benny and Luna have left us. So, who better to don the UnderDog cape then Henry?!
For those of you unfamiliar with UnderDog, here is a snippet.
For those of you who remember, name UnderDog's girlfriend for bonus points!
We weren't sure if Henry was going to go trick-or-treating this year. We decided to make it a game time decision based on how he was doing on Halloween Day. He had a great day on Halloween and just before sunset, we suited him up and he took to the streets to get some treats. Going out while it was still daylight was a huge help to Henry. Here is a short clip of Henry flying to Grammy's house.
Henry also came across this guy while he was out and thought someone ought to give him a few treats to put some meat on his bones!
We close our Pugs in the City posts with the final chapter. This was the breakfast on the beach event. I will say it was bordering on torture to roust Henry for this event. The breakfast started around 11 and while that is not early by even my own like to sleep in standards, Henry had such a big day the day before that he was happily recuperating well into the late morning hours.
Despite Henry's sleepiness, we managed to get up and make it to the beach in time. When we got there the yummy smells overtook him and he simply wanted to devour everything within his immediate circumference. Since this was not feasible, we took a jaunt from the covered pavilion area to the beach. And by a jaunt, I mean we carried him. Henry was toast. He entered full on stubborn mode and was not walking anywhere except back to the yummy smells.
We got to the beach where it was super windy! And even though there was a cone that said, "No Parking," Henry disobeyed the instruction and parked himself there anyway! He would not budge. He would not walk, sit or move in any capacity! He was still taking in the smells that the wind brought his way.
We saw other dogs, not just pugs, enjoying the windy day on the beach. The surf was pretty rough and the sand was gritty (not like on our beaches) so we did not really venture out to get closer to the shore. And by that, again, I mean we were getting tired ourselves of toting the 25 pound doodle boy everywhere that morning. We had brought the Solsey stroller and he may have used it by that time. We had brought the stroller everywhere with us on Saturday, but Henry scoffed at the need for such transport. Saturday he walked everywhere he needed to go. By Sunday he needed the transport, but preferred to be carried, of course.
So, after some time visiting and chatting with other pugs and their people, spending some time on the beach, we headed home. Home to Cupid who had been cat sat by Grammy. Thank you, Grammy! We gave Grammy off on Monday, though. We needed the bonus day off work to take care of our typical weekend business such as grocery shopping, cooking/making Henry bowls, cutting the grass, doing laundry and other household chores. Henry pretty much slept most of Monday! One tuckered out little pug!
Thanks again to CFPR for putting on a weekend of wonderful pug events! It was a great experience, a superb Henry adventure and a heartwarming make up trip for Henry who just over a year ago we were still not sure he'd be alive another month! But here he stands! One strong trooper of a pug!
This is about the pug party! After a long day of train riding, pirate museuming, walking the city and just overall being awake and active, Henry still had a party to attend! He had a few bites of food and tried on his Pirate costume. Which after we got to St. Augustine, I realized I had packed the wrong costume. When Henry lost his eye in 2014, we planned ahead and bought Pirate costumes for all 3 pugs - Benjamin, Henry and Luna. Sadly, by the time Halloween rolled around only Henry remained and he was not really in the mood for tricking and treating, but he still made his rounds that year. The costume that Henry wore last year was a mix and match of his own and Benjamin's. And what I realized that I had packed were the "leftover" pirate pieces. But, we had what we had so we just made do and brought the costume with us. We knew that Henry would not wear the costume for very long, so our plan was to suit him up right before the contest. That was the plan.
We were at the part somewhere between an hour and hour and half when we realized that Henry was done for the day. The party, being an outdoor event (in a wonderfully decorated and arranged yard) was in the evening. And when darkness sets in Henry's world, especially on a day with little time for rest, he tends to melt down a bit. To his credit, Henry's meltdowns are few and far between now and we are getting better at cutting them off before they start as long as we are around when they begin. At the party, he was becoming disoriented, but knew enough to keep walking towards the front gate from whence we came. So, missing the door prizes, the auction and the costume contest, we took Henry's lead and headed back to the hotel.
While we were there, though, we met a lot of nice people (none of which have names that I can recall!) but this is the place where everyone got much more social and opened up about their pugs. They shared info about their personalities, their health, the ones they loved and lost and it was just a super fun time. CFPR's Ann hosted a seriously wonderful event! We have included some photos to show Ann sharing puppy pops (one in each hand and one dog per pop!) And Ann was gracious enough to allow Henry a few licks of one of the pops! The pops were a hit!
Welcome to Part 2 of Pugs In the City! This was probably our favorite part! After Henry had some time riding in the car, eating lunch and in the dog run, he was ready for the "down time" of riding on the red train/trolley car. This was a train ride through historic St. Augustine. The train ride, which is usually a 2 hour tour, had been chartered for us so we didn't have to make any stops and we were given the express version of the tour. So the whole trip was probably about an hour or so. Henry was not the only pug on the trip. The train was filled with people and pugs alike. Everyone was so well behaved! Henry truly enjoyed this ride.
The weather was beautiful! He was in the shade with a patch of sun on his feet. We could offer him cool water as needed. He had a couple people laps from which to choose. It was pug heaven for him! The tour guide was full of information and that made it a pleasure, too! CFPR's Ann was even dressed like a pug! That was a pure hit, too! She must have been burning up in that suit, though! (A panting mess, I am sure!) And Ann's hubby sat near us and shared more historic facts! We had the double bonus box seats! We've added a few extra photos in to share some of the sites that we saw and that Henry smelled.
After the train ride was a tour at the Pirate Museum. We got to the museum really late and just zoomed through since we realized that the day was taking a toll on Henry. We needed to get back to the hotel to see if our room was ready. We made a silly mistake and got back on the red train at a stop near the beginning of the train line, so we had to do the whole tour again. This made for a long journey back to the hotel room, but Henry seemed to enjoy the ride. Once we got back to the hotel, we got checked in and made our way to the room just in time for Henry to have dinner. Henry had a few bites of his dinner, but the poor guy was so tired he could barely stand. Henry caught a super quick nap and then it was time for him to get ready to go to the Pug Party at Ann's house! This left Henry with maybe a half hour nap that day with a full evening ahead of him!
This Ask OBP is a response to the question about what has been our favorite Halloween Costume. This is almost impossible to answer. But we have tried our best to rank our faves in order. From most favorite to least favorite they are below, with photo reminders. (There are some photos missing as we did not have a digital camera that year, let along a camera on our phone. What sort of world were we living in then!)
This was Sol's only Halloween with us. This was a compromise year in the OBP household. If Sol had made it to a second year, OBP peep #1 promised OBP #2 that the next year the gang could be Star Wars with Sol as Darth Vader, Henry as Luke Skywalker, Benny as Han Solo and Luna as Princess Leia, but sadly Halloween 2 never came for Solsey.
These costumes were specially made by Punchy at Pug Possessed. And rank high on our list of favorites! Again, appropriately fitting their personalities. Benny's "Linus Blanket" was really his puffy and Luna, with a Lucy attitude totally would have pulled the football out from under an unsuspecting, ever trusting Henry as Charlie Brown.
Straw House Pig, Wood House Pig, Brick House Pig From dumbest to smartest, enough said.
#5 Firefighter and King (2003)
Not quite their first costumes and we were still rookies, but Henry has always been the King! And Benny, while actually afraid of fires still made a great community helper
Superman, Spider Man, Wonder Woman. Who, other than Henry, could pull off Superman? We picked Spider Man for Benny since he had recently been diagnosed with an arachnid cyst in his spine. Being that that is a spidery type diagnose, what other super hero could he be? And Luna, well, Luna was obviously Wonder Woman!
Cute costumes, but not among our favorites for a few reasons with a strong one being that we didn't like making the boys be "the same thing". But they were brothers on the football field and in life. Luna made an adorable cheerleader!
Again, low in the ranks since the boys were the "same", but the spoof here was which boy frog would Luna choose to kiss and turn into a handsome prince? Luna's real answer would be "Neither! I am a strong woman! I don't need a man!" Our answer, is she kissed them both.
3 of the "same" crayons, but a cute theme. Benny was always called green bean, so he was green. Henry, ever the mopey type was obviously Blue and Luna, ever the diva, strutted her way in Pink, of course.
Benny, Henry and Luna are all valid words in Scrabble! Henry is worth the most points with Benny a strong second and Luna close behind in total point value.
#11 Clown and Bee (2004)
These were weak costumes and early on in their Halloween lives. Cute but not super cute and no theme.
#12 Devil and Bat (2002)
This was Benjamin and Henry's first Halloween costumes. Benjamin, always the little devil, rocked red horns and red tshirt reading "devil" and Henry was in a bat costume mostly because he used to sleep with head hanging over the edge of the sofa leaving his ears looking like bat ears. He also was slept upside down frequently, which resembled a bat. They were cute puppies but their costumes were just eh.
While this was a very cute and appropriate costume for a one eyed pug, it was Henry's first year solo and a very sad year.
#14 To be revealed later... (2105)
While a very appropriate costume, things still aren't the same without Benjamin and Luna.
Hallloweens of yesteryear. May your tricks be few and your treats be many. We will post Henry's this year photo soon. I don't see him going out for treats this year so we will likely just stay home and give out to the neighborhood kids.
Oh yeah, this is still an Ask OBP post, so be sure to ask something!
The weekend of October 17th we took a trip to St.Augustine, Florida. St. Augustine is about an hour away from us. This trip was for a pug event to benefit Central Florida Pug Rescue (CFPR) called Pugs In The City. This was also a make up trip for Henry. In August 2014, right after Henry "lost everything" (his siblings, his eye, his kidney and bordering on losing the sight in his remaining eye) we had booked a trip to St. Augustine to try to help him through his tough time by gong on a mini vacation. Well, it fell through. He was no where near well enough. He was still chemo sick and by then also had suffered a serious bout of pancreatitis. So, the trip never happened. So, this was not only a great pug friendly trip for Henry, it was also an opportunity at a re-do.
We will tell the story in a 4 part series. The opening episode is about getting there and the dog friendly hotel. Henry enjoyed the hour long car ride and once we were on the "big road" (the interstate) he pulled his head back in the window and settled on his passenger lap pillow for the ride. Once we got there, he was ready to hop out of the car and explore his surroundings! He, of course, was also ready for his lunch which we had strategically packed in a cooler. Well fed, he sniffed around his new home away from home. The hotel was a very dog friendly hotel. They had a small fenced in area for dogs to enjoy while off leash. It was a nice area for pet owners and pets alike.
While there were a few other non pugs at the hotel and the event, there were obviously more than just a few pugs! When we first got there, the pugs warmed up to each other immediately. Surprisingly, the pug peeps were a bit on the shy side at first meeting. In the dog run area, though, there was another Henry! A non pug Henry! A moderately misbehaving, humping everyone else in the park Henry. Oy. It was giving the name Henry a bad name. LOL. Non pug Henry kept getting fussed at by his peep but it was futile. Pug Henry just kind of did what he usually does in new spaces and that is walk the perimeter. He sniffed the fence about half way around and then found a place to sit and settle. He was approached and smelled by several other pugs but never really returned the favor. There was a another blind dog in the run that day. Harley. He was about 8-9 years old. I can no longer remember exactly but I do remember that he was considerably younger than Henry. Other than Ann's dog, Julia, (Ann from CFPR), Henry was the oldest dog at the event that we knew of there but there may have been other elders there that we just did not know about. Julia is a very Luna-like little diva pug and she still has the most adorable pug strut going on. She is the same age as Henry.
It's funny, last week we were just talking about how at a long ago pug event how we could not easily identify our boys from the pack of pugs from a distance. Well, I guess that may be because they were puppies/young pugs (as were the majority of that group of pugs). At this event, though, it was easy to spot Henry in the crowd (and not just because he was the one with shaved square on his side or he was the one stuck under a table or chair but just because at this event the pugs truly looked a lot more different than one another. I guess with a little bit of age, they begin to look a bit more distinct. Anyway, it was not a challenge to tell them apart and spot your own.
