Bittersweet in Spring

 Greetings friends and fans! This is The Daily Bone and I'm your dignified doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

Sorry it's been a while since I've posted, but we've had a busy time lately. First of all, you may notice that I am now sporting a shorter and less shaggy haircut. Indeed, I went to visit my friend and groomer, Miss Jacquie who works out of the vet's office. I also got a bit of bad news. After my recent vet visit, I found out I had contracted Lyme disease! My ghostwriter was so shocked! As many may know, Lyme disease is spread by deer ticks. And there are definitely no deer running around in my yard! I haven't gone anywhere else that might have deer either. But the vet said it could have come from a smaller furry mammal. 

I suspect it was the Secretive Bunny Militia! After all the snow melted, we found lots of piles of bunny poop in the grass. You may remember that a few weeks ago there were clumps of bunny fur on the ground under the pear tree too. 

Or maybe it was from this guy! Grrrrrrr!

I'm taking medication for it, and have gotten my first immunization against Lyme disease. My message to my readers is to be aware of this disease and have your doggie tested for it. 

I'm doing OK now!

But now I have some very sad news.

My NC associate and dear friend, Angus B. Terrier, has crossed the bridge. Long time readers will remember that Angus was originally from England. When his humans moved to NC, they left Angus with some very good friends. But then, they missed him so much, they had him get on a jet plane and travel all the way across the Atlantic Ocean! Wow! 

Angus enjoyed following his humans everywhere, including the local pub, and was a world class squirrel chaser. We're going to miss him a lot!

Ashoken Farewell

I shall now bring you outside, live and on location, to my back yard to do some exploring.

We FINALLY have a few flowers! 

Looking up, we noticed the sun had a halo around it. 

That means rain or snow will be coming to spoil our nice, warm spring weather and …

Hey, are there kids playing over there?

I should go bark at them!

They're running and biking everywhere!

But I'm a professional reporter. Harumph!

Good night.

Look Up, Look Down Some More

Greetings friends and fans! This is The Daily Bone and I'm your observant doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

Things continue to change quickly here in WNY! We're going to keep doing our Look Up, Look Down method of discovering amazing things right in our own back yard. 

Wednesday morning we looked down and found a pile of feathers under the pear tree. 

I gave it a thorough sniff, and concluded the feathers were from a mourning dove. The most likely explanation is that our local Cooper's hawk, Mr. Cool Beans Cooper probably caught this birdie for breakfast. We wish he would try catching some of those annoying grackles, and evil squirrels too, for that matter!

Looking up that same morning, we saw big flocks of Canada geese flying over.

Wow!

Later, we saw a halo around the sun. Even though it was warm outside, a halo like that usually means some cold rainy or snowy weather is headed our way. 

Winter isn't gone yet! There is still a bit of snow on the north side of the shed. The irises are trying to grow in spite of it. 

I went to the vet that day too. My ghostwriter wasn't allowed inside the office, so I had to go with the vet tech while GW waited outside in the car. I did OK, though. I lost one pound. I have excellent, healthy ears for a 12 year old cocker spaniel. I have some age-related cataracts, but no glaucoma. I do have arthritis in my back legs, and don't run and jump like I used to. The lipoma lumps haven't changed. The only thing I need to do is get my teeth cleaned. I might need a few teeth pulled because they're worn down. Pretty good for an old guy! 

Thursday I spent most of the time sleeping, and GW had to work. 

Today, we had high winds that sometimes made the whole house shake. GW says winter and spring are fighting for control! Check out our sunset. These pictures were taken all within about a half hour!

Looks like a storm front is moving in.

Within minutes, it was all cloudy.

But then, it cleared up!

As they say around here, if you don't like the weather, just wait a minute!

Heheheheh!

Lots of News

 Hello. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your erudite doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

I have several stories to report today, so let's get right to it! 

First of all, I want to tell all my blogger friends about a brand new blog by the most adorable little pup named Toffee. Here's a link to his blog:

toffeetawk.blogspot.

Being such a little pup, Toffee has a lot to learn, and I have plenty of wisdom to impart, especially regarding squeaky toys! 

Here's lesson #1:

We hope to hear a lot more from this precocious pup!

Next, I'd like to announce that my ghostwriter will finally be going back to her normal three day a week work schedule this month. Wow, is she glad! Hopefully that means she will have more time for your's truly, and our good blogger friends! 

In other news, we heard an awful, screeching commotion this afternoon.

We peeked out the window and saw an horrible sight: the grackles are back! Faithful fans will remember our yearly rants about grackles. They're notorious for bullying the other birdies, throwing big, blobby, slimy poops everywhere, and, of course, making a dissonant racket. Here's a picture of some big male grackles sitting in the top of the oak tree, squawking and shrieking, and puffing out their greasy, shiny feathers. I didn't catch the names of this bunch. But I'm sure they're related to some of the infamous mob that nested around here last year, like Stinky Guanomaker,  Dropsy Dungflinger, and Poopsie McStagger.

Then the big grackle boss, Effluvium Scatterstool, perched in the pear tree, and glared at us with his beady white eyes as if promising that the Great Grackle Flying PTA (Poop Tossers Association) will be targeting our home and yard very soon.

Soon I shall poop on you too!

Fortunately, members of the local Stodgy Robin Society were not too pleased to see him, and chased him away.

Harumph! 

Today we finally got some warmer weather. We here in WNY didn't get our hopes up yet. March usually has at least one or two more blizzards or ice storms to dump on us before winter finally leaves.

 In the last few months, we've been taking pictures of some of the gigantic icicles that had formed on our house, and at the nursing home where ghostwriter works. 

These look like creepy skeleton hands reaching down to grab that statue of the little boy on his bike in the nursing home garden.

Oma couldn't believe how big some of the icicles were this year, so a couple of the staff brought one in for her to see for herself. Wow! (Don't worry. They took it back outside!) 

Speaking of icicles, here's a picture of one from a few years ago of icicles that formed right outside our front door. Ghostwriter named it Cthulu.  

How the heck did we get from cute puppies to that scary monster? My ghostwriter must be crazy!

Look Up, Look Down

 Greetings friends and fans. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your investigative doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

We have a cold, sunny, and very windy day today! But my ghostwriter finally has a day off, and I told her we really need to take a little time to look up …

… and to look down, and see what amazing things we can find. 

Most of our snow is melted except for a few patches in the shady parts of the yard. 

Last year's leaves and sticks

Lily of the valley growing

Puppy willows in the sun

Beautiful birch tree

Hey, what's this?

Looks like bunny fur

Well, we did find lots of piles of bunny poop in our yard since the snow melted.

Here's some more!

Ghostwriter asked me if I knew anything about the bunny fur under the pear tree. 

Who, me?

She thought about what might have caught a bunny in my yard. Mr. Cool Beans Cooper, our friendly neighborhood Cooper's hawk isn't big enough to catch a full sized bunny. Was it an owl? But owls usually eat their prey whole. Maybe a cat did it. We looked carefully all around the yard, and couldn't find any more evidence. 

Case closed, right?

She asked Dad about it. He said it was a little suspicious that last night I wanted to keep going out every ten minutes for a while. So then she asked me, "Chester did you catch a bunny last night? I bet you did and it got away except for those clumps of fur."

I'll never tell!

Oh, and today is our Lily's third birthday! Hooray!