To any of you who said tonight’s debate was lackluster, I completely disagree. In fact, I think we left tonight with a clear leader. Here’s what I took away from tonight’s GOP debate on Fox News:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zCidiDBAb0

Bella Dog Magazine used a quote from me in their “Top 10 Dog Friendly Cities” article. You can read the article here.

Ive spent a LOAD of time and money at the veterinarian…goes with the dog rescuing territory. To be honest, most of it comes from the boys exhibiting some sort of slight symptom, me ignoring it, and then “it” turning in to something expensive.

My dogs exhibit these subtle symptoms to let me know when something’s wrong. If your pup is doing any of the below, you might want to get him/her checked out before it gets spendy!

Excessive head shaking – Ever seen a kid trying to shake water out of their ears after swimming? Dogs who shake their heads excessively might be telling you they have water in their ears. They might also be telling you that they have a bunch of goop in their ears, or a mild ear infection. To investigate, grab the base of the ears and wiggle around. If the dog is sensitive or if the ears are really warm (like a fever), you have a problem.

You can avoid this by keeping your dog’s ears clean…wiping the inside with a baby wipe a few times a week should do it. If it’s too late and your puppy is already doing the shaking thing, try a very thorough cleaning several days in a row. It could be a yeast or bacterial infection, so if that symptom continues you’ll want to get Fido to the vet.

Related symptoms: Ears that smell weird. (My wife says they smell like old Fritos.)

Rubbing face on couch/floor: We have had two dogs do this. For one dog, it turned out to be allergies that were irritating his eyes. We found out that you can use human artificial tears on dogs. You can also give Benadryl @ 1mg per pound of dog weight. For the second dog it turned out to be an inversion of the lower eyelid that causes the eyelashes to rub the cornea. Not a lot we can do there short of surgery. We just keep his eyes clean (again with artificial tears) and every once in a while we have to put him on steroid drops. (This only happens once a year or so).

Chewing Paws: Chewing paws can be a few things. When Ernie does this, it usually means he’s got matted fur in his paw. You have to watch this with long haired breeds. To remedy, we lay him on his back, spread his paws (a LOT), and try and find the mat. Then we cut it out with safety scissors or dog grooming clippers. He really doesn’t like this at all so he gets lots of petting and treats afterward.

More recently, both Ernie and Ollie (a lab mix) have started chewing due to what the vet thinks are allergies. As they dog around in our yard they pick up allergens on their paws and it itches the bajeezus out of them, so they try to fix it by chewing. Benadryl and anti-chewing spray (eg Bitter Apple) are the remedies here.

Dragging bottom: Our dogs get groomed regularly, including anal gland expression, so this isn’t much of a problem in the Lilly pack. It’s a pretty common problem that can create a really serious problem, though, so it warrants discussion.

Typically, dogs who drag their bottoms are trying to express their anal glands. These are little stinky sacs on either side of their butts. A diet rich in proteins and exercise helps dogs self-express their anal glands, but sometimes they can’t. The result is irritation that requires a groomer or vet to express them manually. (Don’t try this at home.)

Ignoring the anal glands can cause them to impact or even rupture, which is a very serious problem for your dog, so make sure to get them to the groomer or vet if they are dragging bottom. Anal gland expression shouldn’t cost more than $10-$15.

One final note: I’m not a vet, so please don’t take this as medical advice for your pets. If they exhibit behaviors that concern you, get them to a veterinarian ASAP!

Coach is doing quite nicely in the Lilly house. So well so that we decided to celebrate Easter a day early with him.

Ozzie has taken it upon himself to socialize the new guy and teach him to play. Check it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BELxHmpbQ7k

The key to working a new dog in to your pack is to 1) make a controlled introduction, and 2) not over-manage the situation. Let the dogs find their own dynamic. But also 3) be on the lookout for ahole type behavior and correct it. (If you’ve done #1 right, this isn’t usually such a problem.)

Of all our animals, I was most concerned about Ollie shredding Mini Ditka into a billion little puppy pieces. He is ok with other dogs 80% of the time, but the other 20% he’s SUPER aggressive – think Stephen King novel-type stuff. Mini Ditka and Ollie largely ignored each other for the first two weeks.

Then last night I caught this. I think Ollie likes the new guy:

My reflections on 2010:

Best Purchase: Gibson SG American. I bought this very early in 2010 to round out my guitar collection. Sounds great, plays very fast, and my hands have always been favorable to the fretboard gauging of Gibson over the longer Fender gauge. It’s also much lighter than any of my other guitars, making it really easy to play for very long periods of time without shoulder fatigue.

Worst: Every book ever written by Robert Dilts. Although he’s considered by many to be one of the creators of NLP, I find his writing very dry and difficult to get through. I do a lot of reading but I haven’t managed to get through any of his books yet.

Best Band I discovered: Although they didn’t debut in 2010, I only became aware of them about 4 months ago. I’m talking about the Zac Brown Band. These guys are infreakingcredible. Awesome musicians, great songwriters, and they seem to be pretty down to earth dudes. They’re more flannel shirt country than cowboy hat country, which totally appeals to me. (Close second is Micky and the Motorcars, who I was just turned on to a month ago by my buddy John at 9Seeds.)

Worst: Anything with the last name Beiber.

Best Movie: Although I was pretty well appalled by the heavy politics, Avatar was a beautiful movie to watch. I saw it in XD 7 times or so, stunned the amazing FX. Wow. Breathless.

Worst: Tron. Save your $.

Best Road Trip: This is tough, as I took quite a few trips this year, but I have to say the best was my 48 hour jaunt to Utah to go hog hunting. It was my first hunt and the group we put together was awesome…oh, and it doesn’t hurt that I have 100+ pounds of hog meat in my freezer to remember it by. (Christmas in Kern Valley was a close 2nd.)

Worst: Flying to Cedar Rapids, IA for the memorial service of one of my college professors.

Best Mac App purchased: Dragon Dictate. This mofo allows you to dictate into your computer. It does a phenomenal job. I type pretty fast (70-80 WPM) but with Dragon I can get upwards of 150WPM. Outstanding productivity tool. (Second place: Curio. Great for brainstorming, mind mapping, and light project management. Also good for information sharing. Well worth the $$$.)

Worst: Comic Life. Although it seems to be a great program for cartoon illustrators, I have very little use for it. It was an impulse buy because I thought it would be funny to make a cartoon of one of my friends calling himself a douchebag. 15 seconds of chuckles: $24.95.

Other cool happenings from 2010:

1. I lost 60 pounds on a medical weight loss program. I am currently in the process of launching a non-prescription program to help folks lose weight who can’t afford to spend the $100′s of dollars a month I did.

2. Ozzy (Osbourne Cox) came in to our lives. We rescued him after the passing of our beloved Sonny. Ozzy has been a great addition to our family.

3. My wife got to know my family better. We had a very fun trip out to Indiana in July, and the whole family came to Vegas for Turkey Day. Prior to 2010 she hadn’t spent a whole ton of time with any of them. I’m really happy that we’re all bonding.

4. I started my final tattoo. Right leg. Pics forthcoming.

Next Up: Resolutions!

Had my first day without email in a long time. (Ok, it was most of a day.) While it felt great to be de-tethered, it was not intentional. I took the wife and our smallest dog on a hike to some little-known hot springs outside of Las Vegas. Two hours there, two and a half back. We were in a canyon and the cell service was spotty – hence being without email for a day.

It was amazing to be able to spend a day of uninterrupted time with my favorite girl – no rings to answer, text to reply to or SPAM to delete! I think I’m going to make it a regular thing.

Quick aside: We did some pretty intense scrambling up and down this rocky river bed. When the jump was too big, we’d just pick Ozzie up and chuck him to the next boulder. Had a scary moment when he tried to run up a 12 foot rock, slid down and damn near killed himself. I had to rope him to my chest and climb up supporting an extra 40 pounds of dog. Video forthcoming.

It was a really bad last couple of weeks. After watching his health continue to degrade, we enjoyed Sonny the bully mix’s last day on earth this last Saturday. RIP Sonny. We will miss you.