This is Remington now :) He loves to walk

Behaving in the bath

As a young puppy.

My 6 month old dog Remington has just been diagnosed with the Parvo virus. I am doing this as an Informatory blog, so all of you with dogs or puppies can know about it. 

Parvo is the shortened term for the canine parvovirus, a viral disease that affects dogs. The parvovirus most commonly affects puppies as the virus attacks the rapidly developing cells in a young dog’s body, but dogs of all ages can become infected.Parvo generally affects the intestines causing diarrhea that is often bloody, but parvocan also affect the heart causing it to fail. Parvo is the most common lethal virus known to affect dogs, but is preventable with the parvo vaccine.

Parvo is an extremely contagious virus that is transmitted through fecal matter. The virus can live for weeks or months in areas where feces from infected dogs have been deposited. Parvo is highly resistant to surface disinfectants, but many veterinarian offices and kennels use bleach as surface disinfectants because it is the most effective. An unvaccinated dog is highly susceptible to the parvovirus.

An infected dog will display symptoms of diarrhea, vomiting and lethargy. A loss of appetite is another significant symptom along with fever. Complications of parvoinclude dehydration, shock and death. Vaccinated dogs can be carriers of parvowithout being infected and may not display any symptoms of the virus at all.

Because of the parvovirus’s highly contagious nature, it is important to vaccinate dogs against the virus. The parvo vaccine is part of routine veterinary vaccinations recommended for all puppies and dogs. The parvo vaccine is generally administered around six weeks and is re-administered three to four additional times before the dog is a year old and annually after that.

There is no cure for parvo, however veterinarian treatment for the disease, which includes intravenous fluids and medications, can sustain a dog’s body systems during the course of the disease. Unlike many human viruses, the contraction of canine parvovirus does not cause the dog’s body to develop immunity or resistance and the dog can contract parvoagain.

To prevent parvo, veterinarians recommend having every puppy properly vaccinated during the first 20 weeks of life and annually each year after. With the proper vaccination your dog will be protected from the virus, but if you believe your unprotected dog has contracted the virus or know he has been exposed, you should consult a veterinarian. If you have a dog without vaccination records or are unsure of their medical history, you should take them to a veterinarian for examination.

Remington had his vaccination but still contracted the virus, so please make sure to get your dog boostered and checked up on. It is a very fast acting virus, and it is given abou 5 days from time of infection to time of death. Our vet has high hopes or our dog, lucky for us we caught it within 12 hours into the 5 days. He is currently staying at the pet hospital, and We all hope he will be better and home with us wrecking havoc again. 

For Drivers Everywhere

     To everyone out there.. this sign means MERGE LEFT. 

To everyone except those that have no clue what they are doing. It seems to be a general consensus in Fort Mac to stop at the intersection before this sign, and wait for someone to let you into traffic. That is not how the sign works. You are given 400 meters of pavement after the intersection to get to the speed of traffic and then MERGE into it. Not sit there like a duck, with 400 meters of asphalt in front of you wondering what to do. I got stuck behind someone earlier who did this, and I have the patience of a saint, but this is my pet peeve I think. The line up behind me was longer than the one for Tim Hortons (which is usually 10-15 cars long) and the person in front kept looking in her mirror like it was MY fault. I was behind you my love, and you needed to go FORWARD. No wonder there are so many accidents on Highway 63. 

On the Eve of Good Friday...let me say....

... it pains me that a Catholic turned Wiccan needs to be the one reminded people of what the whole purpose of Good Friday actually is.

Listen up Cafeteria Catholics and your innate sense of guilt - Good Friday was meant to be a DAY OF FASTING.

Fasting, abstention from food, and often also from drink, for a longer than usual period. Fasting has been practiced for centuries in connection with religious ceremonies. MSN Encarta

Following is stated in the Code of Canon Law of the Catholic Church.

Can. 1250 The penitential days and times in the universal Church are every Friday of the whole year and the season of Lent.

Can. 1251 Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday. Abstinence and fasting are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

That in NO WAY means that you should line up at your local fish shoppe and stuff your face with Fish, Chips, Dressing, Onion Rings and Gravy.

Which brings me to my next point. Even if you consider yourself religious and are taking today's Good Friday practises as not being able to consume meat - most people obviously need to do a lil more research into that subject.

GRAVY is meat people - it is juices from the cooked flesh OF AN ANIMAL = meat. If you are believer that fish is not meat - there is no such thing as FISH GRAVY.

ALSO - if you are a believer that fish is not meat - ask yourself why? It used to be because fish are not warm blooded animals, not mammals, not considered to be meat. And, since we don't eat many things "not considered to be meat" - fish is the Cafeteria Catholics answer to the day of fasting, fondly known as Good Friday.

Now I can kinda understand the logic behind this lil bending of the actual rules for practising your faith. However, how a grown, supposedly intelligent, person can look you in the eye (while judging you and your hell-bound lifestyle)and say that they are a devout Catholic (hence a better person than you)while shoveling Seal Flipper Pie in their mouth smothered in gravy - that is something I cannot understand.

Seal = warm blooded = live born babies = mammal = animal = MEAT PEOPLE. Don't try and tell me that because it comes out of the ocean it is not meat. You are just making your chosen religion look bad and insulting the intelligence of others.

Anyway, that is my first rant about organized religion and the types of masses that follow it. Stay tuned for further blasphemous pieces.

Dammit - I was supposed to give up religion for lent :(

***NOTE*** by the way - before you go blasting me about the Catholic religion and my lack of knowledge about it. I was raised in a strict Catholic household in early childhood (my grandmothers house) and when I moved in with my parents I often got up and went to church by myself (or with a neighbour) when my parents chose not to go. I also was a Eucharistic minister as well as a Confirmation counsellor AND went to a Catholic school until amalgamation.

Green is my Favorite Colour

I know there is a lot of praise going around about "being green" and "we are killing the earth" but i just thought i would put this out there, earth was killing people long before fossil fuels came around,  ex: drowning, avalances, frost bite, etc. etc. etc. BUT thats not my point, the point is, we can all do a small amount that can do so much. 

My better half and I are making plans to build a cabin down towards the Alberta/US boarder (pretty scenery) and since i do not want to ruin the scene by bringing in bulldozers and power lines galore, a huge TV etc. instead i decided to build a small but very tall cabin, takes up the smallest amount of ground space, and can still give us a large footage. 

Thats a small part from me, and if you would like to do all you need is a reuseable water bottle, a water filter, and some washable hand towels in place of paper towels. It doesn't take much, even just hanging your clothes out to dry can do a big thing. 

I will give more updates on the cabin soon, i can't wait to get it started :) 

The New and Improved DiVinci Code

People of the Book: One of the earliest Jewish religious volumes to be illuminated with images, the Sarajevo Haggadah survived centuries of purges and wars thanks to people of all faiths who risked their lives to safeguard it. Geraldine Brooks, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author, has turned to intriguing but sparely detailed history of this precious volume into an emotionally rich, thrilling fictionalization that retraces its turbulent journey. In the hands of Hanna, a rare book expect who is restoring the manuscript, it yields clues to its guardians an

d whereabouts: an insect wing, a wine stain, salt crystals, and a white hair. While readers experience crucial moments in the books history through a series of short stories within the story itself. A love story, thrilling mystery, vivid history lesson, and the power of ideas is why this novel was hailed one of the best of 2008.