a99kitten's Musings

Took Shadow out in the fresh snow this AM. He was FIRED UP!! Run, run, run, stop, eat snow, run, run :) Hiked uphill as it continued to snow on us and I took a gazillion cute pics of him having fun.

Then I got a weird feeling. Looked around, didn’t see anyone or anything but just felt weird. Ran to catch up to Shadow and BAM – slipped on some ice and down I went. Darn it. I know better. Luckily experience has taught me to twist a little so didn’t land on my tailbone and my arm took most of it. Shadow immediately ran up to make sure I was OK (or see if any of the cookies fell out of my pocket…) and I put his leash on.

Not 30 seconds after his leash was on we see 2 coyotes. Whew. Shadow would have taken off to play with them for sure! Score 1 for listening to gut feeling!! If only I could apply that more to my trading account.

Started heading back down the hill and get allllllmost home and decide to cute pic of Shadow. My phone?! Not in pocket?! Oh….good…I bet it’s right where I fell and IT fell out of my pocket instead of any cookies! Shadow failed to mention that…

Let’s go back buddy. He looked at me like “what?? back uphill??” We charged back up the hill quickly as I was imagining my phone being buried in the still falling snow and falling victim to the dreaded water damage. Found it! And it worked and seemed perfectly fine. Whew.

Back down the hill we went and Shadow got more crazy running time. I let him off leash again as we got closer to the house and away from where the coyotes were. Got home and he didn’t even run straight to the kitchen for breakfast! Fed him and he went right to the deck door and looked at me with pleading eyes “let me back in the snow LadyMom.” OK…and he fell right asleep as he was being snowed on.

Successful snow morning mission!

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This is my neighborhood up in Tahoe. All this snow fell last night. The amount of husky mom fail I feel right now is unmeasurable. They should be running and bounding through the snow with that golden retriever in the video! Especially now that Stormy has his new fur coat growing in so nicely!!

If I didn’t have a doctor’s appointment at 7:30am tomorrow AM, I’d drive up there tonight. Damn.

And to think – this past weekend I was up there in sundresses and flip flops!!

Angelus says it is too deep in the backyard – fix it. :)

But I do think I wore the huskies out. They are both sound asleep tonight. And not even looking at the front door.

6:00am – Wake up and see it’s raining outside. Sigh…lay in bed a few more minutes. I feel like Indiana Jones when he looks down into the Well of the Souls and sees all the snakes. “Rain…why did it have to be rain?” (for the the zillionth day in a row!) (and yes..I do actually say that to myself in that voice in my head as I remember the scene in the movie – kookie!)

6:15am – Get up, feed huskies, get dressed in rain gear, leash the boys up and go…

6:30am – Stops raining!!! Praise Bejebus! Super fun time on beach with the huskies and their friend Yogi! And I’m 100% convinced that I benefit from the walk just as much as they do. Yesterday the rain and wind was so bad, we didn’t make it 10 minutes before going back home. And I was grumpy all day!

8:15am – Home, shower, get ready for work. As I am about to leave, husband says only time to beat storms is leave by noon. Otherwise no go until Sunday. Sigh. Pack for Tahoe. Need to call boss on way to vet.

9:30am – Take Stormy to his ultrasound appointment. Stress the whole drive in and curse at the stoopid Prius and truck drivers.

10:00am – Storm’s appt. Stress in waiting room. ALL CLEAR!!! YAY!!!! Doc says how great he looks :) Why a guy. Nurses give him cookies. He is loved :)

11:00am – Post office and then home and pack up car.

11:30am – Drive…rain….rain…….80 still closed, go to 50…drive……hail….drive…overturned vehicle….drive….accident…..drive….(at least not as hellacious as last week)

4:50pm – Get to Incline Village – SUSHI! Take huskies out first and walk them a bit.

5:20pm – YUM! EAT! First meal of the day!!!! See guy walk in for dinner and comment “he looks like an 80s hair band guy” Oh..he is. Guy from Whitesnake. Hysterical!

8:00pm – Get home. Drive down snowcave of a street and driveway. Let huskies out of car and run around. Tromp through waist (yes, waist) deep snow into house to disarm and unlock. Good thing I’m not some dumb, high-maintenance girl. Feed huskies dinner. Give them a lot of extra chicken for being such good passengers :)

8:02 (or…maybe 8:03pm) Husky dinner inhaled. Take huskies back out (this time in snow gear).

Seeing huskies so happy to be in snow – a good use of a day off after all :) Excited to see what snow adventures we will have this weekend!

The weather forecast this morning said big storm tonight and Saturday but cleared out Sunday and basically clear for the rest of the week. Now it says snow tonight through Monday. Huskies say don’t mess their snow making super wonder twin powers :)

It’s been snowing all day. Well, actually it’s been snowing since Saturday night. I have been out a lot having plenty of snow fun with the huskies since we got here. And they are pretty tired now – even Angelus! So I decided to just take a walk on my own. On my walk I met up with a LOT of doggies and skooshed them all and they were following me so I felt pretty much like Snow White :) Shhhhhh……don’t tell the huskies!

They just closed Interstate 80 again due to whiteout conditions! Crikey…no wonder the Donner party got lost up here….

p.s. I am a goober sometimes :)

From our first walk yesterday after we FINALLY arrived.

And then after our walk this AM.

Angelus playing in the driveway.

This is our local weather guy, who has been far more accurate than the news weather guys…

“Resort Totals page updated as of 6 a.m. Resorts West of the lake reporting 18-36 inches with the highest amounts on resorts furthest West. Resorts East of the lake reporting 6-8 inches as there was good shadowing overnight due to the direction of the flow from the South.

This series of storms Wed-Sun is going to drop several more feet on top of the massive amounts we have already received in the past week. Looks like we could finally have a break after next weekend, but it may not last as we could see storms return the first week of April. Stay tuned……”

It seems to me that this spring is looking like a good one. I also believe wholeheartedly that the huskies have a deal with the weather gods :)

Took the huskies out this AM to pee before breakfast. They ran around in circles in the snow with big smiles! Stormy ran right inside for breakfast though. No keeping him from breakfast. I had to entice Angelus back in though! They inhaled breakfast and were ready to get out there! The driveway was about mid-calf on me. This was just from about 2am when the snow plow came and did our driveway and easement road. But this is belly high on Stormy.

When we got up our easement road to the street it was even deeper as the town snowplows hadn’t come yet. It was high enough for Angelus’ chest to have to push through the snow. Stormy toughed it out with his naked belly but we lasted about 25 minutes out and he wanted to turn back. The snow was coming down so fast that it was getting on our eyes and I think he was like “Mom, inside sounds good to me!” So we went back home and dropped Stormy off. Then Angelus and I went on our way….

We came across a couple with a little black doggie who had to leap through the snow. But he was having a good time. He and Angelus played for a bit and then Angelus got bored so off we went. The streets were unplowed so they are just like a giant snow field. No cars on the road and nice and quiet out. Perfect. Then we met another doggie – a standard poodle – who was as tall as Angelus but afraid of him. His Dad was like “you are the same size?!” Heh. Angelus got bored there too so off we went. We tried to find his friends the other huskies down the street but they weren’t out. Darn.

We played in the snow, Angelus dug in a lot of snowpiles and then we got back home. He is resting up for our next outing. I-80 is closed. Some of the resorts are even closed. Snowed in! Time for me to make some Star Wars pancakes!

That was the worst drive up to Tahoe EVER. I was dumb and left late. You wouldn’t think 7:30am is that late but it is. Especially when there is one snow storm clearing out and another coming in so this “break” in the weather was the time to go. Plus the highway was closed yesterday from 2pm to 1am. So people couldn’t go yesterday. Between the traffic, the snow, the idiots driving up in their non-4-wheel drive cars who need to put on chains the highway was a parking lot.

They should NOT allow vehicles up to the mountains during snowstorms that are not properly equipped. Vehicles that need chains create traffic jams for the chain on/off procedures, create traffic due to their having to go SLOW the entire way AND destroy the roads in the process. JACKASSES. I HATE YOU.

THEN, after you FINALLY get past chain control, which took 5 hours. Yes…FIVE hours of sitting in traffic due to m-fers who drive stupid cars and create stupid traffic jams and then the stupid CA Department of Transportation puts up chain points for no good reason (you would needed them for MAYBE 5 miles…MAYBE.) Anyway – after that, you get a free and open freeway of snowy highway with no lane markings (because of the snow.) So people just create their own lanes. And create their own non-lanes to pass trucks and other cars. Passing on right, left doesn’t matter. And then cars just stop in the middle of lanes to remove chains, or fix their chains, or whatever. Just stop…right there in the driving lane. Idiots. Hate you. So much. And as proof they are idiots, half of them (you could see them as they got out of their cars to deal with the chains) were wearing shorts, or jeans with flip-flops or sweatpants and flip-flops and t-shirts. And standing there shivering. Hello? It’s 25 degrees and snowing out. Plus it was 40+ degrees and raining wherever you started your journey from today so WTF? You have no sense. None. You are idiots. Please do not breed.

Anyway, got here at 3:30. Almost 8 hours later. I say almost because I stopped to get gas and a coffee on the way. But basically an 8 hour drive on what should be a 3 (4 with snow) hour drive. The amount of anger I have towards people who think driving up to the mountains in a snowstorm in cars without 4 or all wheel drive and for the Department of Transportation is unmeasurable today.

Luckily, I have 2 awesome huskies who patiently drove with me with no complaints. Who jumped out of the car when we got here and ran around in the snow, big smiles on their faces. Who let me inhale a glass of water and taco (hadn’t eaten anything today and was getting punchy) before taking them out on a walk with still no complaints. Who then took me on a jog through the snow down our street and back and then around in various driveways where the snow is currently belly high for them and then running all around our easement road, neighbors driveways and our driveway. Angelus and Storm were BOTH (yay Storm!) running around and chasing each other through the snow. Dummy me left my phone in the house in my rush to get them out so missed some GREAT video of them. Dangit!

So yes, I still HATE the above mentioned idgits. But thanks to 2 fluff-monsters my blood pressure has been restored to normal and the steam has stopped coming from my ears. The amount of snow here is crazy. It’s lightly falling now but another big storm is supposedly coming tonight and tomorrow. YAY! And then snow is forecast every day for the next week. Wheeeeee! But I shall be staying out of my car and off the highway and away from the real world of annoyances and will be here in the forest with 2 fluffy beasts. Better for my health :)

Took the huskies to the beach this morning and they had a GREAT time! It was super low-tide so there was a ton of open beach to run on. I let them off-leash when they saw their friend Marley (ginormous black lab.) Actually Marley saw them first and he took off running full speed down the beach to meet them – he’s pretty darn cute. I let them off so they could meet him half-way! They ran around and had fun. Then we met a border collie named Maverick. This dog was FAST! And the huskies were tearing around chasing him as he chased his frisbee. Then he would drop his frisbee and chase them back.

Storm even went into the water to cool off! He has not done that in a long time. I guess with so many missing fur spots, he doesn’t get as hot as Angelus anymore. But he was chasing Maverick and they both just ran into the water and then a small wave came up and they were both belly high in water and Storm had this HUGE smile on his face. So, so cute.

Angelus wanted to play with a little dog who wanted to say hi to Angelus but then got scared and ran away at the last second. Well…to Angelus this means “Chase me!” Oops. He chased the little dog into a small alcove by the bluff and was like RUFF! Tail-wagging and smiling. But the little dog Mom saw it more as a “he wants to eat her!” No…he doesn’t. Little dog people are so funny. I grabbed him so she could grab her dog (Francesca…of course) and even as she did Fracesca was leaning out of her arms to sniff Angelus. See – everyone is fine. Then Angelus got bored and came back to the chase game with Storm and Maverick.

We were down on the beach for 2 hours playing! Angelus started getting warm after about 1.5 hours. The sun was shining so even with ocean dips, he was getting hot. He was making it clear he was done and wanted to head back. But Storm kept wanting to play!! I finally had to say enough when I saw Stormy’s back legs shaking a little. I think with everything he has been through this past year, he muscle tone is still not at 100% and he gets tired. But after 2 hours of running and chasing – I’d be tired too!

While we were out there, everyone wanted to talk about the tsunami. Was quite the event here. Maverick’s dad told me that they had an evac area set up on top of 92 (at the highest point.) I did see a bunch of cars and the state police there when I drove to work but apparently the news showed it as basically a parking lot with tons and tons of cars parked there and along Highway 35 too?! Who knows if the news exaggerated (as they like to do for drama and effect) but when I drove by the area there were about 20 cars and the cops. So I’m sure between 7-9am, there were a lot more. I do know they evacuated the houses on the west side of Highway 1 as well as the beaches and harbor. I guess safe is better than sorry but seeing how the tsunami was when it hit Hawaii, I was pretty sure anyone not actually standing on the beach would be just fine. But on my way home from work around 8pm last night, there were STILL cars parked there with people just milling about. Really??

I tend to not worry about most things. I think I keep all of my stress and worry focused mostly on the huskies. So as I was walking around yesterday AM and the highway was closed, fire trucks and cop cars lining the highway with lights flashing, cars and trucks just parked on streets and people walking around, helicopters buzzing around…it was a bit eerie. I thought to myself “Am I not as concerned for our safety as I should be?” But I figured the huskies didn’t seem concerned. They wanted to go to the beach. And animals have much better senses about this type of stuff (notice how all of the animals in Indonesia ran AWAY from the coast as the tourists walked towards it..) so I was taking their lead.

Even this morning, while we were on the beach, there were tide surges. It was super low tide but then all of a sudden, like ALL OF A SUDDEN, the tide has come up right to the bluffs. I managed to jump on a rock both times to avoid wet feet! And the huskies like wet paws! But it was SO fast, that I can’t even imagine it at that same speed with much more powerful water/waves. And it goes out just as fast. Very cool effect to see in real life. But I am totally OK with that and yesterday’s wave and tide viewing being the extent of my tsunami experience.

It’s a gorgeous day here today. Sunshine and a light breeze. Angelus argues much too hot but even he is lying on his lawn right now with a smile on his face :) He loves, loves, loves the snow but Storm tends to get cheesed a bit when we are in Tahoe as he gets cold faster so gets shorter walks. I was all packed and ready to go to Tahoe last night but I was SO tired after 2 nights of very little sleep. So I bagged the idea right as I should have headed out and decided to stay here. Plus the weather said it might rain up there. Yuck! I think I made the right call. The huskies had a BLAST on the beach today and Stormy got lots of playing and running in which he probably wouldn’t have in Tahoe. I think Stormy likes the snow and loves the beach. Angelus loves the beach but loves the snow more. So I need to make sure both are happy :)

So last weekend we spent in the snow. This weekend we are chilin’ at the beach and next weekend we will head back up to the snow as a new storm is expected to drop another 2 feet!

Snowy mountains, tsunami warnings, sunny beach…just another week in California…

We got up to Tahoe last night but it was after 11pm and really dark out – no starry night or bright moon to light the way. Of course, the huskies wanted to go for a walk as soon as they got out of the car. Since they are stuck in the car for 3-4 hours on the drives up, I usually take them no matter what time we get in. Just a short walk down the street so they can sniff everything, pee on stuff, say HI to Tahoe :) But last night we could only go a short ways since it was really, really dark out.

And normally when we get here, I let Angelus out on the back deck so he can play in the snow but husband didn’t want me to do that since it was really heavy snow, and had rained a bit on Thursday which made it icy and it was going to be a pain for him to remove, and Angelus paw prints and husky-dug holes everywhere supposedly make this harder as they harden/get icy. I don’t necessarily believe it will make that much of a difference with the snow blower but he is responsible for snow removal so it’s up to him.

So needless to say, Angelus was annoyed. He was like “you bring me to the snow and then I can’t play in it???” He even tweeted about it! :) So this morning, bright and early, I had a wet nose in my face :) Took the buds out for their short walk after their breakfast and brought Storm back home when he wanted. Then it was Angelus time! We walked pretty far (about 1.5 hours), met Jake the GIANT lab and Cash the sweet pit/boxer mix. They liked Angelus a lot! Cash even started to follow us away from his house – doh! We also met 2 Russian guys on our walk and they loved Angleus. Every time we meet Eastern European people, they really fawn over the huskies :)

Anyway, on our loop back home we climbed the snow mountain (about 12’+ up) in our greenbelt area and I let Angelus off leash…

Now we are home and he’s a much happier husky :)