The-daily-tail-the global edition

Hi !! It's me, the one and only Lily again !!

Today is sunday, so today I take it easy !!

Mom says I always take it easy !!

So what ? I am a super lazy doggie !!

Well, I heard somewhere that a good laugh is good for the soul !!

And I want nothing but the best for my fans !!

So !!

Mom bought Miss Poppy a hat for winter ...

Ha ha ha ha haaaaaaah

She looks real happy, right ?

High Paws !

Lily

Here we are again !! 

By now, we have reached "modern times".

Somewhere in between surviving the Y2K problem and mom's "old" money being replace by brand new cash (she is still convinced that they cheated on her !!) came Woody, mom's first Shih Tzu !

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6 years later, it was my turn !! 

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Followed about 6 months later by my little (well yeah ...) sister Tiger Lily !!

So now you know a bit of that history too.

See you next time !

Miss Poppy

it is Sunday for us !

So mom did not have to go to work. She and oma (grandma you remember) went to a large garden center and bought (oh yes, she always buys stuff !)

Rudolph's little brother and weird creature called a "squirrel" .. Mom says some doggies like to chase them around the yard ... that looks like fun to me, but I guess I will have to move to different places then, because I have never ever encoutered one in my backyard jungle !

These two will spend some time on the mantlepiece. But with a joint effort from me and Lily, mom will soon "realize" they belong with us on the floor being dragged around the house !

Hugs and kisses

Miss Poppy

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Hello !

And as promised, I will give you now an idea of mom's pets throughout the years. 

The fact that mom would love doggies, started at an early age. I know ! She obviously was to young to know how to hold a puppy properly and not choke the tiny thing !

Later in life came a sweet little Cocker Spaniel puppy named Snoopy. One day she walked by a pet store and she noticed this little beauty in the window. Indeed, these were still the horrible days when pet store sold puppies and kittens instead of toys, dog beds and delicious treats ! As you might notice, by now she knew more or less how to handle doggies.

A few months later mom heard about a farmer in the neighborhood who's cat had another litter and he was going to drown the kittens. Of course she hurried to the farm and brought home Sammy. On the way home, she wondered how this tiny kitten in the cardboard box on her lap could be so heavy ... Well it turned out that 2/3 of that weight consisted of millions of flees ! The kitten got the full treatment and grew up to be a sturdy cat of about 25 lbs ! On the picture he's still a kitten and is teasing his partner in crime, Snoopy.

Much later in life, enter Bobo, the black persian and his halfbrother Ziggy. 

Bobo lived with mom for 18 years !!

Ziggy was the laziest cat in the world and unfortunately so were his bowels.

He was only about 5 when the vet noticed that his bowels were paralyzed and no treatment was possible.

As these past years, were definitely mom's kitten years, luckily she realized that doggies are just as much fun, so Benson, the Great Dane, came to live with her.

Alright ! He's still a tiny baby in this picture, but man, did he get big !!

As you all know, mom is old, so I guess a "pets - part 2" would be best !

Big Hug from yours truly,

Miss Poppy

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Well, it’s not really true, I mean that he is really gone, because he will always be with us. A month before this dreadful day, mom took him to the local photo studio and had his picture taken.

A huge enlargement hangs on the wall in our sitting room.

His favorite cuddly toy, his Eeyore, still sits on the book shelf. Mom talks to Eeyore every day.

Did you notice where Eeyore's sitting in ? Sooo cool !!

As you probably would have guessed, each one of us has a personal bowl !!

 But all this left us with a bit of a situation, we were in an urgent need of someone to take care of Woody’s blog … I was young, very young, but I was also an real ambitious little doggy, not afraid of anyone or anything and still having to meet this one person who was going to stop me in whatever I wanted to achieve (mom’s still trying) !  

So that’s how I, MISS POPPY, became editor in chief of The DAILY TAIL !! 

 If by now there is still one person left reading this … a final thought ... we really had tough times during Woody’s treatment, but we also had so much fun, laughs and sweet memories. Mom keeps repeating that if she has to do this over again, she would do it without any hesitation ! Even knowing now that the whole thing costs her something in the region of an average car …

Next time ... mom's pets !

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Early 2007, soon after Woody wrote his first posts on his very own blog, mom found an ad from a breeder not so far away from where we live, announcing the birth of shih Tzu pups. As mom is a believer in the theory that one doggy can teach the other doggy how to behave as a good pup, she was just this little bit tempted to make sure Woody could still give his "wisdom" to a new arrival ! And as Bobo had passed away a few months earlier after reaching the respectable age of 18 years, the time for a new puppy had arrived ! ENTER ME ! Miss Poppy, the one and only ! 

We became friends from the first time we met !

 By that time, Woody regularly suffered from severe eye infections. And as he only had just the one eye, this meant that now and again he could not see a thing. At these moments I would try not to bother my big brother too much, but just keep an eye on him.

But as soon as mom got home and cleaned out Woody’s eye, he was the first to start teasing me and it was play time again ! He really, really never gave up !

But, we all knew it was going to happen one day, and on July 31^st 2007, his little body gave up. That morning, Mom came down, feeling something was wrong. Woody, with all the strength that was left in his battered body, looked up at mom and then she knew. Mom called our vet and she rushed over to our place. Half an hour later, Woody was no longer with us.

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He did respond well to the treatment ! Okay, at one point, he lost almost all of beautiful furry coat

but, don't worry, it grew back. He put on (a lot of) weight because of the steroids he had to take. He had to take an extra pill just to make him not feel too sick from taking the first or the second or the third. But this incredible brave hero (that's how our vet called Woody) did not growl or bite once when our vet injected him yet another time. And if things got too bad for him, he always found comfort in his trusty fluffy toy, Eeyoor. 

 All this medication finally got him renal problems so he had to go on a diet. Unfortunately he did not like the prescription food so mom looked around and finally found a (people’s) dietician who was prepared to draw up a schedule which would help keep Woody’s problem under control. In the mean time a lot of his regular medication was changed to homeopathic treatments. As the options for new treatments narrowed, mom had the idea of starting a blog in the hope she would find someone who could help her in finding new solutions for Wood’s problem. And that was the birth of "The Daily Tail" !

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 The guard dog issue turned out to be a big mistake. Woody liked any one who came into our house.

He was world champion in "air-barking", not a sound came out of his little mouth. So mom decided that an extra lock on the garden gate and the back door would be a pretty good attempt to keep burglars outside. Later on she would hope that in case the bad guy did manage to get into the house, he would end up suffering the same fate as she did and break his leg on one of the Woodster’s toys or dog beds !

 Well the years went on, Woody had his paws full with saving mom from doing stupid or dangerous things. He got pretty good at it too, but nevertheless he could not protect mom from breaking her leg when falling over one of his toys (remember my remark on the burglar thing) ! Nor could he prevent that she, in a genuine Quentin tarantino style, almost cut off her little pinky when slicing some tomato's for supper ! 

 About 3 years after Woody moved into our home/life, one night mom felt a lump just under his jaw bone. Do I have to tell you this caused a bit of a panic ? Am I a drama queen ? No of course not ! It caused a huge panic attack ! He was raced to the vet, the next day she performed a biopsy and had the sample sent to the medical lab straightaway and then a few days later, well it felt like the end of the world, Woody was diagnosed with Lymphoma. Our vet and mom discussed the possibilities, the treatments, his life expectancy and most of all his life quality. But let’s not forget the huge bill that would come with it. But as you could have guessed, the next week mom and Woody went for the first of their weekly chemo therapy treatment trips to our vet, about another 150 would follow.

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And then there was Woody !!

 Our mom moved from the city to the country side in 1999 (way before I was born) because she was looking for some peace, quietness and a safer place to live. With her came Bobo, a black Persian kitty cat. He was deeply disgusted by the move and there was no way of getting him to go outside. Oh no! All that dirt made him feel yucky or he might get wet feet from the grass or maybe because he was a bit of a loner and he was not entirely convinced that the backyard was "kitty-free-country"... a crybaby if you want my opinion.

 Did I mention that mom was looking for a safer place to live? Well, a few months later bad people tried to get into our house ... So mom decided that a guard dog would have to be added to the family, the sooner, the better! She started looking around and her mind was more or less set on a Labrador doggy. But when she found out how much a doggy like that would cost (almost $2000), she quickly changed her plan and contacted our vet to see if she would know of a doggy, no matter what breed, that was available for adoption. 

That same week our vet called mom, telling her she had a tiny little puppy, a Shih Tzu, ready for adoption. Bear in mind, these were the dark ages, access to the world wide web was limited, mom never ever heard of a breed called shih Tzu, so she called one of her younger sisters, Auntie Joan, a genuine computer freak, and asked her to look it up on the internet. Mom's first reaction.. OH NO CERTAINLY NOT MY KIND OF DOGGY ! Our vet also told mom that if she could not find someone to adopt him soon, the breeder had asked her to euthanize the pup, because he did not wanted this "defective" pup on his high standard litter's pedigree. Mom being a softie, decided that taking a look at the pup, could do no harm and would certainly not mean that she was going to adopt him ! Did I mention what was wrong with the puppy ? No ? Well he was born with just 1 eye ! Don't tell me you've got no clue of what happened next !! Of course mom brought the little devil home ! Meet WOODY ! What just one puppy eye can do to change the mind of a very decisive mom !

To be continued !

Good morning !!!

My name is Lily and I am Miss Poppy's younger sister. Now and then I will take over here, not a lot, because I am extremely lazy and blogging is a real tough job !

This blogpost is really a call for help ... last week we went to the groomers and mom asked Lieve (that's my groomer's name) to cut the ears real short, because mom thinks I look real cute then, but guess what happened ????

Lieve turned me into a monster !!! Maybe she was already thinking of halloween ...

She cut off one of ears !!!!

So, my dearest Lieve, GIVE ME BACK MY EAR !! Mom is already complaining that I seem to be deaf whenever she's calling me.

(she's so wrong, but don't tell her ...)

High (stinky) Paws !!

Lily