Time out

It's possible that we'll be offline for a few days as we play at the beach.
If we are, we're sorry for the silence, but we promise to let you know everything we learn over the holiday.
Happy New Year!

Real dogs don't squeak

Staffer Mom's been home for a couple days. And while we like the decent service we're getting, she's really cramping our style. We have to stay in the yard and we have to stop barking at things we can't see or Ernie or George.
Today we discovered the side neighbor Jane has a new puppy named Tia. It's a 12-week-old chihuahua that would fit in our smallest food dish. She lets it run around on a leash outside her front door. It seemed nice enough, and all we wanted to do was say hello. We swear.
Anyway, the little mouse-looking thing thought we were going to eat it and it squeaked really loud and its staff came running out. Staffer Mom came running from the yard, and it got really out of hand. The little thing was shaking like creme-colored Jell-o, and Maggie thinks it peed on itself when it saw Bandit. We don't know what happened after that because Mom made us go in the house and stay on the porch.
Here's the thing: If it's really a dog, it needs to act like one. It didn't even have fur.

Par-tay!

We'd like to share a few milestones we hit this week:
- We've posted our 100th blog entry. (Not bad for mammals with no thumbs.)
- Our page views topped 1300. (What are you all thinking?)

We'll be celebrating those and our New Year's at the beach this year -- the staff finally told us they'd take us down there for our own party.
So, if you're in the area, we'll be on Pensacola Beach on New Year's Eve. We're not likely to see someone get Tasered this time, but there's always hope.

Come on by...it's the pink house before the spaceship. Look for the lights on the deck!

It's Christmas Day!

First of all: This stocking thing sucks. We didn't get anything other than snackie treats. And then Bandit got greedy and got the stocking stuck on his head. Oh well. Another day with his head in hole. Big whoop.

A Christmas Carol from us

We're singing our new special song for you...sorry there's no audio. You'll just have to pretend it's to the tune of "Jingle Bells." Here goes:

Dashing through the yard
On a soft-dirt rainy day.
Through the flowers we go
Snorting all the way.

Bells on Ernie ring
Scaring birds away.
What fun it is
To dig and trail
The varmints every day.

In the yard,
Through the mulch,
Under piles of leaves,
Oh what fun it is to be
A wiener hound indeed!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Maggie&Bandit

Busy holiday weekend!

From Maggie: Wow! It's been a real fun time indoors and outdoors for the last day or 2. As we'd mentioned, Grandma's here, so that's fun....there's always more stuff for us to check out and there always seems to be more food around to drop on the floor. It's never a bad time. And outside, it's been raining, so the ground is nice and soft. The mole traffic has been steady, so there are plenty of trails for us to snort through.

Last night, the staff thought it would be funny to put a Santa cap on Bandit and reindeer horns on me for a picture in front of the Christmas tree. Right. First of all, I'm not sure why I got the horns. Anyway, they ain't staying on my head, and Bandit's just a big ol' wienie for letting them put the hat on him and pull his ears through the little elastic strap. What an idiot.
Anyway, the photo session was probably not what they'd planned. They did try to bribe us with snacky treats, so we ate as many as we could. Whatever. We'll post some of the photos because we know they'd want us to put them up (and we know they suck).

Grandma's here!!

That means lots of things....more treats, more time in the house, more chances to run around the kitchen and pick up scraps. AND, she let us have RIBS!!! Yep, she brought home ribs for dinner with the staff, and we got bones from it. Dad made sure we didn't choke or fight, so that was good. Now we're just plain tired, and headed for the couch.

Max rules!

The Grinch's dog is really one of the unsung heroes of the holiday screen. Max the dog -- obviously a dachshund mix -- is a wonderful foil to the mean green guy in the genius work of art in "How the Grinch Stole Christmas." It remains a holiday classic for its good nature and the brilliant writing and artwork of its creators.
We don't often show our artsy sides, but it's important for us remind all of you about the best piece of Christmas spirit out there.

Hawes buddies return!

Hey check out the comments from our last entry! We've heard from our racing buddies on the USS Hawes. How could they have known Staffer Mom was wearing her Hawes hat this weekend?
It seems that Cricket, Pretzel and Skipper are in line for some amazing goodies from Santa this year. They've become regular foster siblings for doxies who don't have homes. So far, they've hosted three new buddies on their ways to new homes. It's sad to think there are so many doxies without homes or staffs to keep them warm and fed.
So kudos all-around to the Hawes Team, their staff and others for taking good care of others.
Skipper, Cricket and Pretzel: Let us know how you're doing again soon! Merry Christmas!

Busy wiener weekend

There's been a lot going on this weekend. It's been raining and really warm and now it's gotten dark and really cold. We took a run through the neighborhood while Dad was grilling the staff dinner. I'm not sure he was pleased about that.

All in all, it's been a very successful two days. We've dug lots of holes -- one mole trail went from under mom's potted plants near the porch all the way across the yard, under the blooming pentas to the soft spot near the bird bath. We dug out most of it, but moles were already gone. It was easy since we had some rain. Mom wasn't real thrilled that we had to go under the pentas, and Bandit (at right with a snoot-full of dirt) nearly got beaned when the potted coleus fell over. But, it was a good exercise.
We figure if we dig up enough trails, the moles will take the hint and go. Of course, then we'll have to dig up something else!

And a couple notes:
- A shout-out to Uncle Brad. We see your Dolphins finally won a game! Yay!
- As of today, 1241 people have looked at something on Lowdogworld. Wow! Thanks for stopping by!

Our fave commercial

Winter at the beach

We know that most people like to go to the beach in the summer, but we've always been partial to winter. First of all, there are fewer cars, less noise, and it's beautiful. The deck boards and pavement don't burn our paws, either. The sunsets are incredible. We can see them from the back porch on the deck. It's rare that we can see tall things or big things up high, but out there we can see the world. We like that.

Strange weather

We know the staff brought us to the South so we'd stay warm, but every now and then we want it to get just a little cold so we'll appreciate the decent weather here. So right now, we're wondering why it's 80 degrees in December. Mom's plants are still blooming in pots out back, and a poplar tree in the front yard is showing more tulip than leaf.
Ernie has his big winter coat on, so this can't be easy on him. But he sleeps all the time when he's not chasing mice in the culvert, so he's coping.

Car trip!!!!

We’ve been gone for a few days, and we apologize for the silence. We hope we can make up for it with this post.
We decided to try to do what we believe is the first live blog by wiener dogs. Sadly, it couldn’t get posted as quickly as we’d hoped since the wireless signals weren’t working. Oh well. We told the staff we needed better technology. Here's our live blog copied over to a post from our trip.


THURSDAY: Early this morning we saw Dad take the leashes out to the limo….and that meant only one thing: Road trip!
He thought he could get them past us, but no way. Then we heard the hatch on the limo pop, and we knew it was going to be more than a quick trip to Forsyth Park – Grandmas’s house? A visit to Sidda and Seamus? Wait.
Watch for it….watch for it….there goes Dad’s white music block and funny ear things…. a couple bags of junk food….watch for it….. Mom’s packing up 2 bottles of wine and …….watch for it…….a bottle of tequila! WE’RE GOING TO THE BEACH!!!!!

In the car! In the car!
Mom says if we don’t calm down, we can’t do our live blog. She’s willing to type, but we have to focus. We’ve never blogged a road trip before, and we know our regular crew will want to know what happens along the way. Staffer Dad, our driver, says he’ll even roll down the windows for us now and then.

8:20: We’re pulling out now….but Driver Dad says we’ll have to stop for gas and breakfast. We don’t know why. We’ve already eaten and Bandit has plenty of gas.

Drive-through windows are torture for us. It generally means that others get food and rudely eat in front of us. This time was no different. If we could only taste that Egg McMuffin…..
As we’re jolted back to reality, Driver Dad tells Bandit to keep his nose out of the hash brown. (Is that what they call that squished brown thing?)

We’re not even a few miles out of town and Driver Dad’s already cursing the left-lane drivers. We wonder if that old lady even knows she’s keeping us from getting to the beach.

Uh oh.
Bandit’s in trouble. He just started pulling stuff out of Staffer Mom’s purse again to look for gum. She didn’t have any, but he did hit paydirt with a few old Tums. Last time he got in her purse, he punctured her Belk’s charge card right through the magnetic strip and she wasn’t happy about that. We’re going to take a nap for a bit so she’ll chill.

Rest stop!
Mile 318 on I-10: We love rest stops! And this is one of our favorites on the way to the beach. It has great smells and deep grass. Today someone’s been piling up pine straw in little piles all over the dog park. We were able to pee on every pile! Almost missed one, but Bandit hit it as we had to head for the car. You have to set goals, you know.

Seems like there are a lot of cows out there. Must be cool to sit in the field and watch cars all day. It might get boring after a bit, but we bet they see lots of neat stuff.
We saw one truck with some neat art on the back of it that said Mtha Fkr on it. We’re not sure what that stands for. Mom says that good graffiti artists should know how to spell. We don’t think she should edit art.
We’ve also seen a lot of big boxy cars that Mom says are full of “snowbirds.” So why can’t they just fly where they are going? Mom says they are too old. Dad told her to be careful about making remarks about old people.


Have you ever noticed how kudzu vines make big trees look like big monsters hanging over the road? They aren’t monsters, though, because they didn’t run when we barked at them.

OH WOW! Mom says the next stop is to see LASSIE! Maggie’s always liked the Lassie legend, but never really believed one dog could be all that great. In general, we’d like to meet a dog that is recognized by humans to have more sense than most humans. This is exciting!

We just passed a sign that said “Dog Track.” Is that bigger than a Dog Run or Dog Walk?
Mom says we can’t stop there. But we want to!

Mile 216 on I-10: Dead animal update:
Raccoons: 4
Deer: 1
Possum: 3
Chickens: 1
Old truck tires: 9 (We know they aren’t animals, but they make funny shapes on the side of the road, so they are worth counting.)

OH NO.
This is terrible. Mom didn’t say “to see Lassie.” She said Tallahassee. There’s nothing here. This is awful. We really wanted to see Lassie. DAMMIT.

Mile 158 on I-10: We just got behind two double-decker trucks full of real live cows. Mom thought it smelled nasty, but we thought it was pretty wonderful. Driver Dad did roll down the window for us as we passed. We like the window down, but all the nice cow smell went away.


Bridge! We’re across the water and we see a train and a bunch of men in orange vests and trucks and lots of concrete. This was the bridge that fell in the water during the storm, but it looks pretty sturdy to us. The air smells good.

And now we’re in Pensacola and there’s another bridge and lots of birds. And more cars and more birds.
Hey! There are our toll booth friends with the cool shirts with big flowers and the big water tanks with dolphins on them. We’re at the beach. FINALLY.

Final trip tally:
Dead Raccoons: 4
Dead Deer: 1
Dead Possum: 5
Dead Chickens: 1
Old truck tires: 15
Slow people in the left lane worth cursing: 5
People who fell prey to the blue light people: 7
Men in orange vests: 4 small herds.


4 p.m. Central: We’re here; we’re on the deck. It’s dinner time! Where’s the food?

Stupid human news

We think it's time we talk about stupid events humans think are news. First of all, we count on our humans to worry about things that matter in the big world - anything that affects how we get food and how often they'll be home. So when stupid stuff takes their attention from those important things, we think it's bad.
For instance, mom's been on the phone all weekend dealing with some stupid, threatening behavior by a washed-up talk show host. And granted, it's never OK to threaten to blow up anyone, especially a teen-ager who's working really hard. But why do people just go crazy over news like this? Surely there are more important things to wonder about.
Just to make our point, we just checked a news site to look at stories people are reading.
Here's this hour's sampling from the web headlines:
- "Cat rescued after 19 days with jar on his head": It was a peanut butter jar. He got in; he can get out.
- "Ozzy Osbourne's bat coat fetches $3,300" - If Batman needs cash, we wonder what the Batmobile will bring? Will the lagging real estate market affect the Bat Cave's market value?
- "Baking soda could help save planet" - It sure helps save Ernie's litter box.
- "Giant snake is boy's best friend" - Every boy says that.

Our point: None of this matters. Except that the talk-show host threats made our dinner late 2 nights in a row and made mom late to get home. That did matter. Next time they leave the TV remote out on the sofa, we're not watching his show.

How 'bout those Mildcats?

So as our poll closed today, the UK Wildcats had more than a snoot-full of the Tarheels. Another year of dominance for the Heels.
In the poll, we learned that Dook fans anytime, followed by Auburn fans who are out of beer, actually are more obnoxious than UK fans. Wow. That's big. We probably should have considered the option of UK fans after a rich Hot Brown in the bathroom line....but that's another poll. If you've had a real Kentucky Hot Brown, you'll know what we mean. That menu item used to give Dad the fits.

Doofus and dog

Our favorite story in today's paper was about a man who drove his truck into a river after he was attacked by a bug.
And here's the best part: His dog, who was riding with him, got out of the truck and swam back to shore. The man got stuck out in river and had to be rescued. Maybe the man should let the dog drive next time.

New poll: What's more annoying ...?

From Bandit: In the spirit of basketball season and the UNC-UK match-up on Saturday, we have a new poll.
And hey! Did you notice we've had more than 1100 visitors to our page? What were they thinking?

Heels and Buckeyes

From Bandit: Tonight's basketball game is really starting slowly for the Heels. Staffer Dad says the Heels are "cold as a wedge" and I don't want to know what that means. I still don't know what a Buckeye is, and I can't figure out why they've got my fave player Hansbrough "The Animal" befuddled under the basket. He's bigger than everyone and he's fierce. (As careful readers know, Fierce is our highest compliment.) He needs to just chill and take on the triple team. Kick it out!
As for the endless Jimmy V Week early in every basketball season: Ok he was Fierce in the end, but he's gone and it's time to play ball. And he coached for the Wolfpack. (At least it wasn't Duke.) Insult to injury. Move on. Go Heels.

Deer tales

Last night Staffer Dad was taking the trash out and he saw a bunch of deer. Big wow.
We see them all the time. They hang out in the side yard, eat mom's flowers and gossip. We hear them. They talk a lot about the neighbors -- they know everything about everyone in the area. We think it's pretty rude for them to look in windows, munch on rose bushes and push over trash cans, but they seem to enjoy it.
With the drought, they don't have a lot to eat right now, so they need some entertainment. We hope it rains soon; they're getting a little petty.

Another good cat?

While we sometimes joke about getting Ernie locked in George the Neighbor's garage, we do like him. And today we got a picture of another cat we think we'd like: Bisquick. He's the orange tabby in the photo.
He stays at Aunt Allison's house and apparently gets to eat a lot. Reminds us of our old friend Ozzie. He died some time back, and he was Huge. He weighed as much as Bandit. We liked him because we could put our noses under his belly and make it jiggle. He's the black and white cat in the other picture. And No, that's not how he died. (Be nice.) He liked to sleep like that.
Anyway, Bisquick is nowhere close to being as big as the late, great Ozzie. But then again, neither is the Goodyear blimp.

Who's on what?

We just found this and mom thinks it's really funny. We don't know what's wrong with her.

Wags and kudos

Careful readers of our blog will recognize comments by our friend Bebe. She wrote an essay for Newsweek and it's really good. Aunt Allison sent us the the link.

She's worked hard over the years, and we love just about anything that's fierce. So she's made our annual Fierce List! (That's a good thing.)
Congrats Bebe!

Feast or fooey?

So what is this Thanksgiving feast day anyway? The staff was home most of the day, and that was good. When they were in the kitchen, they let us hang around. They scurried around last night making something called "dressing" and today they made "casserole." Staffer Dad kept munching off of it because he said he likes green beans. Whatever. We still got our regular food in our regular bowls.
If they are going to cook a lot, have a lot of food in the house and let us hang around, they should at least drop some on the floor now and then. Overall, it's been pretty disappointing.

Happy Birthday Aunt Allison!

Today we remind everyone to celebrate Aunt Allison's 39th birthday. She's really wiser than her years might tell and that's a good thing. (It's sort of like she grew up in dog years like we did.)
Staffer Mom says the road to 40 really isn't so bad as long as you're not really paying attention to detail and keep good wine in the house.
We're depending on her weird cat Bisquick and Uncle Mike to take good care of her and throw a good party in her honor.
You go, girl!

2 old men and a hound

From Bandit: Ok, we got stuck at the vet all weekend. We got decent food and Maggie eventually got thrown into a cage away from me. So it worked out.
Mom and Dad brought us back pictures of dead animals in a window in downtown Columbus. Wow. One was a spitting beaver and the other was a fox. Both were cool. We never see dead animals in store windows in Savannah, but they probably don't sell a lot of them here. That's more of an Alabama border-town kind of thing.
Mom also brought me a picture of dad and Uncle Brad and Sidda. It's like one of those old photos with old men rocking on a porch with their coon dog. We did notice that Uncle Brad and Aunt Jenn let Sidda and Seamus sit on the couch. We need to get mom and dad to allow that. Any ideas?

A trip without us

From Maggie: We've been at the stupid vet all weekend. Sorry we haven't been blogging, but it's really hard to do when you can't get out of the cage except to pee. We were surrounded by yapping idiot dogs for like 3 days and none of them had sense enough to shut up even at food time. And then we found out the staff dumped us there in order to go see our friends Seamus and Sidda, left. This was not fair.

Basketball's back!!

From Maggie: Oh wow! The staffers came home late again and I missed the first half. Davidson was up when the TV came on and we had to go stand near the couch to check the score (If we're right under it, we're too short to read the score.) The Heels were coming back, but they really needed some intensity on D. But, Dang it!
We got pushed out of the way so they could eat their glorious frozen pizza in front of the TV.
Then, Bandit licked the pizza and then we got sent to the porch. Apparently the Heels won, but it was really close and we missed the finish.
But we couldn't see it. We're stuck out here on the porch, thanks to Bandit.
Crap. (I think I will.)

Staffer Dad misses his fave TV

While we're talking TV and the staffers, let's look at Staffer Dad's TV issue: "24" and St. Louis Cardinals games. The writers' strike just put "24" on hold for a bit. Dad's not real happy about that. He says it was the only thing that kept him from climbing the walls until baseball season returns.
Staffer Mom had to remind him that college basketball is here and the Heels return this week.
From Bandit: In full disclosure: We proudly wear UNC Tarheels collars, because, well, there's not another team. Really. Bring it.

Sport cooking is stupid

With all our recent kerfluffles over food, you'd think we'd understand Staffer Mom's preoccupation with cooking competition shows like "Next Iron Chef" and "Top Chef." We absolutely do not.
While other people apparently watch movies and talk about the plots and characters and symbolism, she tries to figure out which chef is getting psyched out by the judges and which ones are sabotaging the others. She says she learns from watching their creativity. We think it's because she just likes food and chaos.
And, we're pretty sure those shows are why she goes shopping and brings home really sharp knives now instead of sweaters. And we're certain that the gingerbread house competition she watched the other night was the reason she bought a piece of metal that she calls "The Coolest Cookie Sheet Ever!" Apparently cookies will slide right off of it. Whoopee. We'd be more impressed if she'd let one slide off on the floor now and then.
Staffer Dad says for us not to worry until she starts trying to find recipes for Stuffed Wieners or Grilled Purple Toy.

Ernie runs naked -- again

We're laughing tonight because Ernie's in trouble. A few days ago, he got his third new collar in a year. Staffer Mom put his new tags on it and told him to quit losing it. Well, today he came home without it. Now he's running around with no collar and no tags. And, he's in trouble with the staff.
We wonder where he's losing them. George's garage? The hole in the fence? The big culvert under the road? Somewhere around here there's a place with a bunch of reflective collars with bells and tags on them.
Ernie doesn't care, but he will if animal control gets a call and shows up again before the staffers get a chance to buy him yet another collar. Anyone got a phone book?

Food fight!

From Maggie: Tonight Staffer Mom came home late. We went outside to "do our business." When we got back to the porch, she'd put out our dinner. But, she switched our bowls (Staffer Dad never does that) and gave me the one with a non-skid bottom. Bandit got the cold metal one. When he finished, he kept pushing the bowl around the porch to make a lot of noise and bug me. I told him to quit.
I didn't want all my food right away, so I just sat there for a bit next to my stuffed duck. (I can't just wolf it down like he does.)
Anyway, he kept looking at my food. I barked at him and he just kept looking at me. I kept telling him to leave me alone, but he came toward my bowl. Well, I got mad and things happened. Staffer Mom came charging out, but it was too late. There was food all over the floor. It was bad. She took the bowls and the stuffed duck away.
From Bandit: I can't believe she wastes food like that. Gotta go clean the porch floor. Yum!

Time change and Mondays

From Maggie: I'm not sure what has to be done, but I really think that Mondays are a bad deal. And this one has been especially rotten since we've just had something the staffers keep referring to as as "time change."
First of all, my staffers are around all day for 2 days and then every Monday, they leave for a bunch of other days. So for a few days, the staff is only here at night. I'm not sure what I should do about that.
And then this morning, they let us out a whole hour late. That means breakfast was late, too. Then tonight, Staffer Mom showed up about an hour late to let us out. That meant dinner was late, too. Is it going to be like this all winter? I'm not sure how we're going to get used to this. Staffer Mom says we've done it every year, but it doesn't seem likely. I don't like eating late, and I would remember that.

From Bandit: Maggie gets a little impatient. Mom and Dad haven't ever let us go hungry. They aren't going to start now. Hey, what are you eating? Is that a snackie treat? Can I have it?

Play in the park

We had a great day in the park today.
On the first Sunday each month, all Savannah dachshunds are invited to gather at Forsyth Park. What usually happens is our staffers hang out and talk while we all sniff and play. It's the best thing in the world.
Bandit wore his green harness, and Maggie wore her new pink T-shirt that says "Rock'n'Roll Princess" on it. We arrived in the limo.
Our dog friends hadn't seen us since before the races last month. Longfellow (in the picture) was there, along with some other cool dogs. He won the races a few weeks ago, and he's only got 3 legs. He works part-time as a therapy dog, but he's a full-time cool pup. We met 2 puppies who were really tiny -- one was blue and tan and one was a long-hair tan, and we met a wiener bigger than Bandit. We were really tired when we got home, and Staffer Dad took advantage of it to make us take a bath.
Not fair!

Now the world will know

Here's another video. We're ratting out Ernie. We're tired of his getting away with this stuff.

Whoa

We just don't know what to say about this video. Staffer Mom found it for us and used it to try to show us that we could be working a bit harder for our dinner.
To us, it looks like a bunch of upper Midwesterners who don't have enough to do during the long, cold winters up there.
Hey Santa (or anyone else who wants us to help out the reindeer): We have something you can pull.
Yah Hey Dere.

23 years is longer than Bandit is old

From Maggie: Mom and Dad are staying in tonight, and I'm glad. Mom's making dinner, and she says we can play quietly on the porch. They've been gone an awful lot lately, and they should kick back. Earlier, they told us they might go out, because they wanted to have some sort of dinner for something they called "anniversary." Mom says the real date was last week, but they put it off to take us on the fun road trip. Anyway, it all apparently means they've been together for a long time -- more than 3 times longer than I am old.
Twenty-three years is a pretty long time, and we can't even imagine it. Bandit's 13, so wow. (He's such a geezer dog.) I guess it's like our birthdays. Those are special, and we get extra snackie treats for them. Wonder how Mom and Dad celebrate if they don't go out and get snackie treats? Isn't it boring to stay in? Why would they do that? They really should go out.
From Bandit: Maggie's an idiot.

Oh happy day!

It's been raining some and now the ground is squishy soft!
Mom and Dad are home, so we can dig outside! Wooohoooo!

Mom's a klutz

Well, it's been a weird day or so. Staffer Mom came home limping again on Tuesday -- she did something to a toe. Geez. If she had 4 paws, she wouldn't have this problem. And she must need all the help she can get since this appears to happen way too often. Last time she was home for more than a month and had some lame (har) excuse about hitting a tree with her car.
And then on Wednesday, she was home all day because she was sick and wouldn't let us run in the house because she said we wouldn't be quiet. What does she want? We're dogs. We gotta play!
She must have felt pretty bad though, because Staffer Dad ended up bringing her some food. Today she went to work like usual, but she when she came home she couldn't call us because she lost her voice. Now that was really funny.
Gee. If we don't know she's calling, we don't know when to quit digging up her fall flowers, now do we?

Back from a road trip

Staffer Mom and Staffer Dad took us on a really long road trip to see our Grandma. We got to ride in the limo, sleep in grandma's house and walk around the beach. It was pretty good. We got to meet grandma's friend Buck. He is nice and has a dog named Barney.
Last night, we watched a movie about birds attacking people. There was a blonde woman and screaming children in it. Maggie didn't like it very much when the birds attacked, and Bandit didn't like the screaming children. Other than that, it was a pretty good weekend.
Staffer Mom got a little out of sorts when we forgot to tell her we needed to go outside on Friday night. She and Staffer Dad had to get up and clean up a little. We remembered every other time, though. Sometimes we get excited. You know how it goes.

OK, this is weird

From Bandit: Mom's been home all day so far. This is pretty cool. She's letting us stay out on the porch and sleep on the big pillows. Maggie's going to spoil it, though. She's barked at the tree trimmers down the street, me, the bug spray man, a bird outside, me, Something We Heard in the Bushes But Couldn't See, a lizard, and me. Mom's going to park her in the laundry room any minute. I just hope she'll let me stay out. I'm being good. I promise.

Happy Birthday Aunt Jenn!!!

From Maggie: This is Aunt Jenn (and that is not Uncle Brad with her). And, we hear that she's changed her hair color to bright red, and we think that's very cool.
Most importantly, she had a birthday this week, and I want everyone to wish her happy birthday. Even if you don't know her any way but through us, it's OK. You can do that here on this site by leaving a comment to this message, because we know she reads our stuff.
She's 40, right?
From Bandit: NO, she is not 40. Mom's threatening a big party for that one. (Sorry Aunt Jenn. You know Maggie just wants everyone to be older than she is. In dog years, she's ....nevermind. She's staring at me.)

Another wiener convert

We've spent time this week with a really smart 4-year-old named Maya. And, we're pretty sure we've turned her into a dachshund fan. We were absolutely lovable when she was around, letting her rub our ears and tummies endlessly. Then we gave her 2 great stories about dachshunds, "Pretzel" and "Apollo." Finally, we followed up with a nearly life-size stuffed wiener dog. Now she's going to bug her parents for a beautiful dachshund puppy.
Mission accomplished.

More race pictures! Video!

There are hundreds of photos from yesterday's races:
- Savannah Dachshund Club gallery.
- Spotted photo gallery shot by our fun human friends Jennifer and Mary and uploaded via another human friend Andres.
- a video from Andres. Go to the Videos under the drop down menu under the News button. Then click on the Features tab and scroll down. It's a fun video!

Hotdog vs. Wiener dog: No contest

Today's Wiener Dawg races were exclusively for dachshunds. But Staffer Mom says there are things that sometimes happen around here that can only fall in the OIS category -- "Only in Savannah."
She brought us a video she took (after the races were over) of a drunk man in a dirty wiener suit racing a dachshund while smoking a cigarette and carrying a beer. It's here for your viewing pleasure. A version of this may show up on YouTube, because there was another photographer there.
Here's what Staffer Mom saw....and remember, you saw it first on lowdogworld.blogspot.com.
Thanks to Wiener friend Remi Shuman for racing the human.

Wow! Big race day!

From Bandit: Mom and Dad just got home from the big race, and they said it was really great. When mom told us about how many people were there, I decided it was ok to be home.
As much as I like to go ride, it sounded like too many people for me.
On the other paw, Maggie says she would really have liked the attention she'd have gotten.

Here are some pictures -- Staffer Mom's camera had some problems, but she did bring us some shots. Mom says she'll help me post more photo links over the next few days from people she met and some on the pixels.savannahnow.com web site. And she's got a very strange video I've asked her to post later.

The boat picture is of Navy Wieners Skipper, Cricket and Pretzel arriving for the races. Maggie is so jealous: They had a huge staff, their very own photographer and an armed escort. That's so cool! Our mom never carries more than a pocket knife and pickup bags when we're out.
The person picture is the Navy Wieners' Staffer Mom, who takes care of the USS Hawes champs when the sailors are gone for a bit to work at sea. She was really nice and had t-shirts and hats made for the sailors and racing uniforms made for the wieners. Our Mom scored a USS Hawes Wiener Racing Team hat.
The group shot shows the Navy wieners enjoying an after-race beverage -- looks like Pretzel was hogging the brew. I'm so jealous. (Mom says she might let me have some of her Corona in a little while. Sometimes she tells me that, then forgets and drinks it all.)

The picture of 2 dogs in a stroller are Auburn grads -- or at least friends of Auburn grads.
(Go ahead and make your Auburn dog or stroller jokes here -- we already have. Did someone say "War Beagle"?) They were all really friendly, though.

The little chocolate doxie wearing a hula skirt and padded bra placed second in the costume contest. It's really a shame to be humiliated like that and only place second. It had a sibling in the same costume and their parents were wearing matching red UGA shirts.

Three cheers for three legs! (was that tacky?) Today's first-place winner is already a celebrity and champion: Longfellow. He's a 3-legged dog who placed 3rd a few years ago on four legs. We're sorry Mom didn't bring a better picture, because he's tops in our book. If you want to know more, read a good story in the paper about him. He's had a rough go, but we're thrilled to see how he's bounced back so well. He told mom his motivation to win was to get back to his favorite yellow squeaky toy.

And here's a strange thing Mom told me: After the races were over, people went over to the festival and ate big sausage dogs. That sounded a little tacky to me on Wiener Dog Race Day. But, I think if they offered me a bite, I'd probably take it.

Tomorrow's the day!

From Maggie: Wiener Dog Races start early tomorrow. Mom and Dad will leave early to help set up the track. Our friends Andres and Jennifer will be there, too. Andres said he'd make a video with me, but mom says we were too bad on Thursday to get that treat. I know that we'll get there yet. I'm way too cute to ignore, and Bandit's a good-looking guy.
We got to see the official race t-shirts today, and they are really great. If you want one sort of like it, you can buy them at the Savannah Dachshund Club web site. They don't cost much, and the money benefits Dachshund Rescue.

Where's our beer?

It would be wrong to say that we didn't love the Diversions section in today's Savannah Morning News, but we are a bit miffed that we didn't get any beer. It really looks like they are promising us some beer. (As for the brown doxie instead of a black and tan, we'll get over it.)
So, anyway, on to more interesting matters.
Today was fun. We crashed out of our lockup today and spent the entire day in the house. We were only trying to get out and have some fun, but apparently mom and dad are very unhappy with what met them when they got home.
Dad says it smells pretty awful, and mom kept muttering about having to clean up something all day, too. We couldn't really understand all of that, but they aren't happy with us.
Honestly, we tried to keep our "activities" confined to the living room rug so they wouldn't have to clean up more than one room.
And, we really did try to leave some cat food in the bowl, but it was tough because it smelled so good. We think Ernie's not happy with us either.

Wow! Wag time! Navy wieners!

From Bandit: We are really wagging tonight!.....We got a note from Skipper, Cricket and Pretzel, the official Navy wiener dogs! Wow!
You can see it on our previous post. We really think they are fine racers (at right), and we wish them well in the military challenge on Saturday. We're sorry we can't meet them, because Maggie loves a wiener in uniform. Mom's promised to take lots of pictures for us. We promise to post them.
She's also promised us a surprise, so we think she'll come through with something to make up for not taking us to the races. We'll see.
P.S. Mom says there's a big wiener dog on the front of Thursday's Diversions in the Savannah Morning News. You can also see a picture of Skipper, Cricket and Pretzel, in there, too.

What?! We can't go?

We're very excited about race day, but now mom says we can't go on Saturday to the Savannah Wiener Dawg Race. We're baffled. We're Wiener Dogs and it's supposed to be Our Day. It's not Oktoberfest; it's Dachtoberfest!

Mom says we can go down early, check out the race course on Friday and then go home. She says she and dad are going to be working as volunteers for the race and they can't look after us. Hey! We're not that needy! Really.
Mom promises lots of pictures from Saturday, but it really doesn't seem fair. She's going to have to negotiate a bit more on this one. Stay tuned.....

Fall TV is back

From Maggie: So far, we haven't seen any new TV shows that we like. None has a dachshund, and most of the plots drag lower than a pregnant wiener dog. I had high hopes for Bionic Woman, but Bandit's not so sure. He thinks that other bionic woman is better looking.
Good news is that our faves are back -- The Office and My Name is Earl. We're pretty sure that Earl would have a dachshund if he didn't have his brother Randy to take care of. And, in this week's episode of The Office, Pam saw Steve Carrell's character's wiener. After all, it's all about us. Sort of.

Countdown to race time

It's down to 6 days before the big race! It's going to be a big dachshund event, and we can't wait to go. We just know we'll be the stars, and we know we'll meet lots of fun friends. Bandit even hopes he'll get to have some beer at Oktoberfest.

Wiener Wonderwoman wins!

From Bandit: Maggie's new Derby name has been selected: Wiener Wonderwoman. Ankle Biter came in second, and it would've been a good one. She bites me on the neck all the time. She keeps calling me Butt Munch, but I don't bite her in the butt, so I don't understand. Now we've got to find her some skates. Maybe she'll roll into George the Neighbor's garage.

Story from mom's work

From Bandit: So mom comes home and is laughing about some woman who called her at work today. Apparently there was a news story about a guy who had amnesia and couldn't figure out who he was. This woman said she was a psychic and wanted to help him but wasn't sure who to call.
She thought it was funny. I don't think I get it, but she's still laughing.

Outside, inside

From Maggie: Well, we've been on the porch or outside all weekend. Mom came home early Friday, and we got to go outside early to play. We chased some squirrels, visited George the Neighbor and had a lot of fun in the back yard. Bandit went into the bushes, but never could figure out what was in there making a lot of noise. We tried to talk to it, but it wouldn't answer.

I guess Mom thought we were too noisy because she made us sit on the porch for the rest of the afternoon and took Ernie the Cat inside with her. She wouldn't let us in at all. Ernie made faces at us through the window. I'll get him for that later. I know where he likes to hide things, and it'd be too bad if they smelled like dog pee when comes to get them.

Godzilla! No wieners!

It's Ernie the cat: Yep, it's my turn. Wiener dogs are outside, and I'm inside. (Purr.) Mom threw them on the porch because they wouldn't quit yapping. She came home early from work yesterday with a stomach virus. (I figured that out when I jumped on her stomach and she nearly launched me across the room.)
She thought she'd let the dogs have some outside playtime since she was home, but they yapped at George the Neighbor, squirrels, a school bus, Something They Heard in the Bushes But Couldn't See, and the ceiling fan. She made them stay on the porch until dad came home.
I got to stay with her on the sofa, since she was feeling really bad.
She felt better when she realized that there were 5 Godzilla movies free on cable this month and one of them was Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla -- it has a visit from Mothra and the twins as well as a psychic who can communicate with the big spikey guy.
I'm on mom's lap, the wieners are outside and there's a Godzilla movie on.
All is right with the world. (Purr.)

Dog shows and reality

We generally don't post twice in one night, but there's a dog show on TV and we can't avoid making a few observations.
First of all, the hound group's on right now -- that's our group -- and we know that all these people surely don't call these dogs to dinner by those long, pretentious names. At least, we hope not.
Scentesia's Shake Rattle'n'Roll? Tiara Ne-Ku Chariots of Fire? Caramel n'Haywire Mocha Sorbet at SK JH? Renaissance Lord of the Dance AKA Connor? What?
We really don't want to be called by our long names: Catrons Dashing Maggie May or Air Bandit Express. That would be embarrassing. We'd get beaten up by the neighborhood cats if mom shouted those across the back yard.
And another thing: The announcer seems genuinely bothered that it's no longer legal for dogs to hunt antlered game in the U.S. Gee. That's too bad. How would he like to get gored by pissed-off mountain goat?

Everyone wants to be a wiener

Our friends Precious and Snickers the chihuahuas sent us an interesting link today. It's a picture of a big zucchini that's been turned into a yard-art dachshund.
It's true that we just like to say "zucchini" but it's also true that we're a little disturbed that now people are finding ways to turn perfectly edible veggies into yard art. You know, last week, we went on a little rant about mom's yard-art habit, and we're worried that Precious and Snickers are enablers.
And now we've learned about this site: We're afraid Mom will soon be putting a dachshund on her little car.

Is it fall yet?

From Bandit: Wow. All the wildlife is moving around. There are tons of great smells out in the yard today. I've followed one good one all the way across the yard and over to the neighbor's house. I haven't smelled it in a while, and I'd really like to see the animal that brought it. The yard moles are digging again, and I've made a pretty good trench near mom's pink impatiens again. She'll understand, because she doesn't like moles either. (I tried to nose the plants back in the hole, but I think she'll have to do it.)
And Ernie brought us another dead baby snake today, too. He's found a bunch. Don't think mom's too happy about that, but she figures dead baby snakes are better than live adult ones. He's a good hunter.
Is mom frying bacon?

New poll: Maggie's Roller Derby name?

From Bandit: You all must help figure out Maggie's derby name. The poll's on the left of the page under our pictures.
She's convinced she will be able to skate, and she keeps banging into me when I run across the yard for practice. Please help me.

Oh to be a roller dog!

From Maggie: I gave my staffers the night off, and they went to roller derby night to see the Savannah Derby Devils. And they didn't take me, and I'm not real happy about that now that I know where they've been.
For the record, I love roller derby. If I had skates, I'd be really good, too, like my favorite Devil Fear Abby. I don't have elbows, so I wouldn't have a problem with fouls. I'd be able to cut between skaters' legs and really cause a pile-up. I'd be a great jammer, too, squirting in and out of the pack.
I'm getting a devil costume. Once I get a derby name, no one can stop me.
P.S. If I get enough suggestions, maybe I'll make a new poll and you can vote on them.

Glad it's Friday

From Maggie: Finally. The staff is back. They've been gone a lot this week, and I am so tired of waiting for them to come home and feed me. Last night, they went to a banquet thing and didn't get home until waaaay past dinnertime. It's not like we have thumbs and can get into the food barrel and fill our own bowls.
So finally Staffer Mom gets us our food and then Bandit comes over and tries to eat mine. I really just couldn't take any more and yapped at him. He snapped back and we both got in trouble with mom. Bandit's such a pig. It's not like he really needs to eat all that anyway. He could definitely do a smaller look.

Do we put out plastic people?

Mom has this fascination with fake yard critters. She's always had some sort of thing in the backyard: a plastic pig rooting in the garden, a smiling metal sun standing near the tall flowers, a steel-rotor-body cat birdfeeder luring birds to lunch.

At the beach, she always insists on having at least 2 pink plastic flamingos guarding the yard from hurricanes. (They haven't worked very well at all.)

We're a little less amused at her later acquisitions. She now has 3 dachshunds made of scrap metal. She calls them "yard art." We have other names for them and sometimes we pee on them.

And then there's the last thing: a yard wiener with green moss all over it. Mom says it's a "topiary." And most disturbing, it's the same size at Maggie. We've named it Mo for "mom has one mo dachshund." We wish she'd stick to flamingos, but you can vote on what she'll do next in our new poll.

New pen: Day 6

From Bandit: Remember the cool pen they got for us last week? I can dig out of it!
Dad's a little frustrated, and Mom just moved it onto the rock porch. I think I know how to get out of it there, too. Give me another day or so. This is kinda fun.

We went to the big park!

From Maggie: Mom and Dad -- whom I'm now referring to as "my staff" -- took us to Forsyth Park today.
We took the limo, and then on leashes, we toured the fountain.
We got to meet other "wiener people" and we heard them planning the upcoming race day in October.
More importantly, we got to sniff at other dogs, including a big furry one, one with big eyes and no snout at all (how does he breathe?), and another one that had ears that actually stood up!
It was obvious that they were in awe of us.

New poll: Thanks for letting us stay

Whew! Looks like you've saved our bacon.
Everyone voted to let us use the computer, but apparently didn't trust us enough to let us keep the credit cards to order more stuff. And no, we don't order porn any way. Whatever: We still get to blog!
This week's poll: US Open fashion. (We were going to do a poll on how long you think it would take us to get out of the new "playpen." But....we'll post about that later.)
The new question is to your left.

One month! It's coming!

The best day of the year is coming soon. It's the Savannah Wiener Dawg Races -- the one day all year when people must bow to the dachshund world. Yay!

We got a preview of the new web site for it today, and there are pictures of lots of our friends there. You can see pictures from last year, see the rules for the games and order cool shirts and stuff. There's even a picture of dad when he volunteered last year.

If you decide to race your wiener, you can even register online early. That's a big deal, because you won't have to stand in a long line when you could be sniffing new buddies or checking out the cool giveaways. There will be a costume parade, too. We expect each of you to show up ready to race or just looking good.

You've got to come to the races!! It's too much fun!!!
(and for some of you: mom said to say "Yes, there will be beer.")

Holiday surprise

So Labor Day came and went -- we like holidays because mom and dad are home more with us. This year, though, they decided to make sure they wouldn't have to chase us so much. And granted, we did find a way-cool hole in the back fence where we could go visit the neighbor's cat any time we wanted.

Here's how they presented the new thing: "You can be out in the yard more, no matter what we're doing."
That sounded ok, and then we saw it. It unfolded from a plastic block into something that looks more like a 6-sided playpen for urchins.

After a day, this is how we feel:
Bandit: It's not so bad, but I can't dig quite as freely. Wanna rub my ears?
Maggie (right): I hate it. I hate mom. I hate dad. I hate the yard. I hate Ernie for sitting in the yard chair and watching me. I hate you all.

Fuzzy-ball fashion

From Maggie: Ok. It's been raining, so I've had a great chance to take a long look at more US Open fashion. All I can say is this: Venus has a future outside of tennis. Every outfit she's designed has been terrific. Of course, if anyone else wears the design, they'll probably look like a ruffled green vienna sausage. (I could wear them well.)
Serena's the only one who's been able to pull off the Nike black and pink, but I'm convinced the smocky design is because she's put on a bit of weight since her calf injury. (Mom says that happens when you hurt your leg. But mom could be rationalizing.) And, I'm a little testy about Maria's demise. She had some wicked dayside outfits.
As for the guys, they are all wearing the same thing: Nike diagonal-stripe shirts. The only one who can wear them well is Rafa, and mom says he can wear anything. (Why would he wear just anything?)
And hey...did anyone see how Vaidisova demolished that tennis racket the other day? When they asked her if she felt bad about the tantrum and the "redesigned" racket, she said "It deserved it."
She's my new hero.

Mud has its price

Bandit here: Mom says we've had 15 inches of rain. All I know is that the water in the back yard is up to my hips, so I can splash around. I didn't like it at first, but then I remembered how soft the dirt is in the flower bed.
But dad found out I was in the mud. The humiliating video shows the rest.
One day I'm going to eat mom's camera.

Please vote in our poll

We've changed out the poll question for the week (on the page to your left), and it's important for you to vote. Our ability to blog and order stuff online again may hinge on it. Mom says she will live by the results.

As for last week's question "Will dad's beloved Cardinals pull within 2 of the Cubs ever again?": By mid-week, Dad had declared it was obsolete since the Cardinals had pulled back within 2 of the Cubs. But we left it up, and it's a good thing we did. Those Cards never really made it past that, and now the Cubs are up again. Dad was proud that his friends came out to help him declare that the Cubs always fold. (We remind him that these votes have absolutely no meaning.) He says he knows who voted for the Cubs to do well, and he said something about payback being ugly. But we know he won't hurt you. Thanks to all who voted.

Rainy days=Soft dirt

Bandit here: Wow. We've had a lot of rain. And that's good since the drought made the ground hard, and I had trouble pulling out the tree roots I'd been working on. But today, I managed to pull up a few roots. I'd started working on the crape myrtle when it started pouring again. I'll let you know how I do tomorrow. It should be positively muddy!

A shout-out for tie-dye

It's Maggie: I'm amazed at the how black is the new white for this year's US Open tennis competitors. And I know I look really good in black, but I'm not sweating out on a tennis court. In fact, I'm not sweating it out anywhere. Someone else can do that...when they say "working like a dog," they are not referring to me.
Anyway, I think this year's clothing is really overmanaged by Nike. Can we get some tie-dye T-shirts out there? My mom's favorite shirts are tie-dye, and she's always happy when she's wearing them. I'm pretty sure she could kick someone's ass wearing one.
Back to the Open: Let's talk headgear a second: It should be a rule that your hat matches your clothes. Serena has the right idea. Her headband matched the pink in her outfit. She didn't look like a farmer or a soccer mom. I approve.

I'm no fashionista, but...

It's Maggie, and this week I'm going to keep you up on the US Open. I'm not big on watching people sweat, so you can keep up with the scores on your own. What I've seen so far bothers me a great deal.
- U.S. tennis player Ashley Harkleroad: Girl, didn't your mama teach you not to wear stripes going around? Her dog should have sabotaged that outfit before Ashley left the house.
- Is that strange bluish green really going to be this year's "in" color? I've counted at least 5 players wearing that color, men and women. Do all the activewear companies get together and decide what color will make the most people look stupid? Do the execs sit up in the plush box seats and laugh when they get the stars to wear the free clothes? I wouldn't even sniff underwear that color.
- And Andy, oh Andy: This whole black ensemble may make your beer gut look a bit smaller, but Johnny Cash, you ain't. And it's freaking hot outside! What are you thinking? Obviously, you didn't even ask your dog for help. No way would it sanction that -- would he add more fur in summer just to look skinny? I think not.
- To Justin Gimelstob/Gummiburp/Googlesnort/Whatever: I like you, but the yellow diagonals have to go. And the shirt doesn't even match your shorts. Get your dog to pull some new ones out of the laundry hamper for you.
And my final question for the night:
- Why is Maria Sharapova wearing her Christmas party dress on the court? Has she got a poodle as a wardrobe advisor?

That's it for tonight. I've got to go make Bandit get his ass off my pillow.

Fuzzy-ball holidays

From Bandit: We refer to Labor Day -- and the 4th of July -- as fuzzy-ball time. In our experience, fuzzy balls have been things we chase across the yard to humor mom and dad. But, in our house, they are on TV. If we are at the beach, Aunt Jenn (left) usually hits the champagne early and eats strawberries. Mom has a thing about making pancakes and forcing everyone to eat them. Then she makes a pitcher of Bloody Marys; sometimes, she shares. Dad and Uncle Brad just watch the game, roll on the floor and scratch their backs with us. The important thing is that there's always Wimbledon or US Open tennis on the TV. And this Labor Day will be no different. Maggie's planning to blog for the week about the Open, because her friend Sidda will not be able to watch. Sidda's sick, and it's important that Maggie keep her up to date on the action. As for me, fuzzy balls are about as close as I'll get to ever having any again.

Ernie's turn

It's Ernie: The dogs are outside on the porch where they belong. I'm tired of their barky crap. If I could reach the keys, I'd just lock them on the porch all night. Every time George the neighbor goes in or out, they act like they've never seen him before. And he's nice to them, too.

Last night, they stayed in the bedroom for a while, and all Maggie did was growl over her purple toy. Poor Bandit couldn't even get any peace and ended up trying to hide from her. I really don't understand why she gets that way, and I surely don't understand how Bandit puts up with it. When we lived at our old house, she'd chase him across the yard and try to herd him like he's a cow or something. She's really a bitch.

New stuff

We just added a poll to our site. It's in the left rail.
Questions will get better, we promise.

Thundering attack dogs

Mom says we can't go outside when it's thundering and lightning. But it's ok for Dad to keep mowing? ......We're just asking.

Speaking of Dad: Today we bring you a video of us attacking Dad.
It's really a play attack, but from it, we think you can glean how vicious we could be if we were really angry.
Scary, isn't it?

(Thanks to Aunt Jenn for documenting this for us. )

Mom went to the wine store

...and boy, are we glad. She's been out of wine for more than a week, and she grumped about it every night. It's not that she's a lush or anything, but she believes that a glass of wine each night is a good thing. It's healthy, but mostly it's just her way to wind down at night. When we lived at the beach, she found that crossing the big bridge was really important, too. Just going onto the island made her relax. She was a zombie by the time she got in the house.

As hard-working dachshunds, we treasure our routines, too. It's important that we get to come in from the porch around 9 and then go back to the bedroom and get snacky treats from dad. We get three snackies each. Then we play for a bit, or until Maggie gets grumpy. Dad takes us outside for a nightly poop before we go to bed. When we come in, Maggie goes in the laundry room first, and Bandit must have his ears scratched before he'll go. It's a rule.
This is important: We all need a process to end one day and start another. Even doggies like us.

Cool signs!

From Maggie: Uncle Brad told us about a web site where you can make your own signs. We took turns today making signs while mom and dad were gone. It was fun. Guess which one is Bandit's.

Grumpy boy and nothing for us

From Maggie: We spent a day with dad, and he got mad at us because Bandit kept trying to steal my favorite toy. He just kept looking at me. I had to fight back. He was so grumpy that I couldn't even snuggle with him without him barking at me. It's my toy, though.

And another thing: Mom got home and didn't even bring us anything. She brought Dad some pizza from some place he likes, but nothing for us. She stayed with Seamus and Sidda and only brought pictures back of their parents. They do have a cool house in Bibb City. Mom says they even have a toilet in the guest room. I can't figure out why that's a big deal.

I'm really happy to hear Sidda's still figuring our how to get out from Uncle Brad's new fence. She's keeping up the tradition for us all. We did have kind of a breakthrough on Saturday when we found a hole in the backdoor neighbor's fence. Now we can go all the way over to the next street before we get caught. Mom's a bit irritated by that, but again, that's what she gets for not bringing us anything from her trip.

Mom's back

From Bandit: Mom came back late from her road trip, and we were really glad to see her. Dad was gone some, and then he came home and we watched him watch a ballgame. He cursed a lot, and we think his team lost. But he dropped a lot of corn chips, so that was good. Then it was bedtime and we went to the bedroom with him. He was going to let us sleep in the house! Mom usually makes us go to the laundry room. She says we make too much noise.

Well, dad went to sleep and Maggie blew it for both of us. She had her stupid purple toy and every time I'd look at it she'd snap and growl. It's a stupid purple round piece of cloth, and you'd think it was a dead bird or something. Then she'd try to make nice and come over and crawl on my pillow and I'd be forced to bark her back. She just couldn't leave me alone. Finally, dad yelled at us and made us go to the laundry room. Maggie's a bitch. I'm going to go dig up a mole hole.

Road trip for mom

Mom's getting her stuff together. She says she's going on a short road trip, and I think she's going to see our beagle frineds, Seamus and Sidda. She's also not going to take us.
But dad's ready for her to go off. He's setting the DVR for a Cardinals-Cubs game. So, that means we get to roll around on the carpet tomorrow night and eat whatever snacks he drops.
The weekend's looking good.

Birdie snacks

We know we promised a few days ago to tell the story about our friends Molly and Sidney and how birds invaded their house. It was terrible; Aunt Lesley thought she was being attacked. Molly and Sidney were at boarding school during that part, but when they came home their house had been a giant roost for several chimney swifts for several days, and there were carcasses on the floor. It was pretty nasty, and there had been a terrible fight that left blood, bird poo and feathers all over. They talked to their indoor cat friend Jake, who could only reply with a big belch. Jake had eaten all he could, but there were still 2 live birds in the house. Aunt Lesley got help to get the birds out, and it took all day to put things back in order. Didn't sound like fun to us at all. We think the cat should have done more.

They are found

From Maggie: Aunt Jenn and Uncle Brad are home. They got stuck on an airplane for a really long time and then in an airport. I think they couldn't go outside for a long time.
That must've hurt.

Has anyone seen our buddies?

Uncle Brad and Aunt Jenn have been gone, but they should be back by now.
Has anyone seen them? They went to Cambodia where we hear they have dog dishes. We wonder if they brought one back for Seamus and Sidda.

Wait..... Mom says that's not what that means........Yuk.
Nevermind.

A great day to dig!

From Bandit: It's such a good day. I dug up a bunch of old ferns. I rooted in the garden. I discovered a dead bird I buried yesterday and rolled on it. I got so much dirt up my nose I sneezed it on the porch in the shape of a duck. Is it dinnertime yet?

Not funny ha-ha

Cats are funny -- not funny ha-ha, funny bizarre, you know. (Dad's been watching "Sling Blade" again.)

We like our Ernie a lot, but he's still a cat. And he's never done anything like our friend Phil's cat did to him on his birthday last year -- we think it was last year.
While we find it unbelievable that Philip Wartena is actually 30, we're positively stunned by Ashes' antics. Click here to hear Phil's description. And please look at the rest of his blog, too. He's a fantastic photographer who doesn't deserve to be treated this way (well, most of the time...ok, some of the time).
This move was typical cat ingratitude; after all, Phil did take her in after our friend Mel rescued the kitty from a fire.

We don't want you to think that we don't like all cats, we are just realistic about their betrayal tendencies. These are our friends Robin and Georgie in a wonderful photo by Phil on his flickr site. One time they came to see us and brought a cat and that was fun. They can come back to visit any time. (Robin's a wonderful photographer, too. Check out her beautiful work here.)

Woohoo! It's coming!

Every year something wonderful happens. Hundreds of us lowdogs gather for a magnificent time where all the world is focused only on us. (Granted, it should be that way all the time, but we all know it's not.)

We're talking about the annual Savannah Wiener Dawg Races. It's the greatest event in the world, and those silly Olympics things every few years pale in comparison. This year's event will be Oct. 6 on Savannah's River Street. Hundreds of us played together last year, and there will be more this year. Here's a link to a slideshow from the Savannah Morning News coverage in 2006. (When you open the page, click again on the slideshow link.) The pictures will give you some idea of the scene where all dachshunds are winners.

The event benefits Dachshund Rescue and helps other wonderful dog groups, too. If you love dogs like us, you can volunteer to help out at the races. Or if you've got a wiener dog, bring him or her to watch or race. There will be plenty of fun activities for humans and pups. We'll post more details before the races.
We can't wait!!!!

It's Friday night

I can tell mom and dad are glad to be home tonight, and we're glad they are home. They usually are tired on Fridays, and they just sit around, eat frozen pizza and watch Law+Order reruns like zombies. We try to play with them, but they don't want to play chase or roll in the floor.
So it's a good thing we like L+O, too, because mom will watch several in a row while she's checking mail, reading our blog, folding laundry and stuff like that.
We like the ones with Jerry Orbach because he always has something funny to say after something bad happens. Dad calls those lines "Lennyisms." Mom says he's not in any of the new ones. We'll have to be happy with Jesse L. Green. We like him, too. So tonight we'll be quiet, let mom watch TV and let dad watch the Cardinals game on his computer. But tomorrow........

Can we go ride?

We had some time today to check some email. We found a note from our old friend, Amanda Anthony, that made us really happy. It had a story on a car shaped like a wiener. Wow....granted, it looked like it was in trouble, but wow. We like its style, and we thank Amanda for sending it to us. We think all cars ought to be more for us.

Tomorrow, we'll tell you about our friends Molly and Sidney, whose house was invaded by birds.

At least he didn't call it a Wiener Roller

We've just seen something very scary and we felt we should share it.
Our favorite blogger who's not Uncle Brad or Aunt Allison is named Jeff Houck. He's a food freak in Tampa who scares us (in a good way).
His blog, Side Salad, is full of fun stuff that only a sick, crazy person like Jeff can find. But he went too far recently when he started a series about his new toy, a hot dog roller. Bandit has a hard time looking at this entry.
His site is searchable if you must read all about his experiments with the hot dog roller -- Twinkies, Oreos. The horror!

Friends!

We got good news today! We heard of 2 dogs (sorta) like us who are getting their own web page. We think that's great, and we cheer them. As soon as they get going, we'll bring you their link. Precious and Snickers are chihuahuas who have moved in with people we really like. Mike and Rebecca are good wiener-dog lovers who've decided to keep Precious and Snickers since they were in a home with a Labrador and a baby. Now, we're not saying that Labs and babies are bad things, but we believe they are overprioritized in most households.
And that's our low point of view.

They ARE Dog Days, aren't they?

All day, we've been wondering why they call these the Dog Days if they aren't for us.
We heard that people continue to work when it's so hot outside and they are supposed to be honoring us. We think they should come home and feed us treats. We really don't understand why it's not a real holiday.

On another note: We've been reading Uncle Brad's blog, and we don't understand why he'd want to eat a big spider. We know he's out there with Uncle Eric, and we blame him.
And that's our low point of view.

A good weekend

It's Bandit: Look, I can't believe Maggie wrote all that stuff. It's been a nice weekend -- she is right, it's hot. But the bath felt really, really good. See, dad always rubs our ears when we get a bath and it feels nice. I don't really notice the soap and water since he's so sweet to us. Maggie thinks she should be at some doggy spa, I guess, but I've been to one and they aren't as good to us as dad is.

Today's been fine, too. I dug up a bunch of stuff after I got mom's weed fabric pulled out from under the mulch. Took me a while, but I got it pulled way out into the yard so I could dig better. I know mom won't mind too much. She did say a couple things when she saw it, but it was like last week when she saw the great trench I dug when I was trying to follow the big mole that was burrowing under her bed of pink impatiens. I worked very hard, and I think she was impressed by the size of the hole.