Ranger dog and Ashlyn the bully

Poor Ranger dog. On Sunday he started limping. He would not put any weight on his right back leg. After he howled at Ashlyn when she crawled over him, we decided that he definitely needed to go to the vet on Monday. There we discover that he has torn the doggie equivalent of his ACL. So, he is having surgery this Monday. I'm feeling really bad for him, but I also can't help but think that he has terrible timing.

First of all, in July '05, he tore the ACL in his left back leg. I let the limping go for a couple of weeks before we took him to the vet in August. Now think back to August '05. Yep, that was when Allen deployed. As a matter of fact, Ranger had surgery TWO days after Allen left. So, I was left with a pitiful dog that had to be leash walked, an 8 week old baby, and I hadn't yet recovered from giving birth. Obviously, that worked out fine, in part because my parents showed up the next week, and my dad took over leash walking duties. He's holding up that back leg. It's kind of hard to tell in the picture.

Now, he is having surgery on Monday. Starting Tuesday, as in the day that he will come home, we will have movers for the rest of the week. On Thursday, we will be in a hotel, and, of course, just about a week and a half after his surgery, we are all flying out of here. Another thing about this surgery, it is NOT CHEAP. But, of course, he is part of our family, and we will take care of him. This just adds to our list of ONE MILLION things to do before we leave. So, I sit here blogging. As usual, Ashlyn shows Armand the love.

As to Ashlyn, she is now tall enough to reach the cat's food. And, apparently, she thinks it is quite tasty. She started out just eating a piece or two. Yesterday, she grabbed a handful and shoved it in her mouth. Yum.

Allen has been worried that Ashlyn is timid around other kids. He is not worried any more, since it seems Ashlyn can be quite a bully as well. Of course, he didn't see her Saturday, when she was yelling at Paige to "Clean up! NOOOO! CLEAN UP!" Then, Bo and Becca came over for lunch and play time. Part of this was my fault that lunch was a little slow. But, Ashlyn was just a big bully to these two younger kids. She would take toys away from them and then throw them on the floor. She had Becca in tears, and I've never heard Becca cry loudly before. Apparently, my mean child will do that to her. Bo didn't seem to care one bit that Ashlyn was taking toys away from him. Oh, and Ashlyn would hold out toys to Becca, as if she was going to share. She would then pull them away and throw them on the floor. As soon as they had food in their mouths, things settled down a bit. But, those first 45 minutes or so. Very not fun.

Ashlyn is apparently going to follow in her mother's footsteps, as she is already reading up on Educational Research. She seriously "read" this book for ten minutes on her own, and cried when I didn't want to read it to her. So, I read to her about the oh, so interesting stories about types of quantitative and qualitative research.

Ashlyn, with her beer glass. I swear there was just water in it!