Whippet Snippets

Bailey and Deva

For the best whippet photos - and for textbook examples of whippet pretzels/dogpiles/snuggles - head over to Bailey Whippet's wonderful blog. He and his little sister Deva illustrate, via beautiful photos, what life with two whippets (and a tolerant third dog The Pod) can be like.

Girl thinks Ribsy could seriously use a lesson on how to loosen up and fully embrace his pesky sister Mirabel. Right now, Mirabel is downstairs by the fireplace while surly Magoo is upstairs stinking up the bed. If anything, a pesky sister makes for a great blanket. Right, Bailey?

Whippets: the 61st most popular dog in America

The American Kennel Club's annual popular dog rankings are in, and Ribsy is not surprised by the results. Once again, for the 19th consecutive year, the Labrador Retriever comes in at number one, according to the 2009 registration statistics. 

The whippet inches up two spots to 61st, just ahead of the Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier. The Portuguese Water Dog, which trailed the whippet in 2008, has leaped ahead to the 60th spot, no doubt thanks in part to a certain famous family's choice. But let's continue to keep the whippet a well-guarded secret. We rather prefer it that way.

Frankly, Girl wouldn't choose any of the top 10 dogs. None appeal to her. Here's her own personal top ten:

1. Whippet (obviously)

2. Vizsla

3. German Shorthaired Pointer

4. Greyhound (this is handsome Harley from Expressive Papers)

5. Italian Greyhound 

6. Saluki

7. Scottish Deerhound

8. German Pinscher

9. Bluetick Coonhound

10. Chinese Crested (really!)

What are your favorite breeds?

Wordless Whippet Flashback Wednesday

Ribsy's the one with the big bum on the right.

The Bachelor: On the Wing of Fire

Guest blogger Girl writes:

Jakes loves to camp. Jake loves the outdoors. Jake loves not dressing up. Jack loves tacky themed motels. Is this the same pilot that 25 beautiful bachelorettes signed up to woo?

Welcome to week 4, where 9 lucky ladies remain. Just as the contenders are on the decrease, so too are the aviation puns. This episode clearly had a lack of them. Boo.

Instead of taking off in a private jet, the girls find out that they're heading off in a pair of RVs up the California coast. For some inexplicable reason, this elicits screams and jumps up and down.

Jake blazes down the highway on his motorcycle, and arrives first at a vineyard where he sets up camp - literally. He's an outdoors kind of guy, he explains, as he looks lovingly at his tent.

The ladies arrive and set up camp down the hill. Still no aviation references. Even the note card is a disappointment. All it says is, "Let's go over the moon and be under the stars" and that one-on-one date is given to Gia.

Jake wants to see how NYC Gia handles the big outdoors: playing hide-and-seek among the vineyard trees, dining on wine and cheese, and cuddling under a big warm blanket by a pre-made campfire. Surprise! Despite wearing stiletto heels, she passes with flying colors and that just knocks Jake's wool socks off. (To his credit, casually dressed Jake was wearing a nice pair of black 7 for All Mankind jeans.)

"I've absolutely had an absolute blast," Jake blubbers as he hands Gia a rose.

And before we head to commercial break, we see Jake toss a rose into a fire for the umpteenth time.

Next up is the group date at Pismo Beach with Ashleigh, Corrie, Jessie, Tenley, Ali, and Vienna. Jake greets them wearing his Ray-Ban aviator sunglasses and his Levi's, and tells them they're going to go dune buggying. There are three buggies in total, and Jake will be driving one of them.

And here is the SOLE aviation pun of the episode. 

"I wanted to be his co-pilot," Vienna whines as Ali sinks her claws into the shotgun seat beside Jake.

But she quickly recovers. "Go ahead, I"m going to marry him so you go have your 30 minutes in a dune buggy with him."

Sand dune surfing follows, and Jake confesses about Tenley, "I just find myself drawn to her." We then see Jake knocking her over and pulling her down the sand dune.

They get cleaned up for dinner at the Madonna Inn. Well, the ladies get glammed up; Jake literally just cleans up. He is still dressed in his cotton casuals as the six come strutting out in their cocktail dresses and heels. 

I'm sure the Madonna Inn is really pricey, but did anybody else think it was the tackiest, most outdated motel ever?

Jake spends one-on-one time with each bachelorette in one of the themed suites. Shockingly, the Cloud Nine room is not used - I was sure that Ali was still there. 

Ali? Ali, are you there?

I am truly disappointed. There are 110 themes in all at this Inn, and not one is of an aviation theme. Yet there is a Tack Room, a Barrel of Fun, and a Rock Bottom. Tenley manages to impress amid all the visual chaos, and wins a rose.

Moving on to the next date. It's a two-on-one dinner date with Kathryn and Ella, which means one of them will be sent home that night. Jake arrives to pick them up, and Ali remarks, "He looks so sexy in his lumberjack get-up." Was that before or after she noticed the big elbow patches on his brown plaid shirt?

Both ladies lack the fuel for the long haul with Jake, and are sent home. The others are shocked and - get this - are seemingly distraught. Why? Shouldn't they be happy that their odds of staying are that much better?

And if you thought they recycled or composted the roses, heck no. Jake dramatically tosses the unclaimed rose from the two-on-one date into a waiting fire. Yes! The moment we had been waiting for finally makes sense at last. But where did that fire come from?

Rose ceremony. All the remaining girls are burning bad for Vienna to go home. Did Jake send her home? Of course not. Instead he hopes that Jessie and Ashleigh enjoyed their flight on Rose Air, because it is now over for them.

Mira on the mend

Mirabel shows off her new custom made fleece jammies from Dog-E-Designs. The brown leaf print pays homage to the woods she so dearly loves to romp in, and that she hopes to return to very, very soon. 

The jammes fit like a glove, practically hermetically sealing in her warmth, and she promptly proceeded to fall asleep on the couch. 

Ribsy - you remember him, right? - can't wait until all this pajama drama with Mirabel is over so that this blog can go back to more important things, like him.

2010, can you spare some change?

This time last year there was tons of snow and a rambunctious, healthy, speedy Mirabel to take advantage of it all. Now there's no sight of the white stuff, with mud and dirt and brown patches everywhere. And Mirabel, while she is recovering from her injury, has to be carried up and down the stairs and is limited to short walks on leash.

What a difference a year makes.

Whippet pajama drama

Ribsy would like to say that he would like to have an injury just like his pesky sister Mirabel's. The way Girl is spending all her time looking after her, staring at her, placing her hand on her side during the night so she doesn't pick at her stitches. It's enough attention to make a surly older whippet spin with jealousy...although he doesn't envy her when she has to wear a ridiculous cone from time to time, like when Girl needs to take a shower and that sort of stuff:

The cone is necessary because Mirabel can't resist licking and picking at her injury site. But the cone doesn't fit in the crate - which is where Girl needs to leave Mirabel if she is to enjoy any sort of freedom over the next few days - and it makes for (an even more) manic Mira, who tosses her head from side to side and bashes into walls in an effort to rid herself of the plastic impediment.

The vet recommended pajamas. Sounds easy, right? Try to find a whippet pajama maker within Canada that ships quickly. Most pajamas are understandably made to order. Here's a quick rundown of the pajamadrama that's gone on for the past couple of days:

Vendor #1 - Pajamas in stock! However, the vendor is in the US and the overnight shipping fee is horrendous. Place an order anyway and hoped for the best.

Vendor #2 - Also in the US and made to order. No luck.

Vendor #3 - In Canada but is unavailable to sew right now.

Vendor #4 - In Canada but the style of the jammie still allows Mirabel to get at her injury.

With these vendors exhausted a local breeder, Jetstream Whippets (love the name) offered to kindly lend a pair of their jammies. Their whippet Talon was the same size as big Mira, so it seemed perfect - and they did fit great. However, the style of the jammies has only one opening - you guessed it - right where the hind leg meets the stomach, so these unfortunately didn't work.

Then came the out-of-the-box creativity. A message through a whippet list and a tweet asking for help yielded a host of helpful suggestions - from using a pillow case to a girl's dress to a men's t-shirt. Girl did try fashioning one of Boy's t-shirts on Mirabel, but she promptly jumped straight out of it when she spied a squirrel outside the window.

Finally, a solution was reached today.

One of Ribsy's Twitter friends, @bentleythegrey mentioned Dog-E-Designs, who are based a couple of hours away from the Hammer. Their pajama style covers Mirabel's wound, and they have a whippet pattern they can work with. Custom-made pajamas will be ready for pick-up soon.

 
Until those are ready, Mirabel still needed something temporary to tide her over. So Girl headed down to the department store and picked up a Little Tykes jumper in an 18-24 month size. Ironically it says "Turtle" and has a big picture of one emblazoned on the chest. With a couple of snips the jumper was able to accommodate Mirabel's chest:

 

Snap buttons run along the bottom up the bathroom area, allowing her tail some swishing room. Let's hope that Mirabel doesn't go all Hulk and pop the buttons right off.

Update: That little Houndini managed to rear up and get the back legs low enough that she could step on them and pull herself completely out of the PJs. Sigh.

Lesson learned: get a pair of pajamas for your whippet now, in advance, before injury should strike. That way, you have them on hand in case anything should ever happen: the furnace busts, your whippet gets hurt, it gets a rash etc. You just never know.

Whippets welcome on Yorkshire Airlines

Flat caps, whippets, and working-class attitudes are more than welcome on this airline for northerners:

Awful picture of an awful sight

Mirabel is back home from surgery. It's going to be a rather slow, painful road to recovery.

Over the next while, Girl will try to limit Mira's movement - back into the crate she goes. And no going up and down the stairs, on and off the couch, on and off the bed. She also needs to get Mirabel some pajamas pronto. Unfortunately the exposed end of the BodyShirt allows an opportunity, however small it may be, for Mirabel to get at her wound. Plus, Girl has to watch and make sure that Ribsy doesn't get curious and start licking at it too. All this, and antibiotics and painkillers twice a day. 

Poor Mirabel.

Here's a purposely grainy photo to show the extent of her injury. A clear shot is way too much for Girl - and probably for you - to bear.

Girl and Ribsy can't wait until Mirabel is back to her usual spunky self.

Wounded Whippet Wednesday

So technically it's not Wednesday yet, but the "wounded" part of the post title will continue well into tomorrow.

Pesky Mirabel got gashed at the park tonight. Ribsy may or may not have been at fault. It happened really quickly. One moment they and a couple of other dogs were chasing after the frisbee, and the next moment a pained cry filled the air. At first, Girl thought Mirabel had just tweaked her leg, but then she lifted off her coat to reveal a rather substantial tear along the inside of her leg, with a flap of skin hanging off.

Ewww.

Off to the vet they went, and now she's scheduled to go in for surgery first thing tomorrow morning. So she was sent home wearing the dreaded cone of shame.

Here's a look at her, all bandaged up. 

She was definitely not enjoying the confines of the cone.

"Help!" she begged. "Can anyone hear me in here?"

Mirabel tripped on the stairs, banged into the door, and generally was unable to maneuver around or settle down peacefully. So off came the cone and on came the wonderful, amazing, therapeutic BodyShirt from DogGoneChic.

 

"Ah much better," thought Mirabel.

Thank dog for this shirt. Every whippet owner seriously needs to get one! It's come in handy time and time again for its warmth, coverage and comfort.

Mirabel's now resting on her side in bed, still in pain but at least in a much more comfortable position.