Plus One

This weekend, thanks to some creative scheduling (or rescheduling) of workouts, Chief of Stuff and I made a round-trip-plus-some journey to Kansas City to pick up the newest member of the clan, Newton Clarence.

The trip itself was uneventful: eight-some hours to KC, a quick stop off at the house of the Missouri Vizsla rescue coordinator's house (who, in a bit of Vizsla trivia, turned out to be the daughter of the first Vizsla owner/breeder in the U.S., Frank Tallman), and then a few hours northeast to Iowa City. We finished the trip on Sunday, stopping in Madison only to pick up our bikes, and then continuing on to Iron Mountain so Newt could meet his new fur-brother, Leonard, and fur-cousin, Nolan.

Thankfully, the two have hit it off, and Newt is adjusting well. He's such a sweet little guy, and looooves to play fetch (which his new grandpa is completely impressed by, given Leonard's complete and total ineptitude for the game). So far, we've discovered that, while Newt's a pro at fetch, he doesn't understand keep-away -- Leonard's game of choice -- one iota. Perhaps they'll come to an understanding eventually...

Today, my mom and her friend took Leonard and Newt for a five-mile walk around Lake Antione and reported that Newt did splendidly.

Meanwhile, I fought my way through serious chop for two miles, and followed that by a miserable 10-mile run. I didn't pay close enough attention to my nutrition during the day, I think, and a breakfast of scrambled eggs, three tiny pieces of minimalist pizza, and a mojo bar does not a three-hour workout make. Needless to say I got it done, but it wasn't pretty.

I dropped off my bike this morning at the local shop and it was all rarin' and ready to go by tonight, so I have one more semi-tough workout to make up tomorrow, and then it's on the home stretch to Ironman, complete with a week's vacation with nothing much at all planned other than some working out and relaxing (and maybe some poolside evening-out of the weird tan lines I've developed this summer) in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

After that, the hardest thing that remains is figuring out what to do with the two (or three, if Nolan comes) dogs during Ironman day...

Here are some pics from Newt and Leonard's first day together (#1: Leonard and Newt, #2:distinguished Newt, #3: perplexed Newt, #4: my mom and Newt...and if somebody -- anybody -- can tell me an easy way to format pics on blogger, I'll be forever indebted. Dear god, I've just spent half and hour trying to just get them all to line up in a row, and don't even get me started on how I tried in vain to get captions next to each.)

Posted by Erin 6:49 PM

10 Comments:

  1. Melanie said...
    Welcome, Newt! Can't wait to meet you on S9!
    Unknown said...
    Newt, maybe you and Bella can be bf/gf. Didn't seem to work for Leonard.

    It's definite, I only want a vizsla.
    ShesAlwaysWrite said...
    Gorgeous babies!! I've spent many an hour myself on the road for rescue dogs - totally worth it!
    Iron Krista, "The Dog Mom" said...
    I LOVE LOVE LOVE them!!! Have they started snuggling yet? My vizsla & weim snuggle with each other all the time. It's the cuttest thing in the world.

    Thanks for sharing the pics!

    BTW - do you run with them?
    bigmike600 said...
    Gorgeous dogs. Look forward to seeing you race IMWI.
    teekayes1 said...
    Newt looks like he fits right in, outstanding! I've got a huge heart for animals...dogs in particular and love the fact that Newt was rescued.

    Way to also power through the workout. I think in retrospect, it feels the best getting through them on days like that.

    As far as pictures and captions go, I'm with yah. This is pretty new to me. I couldn't figure out for the life of me how to do captions. All I could find was to make really small font and type them underneath each picture. Seemed to work okay for me. Sorry, that's pretty worthless info.
    Unknown said...
    Very pretty pups.
    Anonymous said...
    I miss you!!! Come back to Madison!

    -Carla
    Anonymous said...
    Congrats on the newest member to the family. I can't wait to meet him. If you need help dog sitting on the big race day, let me know. I can try to help out as much as I can!
    Lynn
    xt4 said...
    That's awesome. Newt should come over and play with Jack sometime. They'd be two peas, baby.

    Oh, and Erin - race numbers are up!

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