Catching Up

• Rodents: For about 2 weeks, there, the dogs were ridding the world of either giant mice or young roof rats at the rate of one every day or two. There were 6 or 7 that we know about, little damp ex-rodent corpses left in some funny spot in the yard (or, once, in some funny spot in the middle of my carpet). A couple of times, only parts of a damp ex-rodent, which I don't really want to think about. And then there was the evening that Jake had something unidentifiable in his mouth that he was carrying around obsessively and wouldn't let me pry from his jaws despite a suspiciously long thin sort of tail-looking thing hanging from between his lips. But it was dark under the table where I had crawled in an attempt to get it from him, and I couldn't tell, so I gave up. Then he crunched it and swallowed it. Erg. Try not to think about it. Better rodent-hunting dogs than live rodents anywhere in my boudoir (or elsewhere), I suppose. I don't know where they were finding them all!
• Jake has been yelping on more and more occasions. Can't figure it out. Something to do with his legs? Or not? Once when I was merely petting him, lying in bed. Couple of times when he sat. Sometimes on my lap when I try to adjust him slightly. Sometimes scratching. Arthritis? Something else? Should I take him to the chiropractor, as all my agility pals are recommending?
• Tika jumping lessons: We've taken a couple more of Susan Salo's private jumping lessons, which I can't afford. But she (Tika, I mean) seems to be getting the idea of handling different stride lengths in a consistent style, and of using her left lead as well as her right lead. I'd really like to solve the knocking-bars problem. Which, I suppose, if you figure it at $12 a run, and if she blows 4 runs in a weekend because of a knocked bar, I've almost paid for a Salo lesson--