Dodger's Page


(After playing in the BBQ ashes.)
This is Dodger. She's a black lab I adopted from the Washington County animal shelter on July 3rd, 1997. She's named after a character from Babylon 5 (of course). The vet thought that she was about about six months old when I got her, so I was lucky enough to experience the joys of chewing and housebreaking. What fun!


Spoiled, just because she gets toys like this? Nonsense!

You're the th person to pat Dodger since August 16, 1998. (Unless you're also a dog, and on the Internet who would know?) Turns out, one did: Meet Dodger's virtual friend, Sweetie.

Here's a picture of PFC Elizabeth "Dodger" Durmand (from Babylon 5, played by Marie Marshall), an Earth Force Marine with a talent for getting into trouble, just like her namesake.

On 7 July 1997, Dodger weighed 53.5 pounds. On July 23, she was 23 inches tall at the shoulder and weighed 56 pounds. On August 15 she weighed 61 pounds. As of October 11 she tipped the scales (and my back) at 69 pounds. Some "puppy!" (Last time I weighed her, she was a bit over 70 pounds, but she should be full-grown by now, shouldn't she???)


Dodger does battle with her natural enemy, the Rain Bird® sprinkler!

"Cousin" Duke Comes to Visit

I'm looking after my great-step-grandmother's 14-year-old Sheltie for an indeterminate period. He's a really nice little fella, though he's almost totally deaf, and moves pretty slowly due to what's probably a touch of arthritis. I built a "wheelchair ramp" so it's easier for him to get on and off the deck... took him a few days to figure it out, but now he knows that he can walk up it as well as down!


Dodger isn't so sure about this... . When is he going to go home?
Duke checks out the back yard in the snow.

Dodger is still somewhat jealous, and tries to crowd in if I pet Duke, but she has already taught him some of the house rules. For instance: "If you go outside, the human is required to give you a treat."

Dodger has a slide show of a recent neighborhood reconnaissance.

Note: There are 11 fairly large images. Could take awhile to download... .

Here are some more pix:


Dodger with an apple that she captured herself. (Does wonders for dog breath!)


I came home from work one day to find that Dodger had eaten the couch... .


Dodger decided that she liked the futon better like this... .


Dodger "helps" me try to make a steel-pan drum. (That's a ball-peen hammer she's holding.)


Dodger hoping for a ride in one of two nonfunctional trucks...

The Damage to Date

(As of )
  • telephone handset cord (twice)
  • aluminum cans (about 8)
  • plastic forced-air heat deflector
  • newspapers (two)
  • toilet paper roll
  • paperback books (six)
  • extension cord
  • hatrack
  • hats (two)
  • roll of quarters
  • bathroom wastebasket
  • package of "craft sticks"
  • miniblinds (two)
  • butane BBQ lighter
  • wooden instrument box
  • hardcover books (four)
  • aquarium power cord
  • video tapes (six)
  • electric pencil sharpener
  • pulley to the family room drapery cord
  • speaker wire
  • vehicle service manual
  • welcome mat
  • carpet padding
  • battery-operated alarm clock
  • LPs (eight) -- yes, vinyl, archaic as that may seem
  • A/V input cable for the computer (good thing it wasn't one of the CAT-5 cables!)
  • $28 dog bed (within 12 hours of purchase)
  • audio tapes (five)
  • flashlight
  • night light
  • sliding screen door (bent to Hell when she ran into it at about 100 mph)
  • Cerwin Vega badges from the bedroom speakers
  • wind-up alarm clock
  • family room drapery cord
  • metal replacement pulley to the family room drapery cord
  • pully to the living room drapery cord
  • disembowled her "baby"
  • living room drapes
  • disembowled "baby" #2, although she still carries its pelt around
  • couch cushion (one half)
  • futon/couch
  • lead weight from the front-room curtains
  • tore a 12-foot strip out of the middle of the living room carpet
  • severely damaged the traverse rod by pulling on the living room drapes
  • mortally wounded the traverse rod by pulling on the family room drapes
  • tore the sliding screen door to shreds while tied up on the deck
  • shredded the moulding on the corner of the house while tied up on the deck
  • trashed a styrofoam hose bib insulator while on her trolley run in the back yard
  • dug and chewed her way through rotten boards in the fence to greet me at the front door
  • apparently ate an 8-mm bolt while I was working on the Hyundai. (At least I couldn't find it. Hopefully it will all come out right in the end.)
Dodger has also nibbled on the arm of the couch that she's theoretically not allowed to be on, carried the alarm clocks out of the bedroom and into the living room, and managed to get a heat-register vent out of the dining room floor and onto the waterbed. (I suspect she was lying on the floor and got her tags caught in the last.) She's also pulled the tape-motion control knobs off of both VCRs, but luckily didn't have time to chew them up.


Dodger's medley of destruction...

After I came home to find who knows how many thousands of dollars of damage to the carpet, I reluctantly borrowed a kennel box. Dodger now spends my working hours in "jail." Her dislike of the box grew progressively greater for the first week, then, on the second week she decided she liked it, and now sprints for the kennel when I tell her to "go to jail." Weird. (I can only think that in her mind it's become her den.) My hope is that she'll get in the habit of sleeping while I'm at work, and eventually the box can be dispensed with.
Postscript: I started leaving the "jail" door open in August of '98 with no destructive consequences, and eventually returned it in September or so. Dodger is a Good Girl!

On the Bright Side

It took Dodger only six weeks to learn her name, that she's a "good girl" when she pees in the yard and a "bad girl" when she pees on the carpet, to despise the vacuum cleaner, that she's going for a ride in the truck when her leash comes out without her slip collar, and that she's going for a walk when the slip collar comes out.

She's found that the Rain Bird sprinklers make amusing toys, and I swear that she's learned to tell time. (She'll haul the mechanical alarm clock off of the headboard of my bed and take it to her spot, and I think that if I'm not home on time she goes looking for something to chew up!)

She's also demonstrated that she can behave herself at an open-air restaurant, and shows some promise as a "babe magnet."

At the moment, Dodger's main hobbies are "talking" while I'm on the phone and not paying attention to her, and retrieving stovewood and other items from the back yard and proudly presenting them to me. ("Good dog, but we don't need any more firewood!") In the fall of '97 Dodger and I went on a hike with a couple of my old College Buds. As you can see, it was hard to keep her attention. (Being in a, shall we say "vulnerable" condition, she'd run ahead of us on the trail 100 feet, pee, and repeat. I wasn't able to convince her that she wasn't going to find a boyfriend on South Fork Mountain... .)


Boyfriends won't be a problem in the future: Dodger went to the doctor in November... . "Wait a minute! I thought you said I was gonna get paid!"

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