Since I’ll most likely be competing in a USPA meet next where I’ll have to walk the weight out I thought it would make sense to start practicing sooner than later. Tyler Weaver will be competing in the USPA meet at the Europa here in Orlando in May, so he needs to start practicing as well. I always used a staggered step to walk the weight out raw, but am going to give both ways a try to see which is more comfortable.
Squats w/Buffalo Bar-
145x5
235x3
325x2
w/Metal single ply suit, straps down-
415x2
w/knee wraps-
415+40 lbs of chains x2
415+80 lbs of chains x2
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNAlcbz-wEs]
My weight is still down quite a bit right now, but the suit was still tight and worked well. It’s definitely the best Metal single ply suit I’ve tried. Hopefully it will loosen a little as I put some weight back on.
Well, we finally decided to get ol’ Tankers neutered. Yes, I realize he looks angry but he actually looks angry all the time, especially with a cone on his head. If you don’t already know, we have 5 rescue dogs; 3 (14 year old Australian Shepherd mix Zen and our staffys Atticus, and Pema) were strays that I found, Icarus was from a rescue, and Tank is a French Mastiff that one of my clients wasn’t able to take care of anymore.
Tank is 3 years old now and has become a little too territorial of our neighborhood and OBB as well. I also know that neutering can prevent numerous health problems and prevent him from having the urge to chase dogs that are in heat. We feel bad for him, but know he’ll be better off. We got him neutered last Wednesday and he was prescribed vetprofen as an anti-inflammatory, an antibiotic to prevent infection, and a sedative to keep him from moving around too much and aggravating the area.
On Friday, when I was home at lunch to let the dogs out Zen seemed to take a horrible turn. He always wags his tail as I approach him, but he became completely unresponsive, stopped wagging his tail, his paws were sliding out from underneath him, and he could barely chew when I gave him a treat. I honestly thought this may be the end for him. He went completely from one extreme to the next. I called Trinity and explained the situation. Instead of going to the gym after work she decided to go home to check on Zen. Zen has elevated kidney enzymes, so we’ve been giving him milk thistle, fish oil, and a dog renal formula for years. We realize that his kidneys failing is most likely how he will eventually go, but the symptoms he was having weren’t at all like what would happen during organ failure. Then I started trying to figure out what could possibly be wrong before we rushed him to the vet.
Tank has big old jowls and has figured out how to eat whatever we put the pills in, hold the pills in his mouth, then spit them out later. I started thinking that he must have spit out one of the sedatives and Zen picked it up hours later. Sure enough as the night went on Zen improved and by the next day was back to normal. I’m very happy that this was not the end for Zen, and now we're a little more prepared for it since we just had a trial run.
Tank and Zen napping together.
Tank giving me his version of kisses to show that he’s not pissed anymore.