Seven Dogs

From the start I wanted to have Seven Dogs translated into Mandarin.  I think this breed is dear to many people who speak Chinese.  I just didn’t quite know how to make a translation happen.

I started by contacting the language department at my local university to see if I could employ someone there to help.  I received an encouraging response, but it didn’t lead to any progress.  My next step was to contact the main office of the Mormon church.  The publication department to be specific.  The Mormon church produces a lot of written material for a worldwide audience, not to mention they send out missionaries to the four corners of the map, and if anyone knows anything about languages and translations it would be them.  Turns out, they use third party contractors for much of their translation work.  I asked them to share my name and project description with their contractors and that drew blanks.  I also contacted the Asian Association of Utah and had them share my name with people they thought might help.  Again, dead air.

I was beginning to think that I might be able to do it myself.  This is where arrogance is useful.  No, I don’t speak a word of Chinese, but Google does.  I did some basic research and found out that modern Chinese is organized in sentences and reads horizontally from left to right.  In other words, it has enough commonalities with English that I started to feel confident that I could make a first pass.  I had done translation work in my profession for decades, Spanish and Portuguese, and the methods I learned there would be very valuable.  The first pass would employ something called “translation-back translation.”  Each sentence would be translated into Chinese, and then that translation would be translated back into English.  If it returned to its original wording or meaning, I had a reasonable translation.  If not, then the original English had to be temporarily rewritten until it worked.  I learned quickly that this is a tedious and often frustrating process.  I soldiered on anyway.

What I needed now was a proofreader.  Someone who could take my translation and make it read like the book was written by a native author.  Out of desperation I identified every professor in the state that taught Chinese at a University.  I think I sent out fifteen or so emails describing my plight, and lucky for me, one of those professors forwarded my email to a graduate student who was perfect for the job.  And of all the luck, she lived about a mile from my house.

At some point during this process, I became aware of online translation services, but I was still of a mind that translating this book would take a whole lot more than “hand it over and get it back.”  I was right about that.  Aside from the words themselves, there are idioms, colloquialisms, popular culture references, movie and song titles, dog names and their spellings, and worst of all; every measurement either real or symbolic had to be converted from imperial to metric. As anticipated, there was a lot of back and forth.

And finally, the Chinese version had to undergo the same rigorous scrutiny that the English version did.  We needed readers to point out flaws in language and places where the story is confusing.  We are still in that process but hope to have a final translation very soon.  Publication in both languages is getting close.

I don’t want this post to sound morbid, but . . .  I was proud of my woodworking and thought I would show off one of my urns.

When I bought this house, the front yard had one tree; growing from the middle of the lawn, but obscuring my front porch view of the powerlines that run along the north property line.  It was a Mountain Ash.  Mountain Ash trees produce loads of red berries that cluster all over the tree.  The fruit soften and ferment during the fall and provide food for birds during the winter.  Well, food laced with alcohol.  It made the birds drunk, and loads of them would fly into my picture window on the front of the house.

Unbeknownst to me, trees have life expectancies, and this one was reaching the end of its.  Over the course of a couple of years, large branches died, and eventually the tree exhaled its last oxygen.  The trunk of the tree was rather substantial and so I asked a local miller if he would resaw the trunk into half inch thick planks.  I wasn’t sure if Mountain Ash could be used for woodworking, but it was worth a go.  I thought pieces of that size could be used to make boxes and half inch thickness seemed appropriate.

I painted the ends of the planks with white paint to guide the drying process.  I stacked them in my shop and forgot about them.  That was over twenty years ago.

When my dogs passed away, I had them cremated, and the ashes were returned to me in sealed plastic containers.  They were nice enough, but they were plastic.  I had always intended to enclose the plastic containers in urns made from wood.  A serious upgrade.  I also thought that making the boxes from wood that lived and died on this property, like the dogs, was perfect for making their urns.  The years passed, but this winter I decided it was time to make good on my intentions.

Pictured above is one of those urns.  This one is for Kronos.  As you can see, the wood grain is spectacular, and the wood itself was very nice to work with.  Each urn had the same basic construction, but the columns that run up the corners are different for each dog.  For Kronos, I used smaller pieces of the ash to create quoins running up each corner of the box.  I think it turned out great.

I’ve lived in this house for over 25 years, and during that time I have accumulated a lot of stuff.  On a few occasions, I have tried to reduce the volume of stuff by half.  I never really throw out half the stuff, but I have tossed a lot of stuff many times.

The consequence of continual acquisition and dispossession cycles means some stuff gets separated from its collection and stays hidden in the spaces between for long periods of time.  I very recently found a video tape titled: Magnus and Family.  I have no idea how it found its safe space, but it had not only remained hidden for many years, it had also completely escaped my memory.

The ancient tape had video of Simba as a 5-week-old puppy, as a 7-month-old goofball, and as a 3-year-old giant showing his strut in the ring.  The tape also showed Magnus’s grandmother, Tsunami.  For the record, Magnus had only one grandmother.  I’ll let you do the math.

More importantly, the video showed two litter evaluations.  A video evaluation of a litter involves showing each puppy in turn as well as in side-by-side comparisons.  In the voiceover, the breeder discusses the pros and cons of each puppy while the video records both body and head footage.

The two evaluations, in this case, were Magnus’s litter at 8 days, and again at 5 weeks.  It was interesting to see him at that age, but more interesting to hear what the breeder was thinking at those times.  In the first evaluation, Magnus did not stick out much.  In fact, he was seen as less masculine than one of the females in the litter.  At 5 weeks, however, he was referred to at the big black and tan boy and was noticeably larger than his siblings.  I saw him for the first time at 8 and a half weeks, and the disparity in size at that point was even clear to me.

Pictured above is a screen capture of Magnus at 5 weeks.  The video shows him and his siblings at that time.  Magnus is on the far left.  Enjoy.

Everything was fine, right up until it wasn’t.

We x-rayed Lottie on day 55 and it showed one very large puppy taking up residence in most of mom’s body.  That news was welcome, but a tad bit disappointing.  Everyone was hoping for a full garage.  Of course, it’s one thing to be sad about only one pup, it’s another to remember that singleton puppies create a host of logistical problems.

Now, the stats might suggest that singleton puppies usually turn out okay, but you may remember that I went through this with Nika and L’acy, and that was everything BUT okay.  Puppies produce the adrenaline that initiates labor.  So, one pup means only one source of starter fluid.  The question is whether or not to allow for a natural birth, or to intervene with surgery.  Natural is preferred, and since Lottie was an experienced dam, we decided to trust her behavior as evidence for our decisions.

By day 63, the due date, Lottie seemed every bit unconcerned, and an ultrasound showed a vigorous puppy waiting for the show to begin.  Unfortunately, progesterone levels in Lottie suggested that labor was unlikely to begin for at least 24 hours.  So, we waited.  And it was an agonizing wait.  One I won’t forget any time soon.

Day 64 passed and Lottie continued to act like nothing was wrong, and that labor was still a ways off.  On the morning of day 65, Lottie was taken to the vet with the intention of surgical consent.  We weren’t going to wait any longer.  Unfortunately, the preoperative ultrasound showed we were too late.  The puppy had passed away.  Later that day, and after several injections of Pitocin, Lottie gave birth to a beautiful black and tan girl.  Another L’acy.  I will mourn her loss for some time.

L’acy, pictured above, was born by c-section on day 65.  I can only think that I was lucky, and probably came to her rescue just in time.  But, it’s always easier to make decisions in the aftermath.  There is no one to blame here.  And although I am sad to think about what might have been, stuff happens and we learn to live with that.

Just a quick announcement: Lottie is pregnant!!  But . . . there is only one pup in the waiting room.

When I got the text from the vets’ office, I immediately experienced disappointment when I should have been screaming for joy.  Of course, I would have liked to have seen a larger number on my iPad, but one pup means that Magnus’s line is alive again.  And, in reality, that was the true goal.

Early next week, the details will start to coalesce.  When the puppy is born, we will know sex and color, and to some degree, confirmation.  What am I hoping for?  Fundamentally, healthy and constructed to continue Magnus’s legacy.  Of course, I expect all of Magnus’s faults to shine through, but his great attributes (e.g., head, muzzle, front assembly, temperament, dentition, longevity, feet, coat color and texture, etc.) are now available as pieces in the larger Tibetan Mastiff puzzle.  Oh yeah, and SIZE!

A quick note on color.  Lottie is heterozygous gold.  We know this because her parents were two different colors, her sire was black and tan, and her dam was gold.  Lottie is a very light gold sable, but she can produce either gold or black and tan.  What am I hoping for?  If you remember, I sat on the toilet lid waiting for Nika to give birth to L’acy and imagined an all-black male puppy.  Wrong.  I spent years dreaming of owning a gold Tibetan Mastiff, and Sindred, and later Kronos, fulfilled that dream, but at this point in my life, either is fine.  But wouldn’t it be provident if the puppy was a black and tan male just like dear old dad?

Pictured above is my favorite photo of Magnus.

Plan A has additional objectives.  First and foremost was the production of a Magnus son, but that son would need a mate.  A mate from a different litter that would complement his attributes.  Enter, the other woman.

All of my past pairings were assembled asynchronously.  That is, Magnus showed up in March 1996, and Blaze, six years old at the time, showed up later that summer.  Nika didn’t arrive on the scene for another two years.  L’acy was already there when Sindred and Kronos arrived.  All that is to say that I always had at least one dog on the property, and I never added more than one dog to the pack at any given time.  Until now.

Given my preference for at least two dogs in the yard, I would need to acquire two puppies this Spring.  Not one.  Part of Plan A was to produce the second puppy from a different litter.  Pictured above is Rocky Mountain Epic Evelyn; AKA Evie.  The other woman.  She is a beautiful black and tan whose pedigree also traces back to Nika’s brother Darth.  And all that overlaps to some small degree with Magnus.

The original plan was to couple her with another dog from history, Shang-Hai’s Jack the Bear.  Jack the Bear was a very successful show dog whose mother, Shang-Hai’s Mystical Medusa – Stretch – was the all-time winningest show dog in the breed during her day, and the reason I had to admit that Blaze was only the second winningest Tibetan Mastiff when she lived with me. 

Unfortunately, conducting a transcervical insemination using frozen semen depends on consistent progesterone production from the female.  Without that, the chance of timing it right is too limited.  As Evie approached her optimal moment, her numbers wavered to the point where a breeding with Jack the Bear was likely to be a waste of time and money.  Fortunately, there was an appropriate living stud available.  Shang Hai’s Kodiak the Bear.

The living Bear obliged, more than once, and again, we wait.  If Plan A works, I will introduce a pair of puppies to my home in the Spring.  Fingers are crossed.

I can’t count the number of times I had dreams, nightmares really, where my backyard fence was missing or broken, and the dogs were free to escape.  They were as unwilling to come when called in my dreams as they were in real life.

In reality, my fence was strong and never yielded to either barometric nor paw pressure.  Until last September.  L’acy had passed away a couple of years before that, so the breach wasn’t a nightmare come true, but the fence crumbled under the force of a strong windstorm.  Two posts snapped at their base and the attached panels, each some eight feet wide, fell to the ground.  No big deal, I just had to replace the posts and reattach the panels. 

Not so fast.  I needed to remove the concrete sleeves the posts were given when they were first installed.  They were about ten inches wide and sunk to two feet under the ground.  I called a fence contractor and asked for an estimate.  Hilarious.  You know a contractor really doesn’t want the gig when they ask for $2,500 to repair about twenty feet of cedar fencing.  Either that, or I really don’t know how much this stuff costs.

I managed to convince a friend of mine to help me dig out the concrete sleeves.  It took two lunchtime sessions and a whole lot of false anger, but we managed to remove the concrete and maintain the integrity of the resultant holes in the ground.  I ran to the home improvement store, picked up a couple new posts and some quick setting concrete.  In short time, I was back in business.

Until April.  Another windstorm blew through and more posts met their maker.  At this point I decided it was time to step back and improve the fence system as a whole.  A post that held up fencing between the garden and the back yard had also broken free, and the gates were sagging to the point where they were hard to use.  I think twenty-five years is long enough.

I started work on the new gate frames, but before I got very far, summer temperatures soared into the nineties and my outdoor efforts became focused on the landscape and garden.  The summer passed and very little work on the gates had been done.  As fall approached, however, old frames were removed, as was the fence between the garden and back yard.  You could stand in the street in front of my house and look all the way to the back alley.  For over a month, I felt exposed.

I slowly completed the gate frames, mounted them to posts, and tuned them to work with ease.  I was stoked.  What remained were three concrete sleeves stuck in the ground and I wasn’t sure I had enough energy to remove them by myself.  My friend helped me with one of them, but two lingered in the ground until a week ago.  Fortunately for me, a group of young men from the neighborhood church ward volunteered to help.  Actually, they were too skinny to help dig and pry, it was their dads, there to supervise, that provided the hard labor.  The kids gathered the shards of concrete and scooped dirt from the holes when they weren’t playing tag on the lawn.  It took about an hour before the last of the sleeves were pulled from their graves.

Over the next couple of days I replaced posts and rails and reattached slats.  The back yard is once again ready for dogs.

Plan A was solid. 

Magnus was going to be bred to Lottie, and to complete the plan, Rocky Mountain Epic Evelyn (AKA Evie) would be bred to produce the female compliment to my Magnus son.  That breeding would also be the result of a frozen insemination drawn from an historically well-known sire, Jack the Bear.  This plan brought history to life, both figuratively and literally.

A couple of weeks ago, both girls started their Fall heat.  There was a lot of excitement for this project among those of us involved, and optimism was high.  It’s amazing how someone with all my years of experience can ignore reality so effortlessly.  I forgot how random this process can be, and how frustrating it is to see puppies from an accidental breeding handed out in front of a grocery store while years of planning and thousands of dollars in expenses might yield nothing.  You’d think we were doing it wrong.

As both girls climbed toward their fertile zeniths, blood was drawn every couple of days and tested for its progesterone.  When the progesterone levels reached appropriate concentrations, the procedures would be performed.

Evie’s progesterone levels rose first, but failed to rise consistently.  Given the requirements to maximize chances that a female will get pregnant from a frozen insemination were unmet, that breeding was abandoned.  Evie was bred by a living sire instead, and ties were accomplished.  Although this was not part of the plan, it stands as a solid Plan B.

Lottie’s progesterone levels eventually rose as required, and at the perfect time, Magnus’s contribution was thawed.  The phone rang, it was the vet clinic.  Turns out, Magnus’s little swimmers were few and tired.  Maybe too few and too tired.  Another vial was thawed, and although it was better, it was still underwhelming.  This did not exclude success, but it certainly diminished chances and might limit litter size even if successful.

A decision had to be made, and despite the poor showing, we went ahead as planned.  We considered doing both the insemination as well as a live breeding.  With modern DNA testing, each puppy would have a legitimate pedigree, but we worried that swimmers from the live sire would win ALL the races, so we opted for just the Magnus breeding and hope for the best.  The next day, the procedure was repeated, and although the swimmer count was again low, it was a bit better than the day before.  Time will tell.

Pictured above is Lottie.  We’re rooting for her.

Ready or not, here I go again.

A year ago, a long-time friend reached out to me to see if I still had Magnus semen in the bank.  Don’t freak out, he is a Tibetan Mastiff breeder who has been in the breed for over 20 years, and someone I coached in basketball when he was a teenager.  He wanted to negotiate a breeding, putting Magnus to one of his females; my compensation would be the pick of the litter.

I must admit that I hesitated.  Not because of him or his dogs, but because I questioned whether or not I was ready to jump back in.  L’acy had been gone for two years and I got used to a clean back lawn.  Poof!  The thought of a Magnus son brought me out of my haze.

When I first got involved in the breed, the size of Tibetan Mastiffs varied greatly.  Just look at my first two dogs: Blaze was a heavily coated 85-pound beauty queen and Magnus was a short coated 190-pound gargantuan.  That summed up the breed variety pretty well.  Here we are some 25 years later, and not much has changed.  Sure, the overall quality of the breed has probably advanced a bit; improved joint and movement quality with extra wrinkles and fur, but the dogs still range greatly in size.  Same old same old.  Perhaps, Magnus’s genes still had value.

I called the sperm bank and verified that I hadn’t paid for upkeep in many years.  I sheepishly inquired about restitution.  Turns out, I needed to break the piggy bank to get my account up to date and find out the status of my cache.  Fortunately, there were 8 well-kept vials ready to give my dream a chance.  Unfortunately, dog breeding is highly unpredictable. 

By the time my friend and I got our act together, the female my friend had in mind had gone out of heat.  This breeding was put on hold for a full year.  Fast forward to today; that year has passed, and that female is in her fall estrus once again.

Pictured above is 6-year-old, Rocky Mountain Charlotte, AKA Lottie.  Her color is Gold Sable, just like Sindred, but her gold color is a bit lighter.  Lottie is a tall drink of water that will bring rear structure and coat quality to the party.  Again, Magnus will provide gargantuousness and his polite temperament.  This breeding is considered an “outcross.”  There is almost no overlap in their pedigrees until you reach back 5 or so generations.  This may produce a wider variety of outcomes than a breeding where genes are more shared, but it is a worthy roll of the dice.

Of course, Lottie’s ancestors are not lightweights.  She descends down two lines from champions Queen of Eden and Loki.  For the record, Loki is the son of Darth, Nika’s brother, and his great grandparents include both Simba and Lady; Magnus’s parents.  There’s the overlap.

This is just the first step, and not the only breeding planned.  Stay tuned.