A Couple Of Dog Stories.

[BigDon]

Trying to keep today's posting simple as I have a lot on my mind.

So I have some dog stories.

First, there is little Buddy-dog. Dispite the name, Buddy is a female toy poodle. White. Twelve years old and weighs ten pounds. Size of a house cat.

Her two main joys in life are sitting on my stepfather's lap and dismembering stuffed dog toys, (purchased for the purpose). Prefers weinerdog shaped ones.

Her main duty is official doorbell and guest announcer. Buddy also waited in front of Michelle's bedroom door every morning for a daily ritual of head pats and those tight circular spins that poodle fans call "pirouettes".

Buddy does that a lot.

Now it wasn't just Pops and myself who miss my daughter Michelle, who has left for college. Buddy did as well, fiercely it seems. Buddy was sleeping in front of Michelle's closed bedroom door, waiting for her to come out, for three days in a row. Like a grave watch dogs do sometimes.

Pops finally opened the bedroom door for Buddy who entered the room all sniffing at the bed, then everything the dog had drooped at once and she turned around and walked out and stopped waiting by the door.

I told Michelle this last Monday and Michelle got all teary eyed. And then I asked her:

Me: "Do you know what this means?"

Michelle: "What?" *sniff*

Me: "Change...your...sheets! Good God child, the dog thought you were still in bed through a closed door!"

Why do all the females in my life feel free to hit me? I never hit them, curse them, use the "b" word as a casual discriptor, none of that.

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Well, the local pocket gophers finally got the news that both Sid, (The White Death) and Squeaker the Green Cat have gone on to their just rewards and that I now lack a working cat to protect the yard and surrounding cul-de-sac.

Since I'm tired of the local stress deciduous grasses in my parents lawn I put down twenty pounds of blue grass seed last spring to crowd it out.

It was looking nice until gophers descended on it like a pack of lemmings.

And Buddy is having so much fun with this I almost hesitate to smoke-check the little varmints.

Now Saturday my brother and I were pulling up to my parent's place and Buddy, who has a head the size of an 60 watt lightbulb, had her head down a gopher hole and was just giving the gophers hell.

She was so pre-occupied that she didn't even notice my brother and I pulling up and getting out of the car.

I enter the yard and Buddy is shoulders deep in this hole, and gives two barks, then a bark flurry with such passion that she discribed two full circles around the hole without pulling her head out.

For all the world it looked like something had Buddy by the head and trying to pull her underground she was trying to pull back.

I broke up the little scene by exclaiming:

"An octopots has done got Albert!"

And Buddy-dog pulled her head out of the hole, just covered in mud, all happy as heck to be seeing my brother and I.

She even gave me a situation report about her progress fighting off the gopher hordes.

The unintended consequence was the gophers back-filled all their burrows deeper than I was willing to dig into my lawn.

But I'm waiting for a fresh burrow with smoke bombs on hand.

[Swift]

Me: "Change...your...sheets! Good God child, the dog thought you were still in bed through a closed door!"

Why do all the females in my life feel free to hit me? I never hit them, curse them, use the "b" word as a casual discriptor, none of that.

And who exactly is the "dog" in this story, you old dog?

[LookingSkyward]

Another dog story:
The scene: Onny, the lab-cross pup about a year old, on a 50' lead in the yard (she's fast, and ignores the fences). Winker, the laid back lab (Bullwinkle, huge for a lab), hanging out in the yard.

Onny manages to catch a baby robin that's not yet flying well. Gets yelled at to 'Drop!', and does. Winker promptly scoops up the robin. Gets yelled at to 'Drop!', and goes over and drops the poor critter in the little fish pond!
Daughter rescues baby robin, all un-crunched but soggy, and puts him up in a tree beyond pooch elevation.

Later in the afternoon, the same scenario is repeated - possibly with the same bird...

[swampyankee]

My parents' last dog, Henry, was being walked off-lead (he was usually very good) by my brother and sister, who had her golden (sweetest, but possibly dumbest, dog which ever lived). Henry was 20+ pounds of bone, muscle, and attitude and saw something to chase: geese. The geese waddled quickly to a ten-foot drop, spread their wings, and kept going.

Henry followed.

Henry did not have wings.

Luckily, there was deep water at the bottom of the little cliff, into which Henry belly-flopped. My brother and sister started to look for him -- "Where's Henry?" -- looked into the water. There he was, snorting water out of his nose, treading water, until my brother got his attention, when he dog-paddled to shore. After that, Henry did not chase geese, but did continue his other hobbies of chasing creatures and hiking with my brother.

[BigDon]

And who exactly is the "dog" in this story, you old dog?

Yeah, there was nothing wrong with her bedding. I would rather she hit me on the arm than be teary-eyed.

Now my oldest daughter has two dogs, both labs. One is a bear-sized yellow lab strong enough to pull rose bushes out of the ground like dandilions. Name of Scout.

Imagine my joy.

That rose had four roots, four feet long holding it in place.

The other is a black lab mix with a distinctive case of microcephlia.

(The dog has a tiny, pointy head.)

Now before you rush to post:

"But Don, all labs have pointy heads!"

Know this, Little Man's head is actually smaller in circumference than his neck. Which means you can't keep a collar on him for one thing.

I informed my oldest daughter that if I had a magic wand and froze Little Man in place, I could pick him up, throw him at a wall head first and with that pointy head of his, he would stick.

My oldest daughter hits me on the arm too.

Note to self: People don't like it when others make wry observations about their dogs.

[NEOWatcher]

Note to self: People don't like it when others make wry observations about their dogs.

Couldn't it also mean that your daughters just look for opportunities to hit you?

[swampyankee]

Couldn't it also mean that your daughters just look for opportunities to hit you?

Given Don's history, I somehow imagine hitting him would be like hitting an oak tree.

[Noclevername]

Seven years ago, shortly after my family moved to the midwest, we had a less amusing dog incident. My mother was out walking with my then 6 month old nephew in a stroller, and my sister's dog Quincy on a leash. There had been a storm the night before and our next door neighbor had left 2 rotweillers outside in the yard while she went to a party (from which she did not return until that morning.) The rotweillers broke out of her rather flimsy wooden gate and attacked Quincy, one around his throat and the other going for his privates. My mother was desperately trying to seperate them and managed to chase away the 2 dogs, but Quincy was signifigantly injured and acting in shock. She called me to help and I found that my mother had also been bitten (back of her leg, she didn't even notice it until I pointed it out). The baby, fortunately, was uninjured, and police were called. After our neighbor got home, she came to our door and immediately began to make excuses rather than apologize >

The law around here says that the dogs can't be put doen unless there was "a history" of attacks (i.e., at least 2) and the cops told our neighbor to fix the gate and get the dogs proper training and keep them indoors, none of which she did. The broken gate was held to the fence with bungee cords, and the dogs continued to be neglected out in the yard. Because of the legal issues, the attack made the local news and my mother was called in to speak about changing the laws. (One reporter interviewing her tried three times to say or confirm that the law should be breed-specific, which was one issue being debated, but she stuck to her own statements and he actually got mad at her for not "cooperating".)

The neighbor tried to coach one of her daughters to say that Quincy had bitten my mother, which would have required that he not only stretch his neck around her but also change the shape of his mouth (fortunately I had taken photos of the wounds, clearly showing a much wider mouth and longer teeth than Quincy possessed).

For months, my mother was afraid to leave her house. She had a high fence installed and got pepper spray for all the members of our family who live on this street. Quincy had to undergo several surgeries and was unable to even bark for almost a year afterwards. We stopped taking walks.

About six months after the incident, the dogs again got loose and attacked another dog being taken for a walk. The cops came, and the dogs were put down, all because their owner failed to take proper care of them. The neighbor moved away shortly after. Quincy has since made a full recovery but don't sneak up on him from behind.

[BigDon]

Darn Clev, that sucks.

Let me make it up to you and inform you that not everybody is a dweeb.

My parents have new neighbors across the street and their dog, a little male chihuahua, got loose and was running about the cul-de-sac. I was afraid it was going to get run over by a car so I tried to catch him, and he seemed sort of willing, but he didn't know me. Well, he found my front gate open, ran into my yard and then into my parent's house. It was a nice day so the front door was open.

Well, I couldn't catch him so I went and knocked on his owner's door, and they didn't even know he was out. So an older son came and got him and I only mentioned in passing to him that the dog marked a spot on the hallway carpet before we shoo'ed him back out the door.

The next morning...

The Stanley Steemer carpet company calls us and says our neighbors were paying to have our carpets cleaned, becaused their dog pee'd on our rug. All on their own they decided to do this.

I'm going to have to do something nice for these people. Neighbors like this you want to keep.

[Swift]

About six months after the incident, the dogs again got loose and attacked another dog being taken for a walk. The cops came, and the dogs were put down, all because their owner failed to take proper care of them.

That's the saddest part, not only that your mom and dog (and the other dog that was attacked) suffered, but in a sense, the roweillers suffered too, and received the ultimate punishment, while the most guilty party, the owner, was relatively unpunished. She not only didn't control her dogs properly, but she didn't raise them properly, to be "good neighbors". She's the one that deserved the punishment.

I like the ending of your story a lot more BD.