Winnie

Poor old gal...

Inter-species territory dispute

Winnie: Uh, excuse me. This is MY crate. Also, maybe you're not aware of this, but around here, I'm what's known as the "alpha".

Maddie: Yes, but you're the alpha DOG. As a cat, I'm not actually under your jurisdiction. I looked it up.

Winnie: Oh. I didn't realize. Well, I'm too tired to argue anyway. I guess we can share.

Beware Renee under delusions of cleverness

Here's the scoop. I twisted my ankle--YES, again, a couple days ago. Walking down to the basement and missed the final step. Thought I was actually on the mend fairly quickly, but guess I overdid it with a few little errands over the past couple days. Son REALLY has zero tolerance for the dogs, and even though Perkins is being AWESOME with respect to showing restraint around the cats, it still seems to make sense to crate Perkins when I'm going go be away from the house and can't supervise (or witness the circumstances as they REALLY unfolded). So Perkins was in his crate at I went to church and ran the odd errand. 

A while back, my mom gifted me with a prong-type collar for Perkins. One does not need to exert a lot of force to make once's presence known. Winnie doesn't need a whole lot in terms of control, but she DOES get wicked jealous if Perkins goes out on leash an she doesn't. So, the clever bit was that, given the extra influence of the prong collar, and Winnie's advancing years, I probably COULD manage to take both dogs out for a brief "pee walk" at the same time. Worked just fine the first few times I tried it, and I was, I think, justifiably pleased with myself. 

Sadly, the prong collar came apart today and fell to the ground, Perkins escaped, and I had to go get him, with Winnie in tow.

He's home safely, but I don't feel so good. Going to rest for a bit. And, Perkins is probably not grounded FOREVER, given that he at least DID is on command once I finally had him more or less cornered in a yard.

I has a house

This is Winnie's crate. Well, was. She doesn't care to sleep in it any more. So recently, Madonna has claimed it. She finds it nice and cozy.

Now tell me something I didn't know...

Trying to make sure Perkins is up to date on his shots. Looked up the vet I've taken him to, and the reviews are right on the money. Dr. J.E. Trego is a wonderful, caring vet, and very affordable if you are taking your pet in for routine vaccines and annual exams--keeping rabies tags up to date and that sort of thing.

But nothing I've looked at so far has indicated what hours he is open--for example, is he open at ALL on the weekend. Here's a typical review:

Very good service! Dr.Trego is very gentle and informative. The price for service is unbeatable. I have reccomended him to many friends. Impossible sometimes to get a hold of!

Tell me about it! But he IS a great vet and a nice person, and doesn't try to "sell you up"--for example, he didn't try to talk me into having a geriatric golden retriever mix sedated (potentially risky at any age, in my opinion) just so that she could have her teeth cleaned. 

Update: Finally found a page that listed his hours. Not open on Saturday or Sunday. Kind of a bummer, but at least I can take that item off my to-do list for the day! 

I honestly think that in this day and age, every business should have at least a basic web page. But I might be biased--Demetrius and I design web pages (when we can get the business and the person or organization doesn't need too many "bells and whistles".)

Perkins learns some words

When Mom came into town for Son's graduation, she brought her dog Pablo and stayed in a hotel. For two of the nights she was there, I brought Perkins and stayed the night. I enjoyed some nice visiting time with Mom, and the two young dogs got to romp together.

I'm not a morning person, and, if I don't remember exactly where I set my glasses before going to bed, I am pretty useless until I either miraculously find them, or go ahead and put my contact lenses in. So I was kind of slow on the uptake when Mom started saying things like, "Did you know that Perkins can bow?"

I was confused, but then looked over at Perkins doing his deep morning stretch. Mom says "That's a bow! Good bow Perkins!" Then Perkins starts in on a sneezing fit. "That's a sneeze, Perkins! Good sneeze!"

Okay, I get it. And I was impressed. I also realized that I could cut myself some slack for not being as good labeling things for my dogs because I hadn't really done it before. I think Mom has been working with her dogs like this long enough that it's become second nature.

In the month and a half since then, I've been consciously working on this--and shifted my thinking from "I'm going to teach Perkins these commands" to something a little closer to, "I'm going to work on teaching Perkins the words in English that I want him to know."

He definitely knows what "treat" means now. I will promise him a "treat" right after he makes a "poop", and will bound excitedly to the door so that I can let him into the kitchen and he can collect his reward. He also seems to know what a "toy" is, but only his "elephant toy" is super special and awesome.

So if I ask Perkins, "Where's your elephant toy?", he will immediately start wagging his tail. "Go get your elephant toy!" Tail still wagging, Perkins begins to track down his favorite toy.

Early this evening, I had both dogs out in the yard together. My main goal was to make sure that Perkins got in a good, tiring play session so that he would more or less happily rest in his crate while the family watched something together. Perkins doesn't understand that Son wishes to impose a restraining order that would require that no part of a dog's body can ever come within 6 feet of him. (Especially that infernal wagging tail!) So the only way "family time" can be a more or less positive experience is for Perkins to spend that time quietly locked inside his crate.

So I was trying to play with Perkins. "Here's a ball, Perkins. Can you go get the ball? Bring me the ball, Perkins!"  I'm trying to work up all this excitement, and then throw the ball. Perkins just gives me this look that says, "Yeah, sorry. I don't care much for those."

Then I see the stuffed Winnie the Pooh doll--which remains remarkably unmaimed. He owes this good fortune to fact that he is stuffed ONLY with fluff. No squeaker. So I pick up the toy and throw it, saying to Perkins, "Where's Pooh?" And immediately I realize, aw, crud, that sounds way too close to the word "poop". So I switch to "Where's Winnie--", and then look over at my other dog. Damn, that name's already taken! So finally, I came up with "Where's your bear toy?"

I never imagined play time could be so mentally taxing!

Videos

Not everybody likes this game

I miss Brady, but I'm happy for Winnie that she now has a dog in the house who's willing to play with her the way she's (apparently) designed to play. I can only imagine the doggie conversation that took place between Winnie and Brady shortly after Winnie came to live here.

Winnie: I'm bored. Wanna play something?

Brady: What did you have in mind?

Winnie: Let's play "Bite each other on the face!"

Brady: I don't think I'm familiar with that one. It doesn't sound like fun.

Winnie: Are you kidding me?! It's the best game EVER! I can't believe you've never played it.

Brady: I don't know--maybe we collies play it, but we call it something else. Tell me about the game--how do you play?

Winnie: Wow--I never dreamed I'd have to explain this. We...bite each other. On...the face.

Why are you looking at me like that? It's fun!

Goose chase

Dog park

Play time. Winnie made a really compelling case for taking her to the dog park. My primary objection to the idea was that "I'm tiiiiiired! She made the point that, if she didn't get to go to the park, she was going to explode. Then there would be bits of golden retriever everywhere...and cleaning up that kind of mess was bound to be more exhausting than just driving her to the park in the first place. Touche, Winnie.

Winnie at the dog park

I wish I hadn't messed up and cut off the first video I tried to record--it would have contained the longest burst of Winnie playing with another dog.  (I think it was a boxer.)

Edit: I just listened to the audio (forgot that I had said anything in this video, as often I just record without comment. And I noticed that I had mentioned the mud puddles, but they weren't really featured in the video. Trust me--there were plenty of them. And lots of dogs absolutely *wallowing* in them.  Fortunately, Winnie didn't seem interested. And she was only really interested in the other dogs when they came up to her.

When I took Brady to the park, it was apparently his job to "secure the perimeter" before he could settle down and enjoy himself. (Read: lean against any human who would allow it.)

Winnie's job, as far as I can tell, is to sniff *everything*. She did run around some too, and seemed to enjoy herself.  Then I took her to PetSmart to try to find her a few toys.  All she really had was a few tennis balls, which seem to have become one with our yard and lost their appeal as toys. I thought I could let her choose something that caught her interest, but once again, it is her job to sniff *everything*. She can't "play favorites".