Bark Bark Bark Bark - Old Dogs

My Old Dog!

My dog is old and it seems to have crept up on us suddenly. He wasn't that old the other day but now he definitely is old. He's not got any noticeable grey hairs, he potters about just as busy as anything, eats well and still sees off the postman.
But he is deaf.
Very deaf.
I SAID HE WAS DEAF - do keep up!
I find myself having to shout much louder to get his attention and when he sleeps he sleeps much more heavily, in fact you can now creep right up upon him without him even noticing. Not something he'd have stood for in his younger days. He was always right up to the crack then, always one step ahead - now I find him loitering way behind and sometimes he just sits down and waits for us to get back to him.
He still hates the postman but it's a hate that borders on obsession now and it tends to encompass not just the postman. I suppose because he cannot see the postman very well he has decided to err on the side of caution and go demented at anyone who ventures near the door.
Problem is because he can't hear very well he sometimes just starts off barking anyway - again on the presumption that he has to let everyone know that someone or something COULD be coming up the drive. This can also happen in the middle of the night.
It's like waking up to a fire alarm.
At first you are disorientated by the cacophony, then you have to trace exactly where it is coming from and then you have to shut it up.
If he is in one of the boys rooms, I have to vault out of my bed and get to the dog before he wakes them up - luckily both are very heavy sleepers and they have yet to wake before I have removed the offending canine. I then take errant hound down to the kitchen and he snuggles up in his basket once I have checked all the doors and windows and given him a dog biscuit.
If he is downstairs and he starts barking, it takes me a little longer to sort out but suffice to say that I then have to take him to bed with me - and as an old dog he has powerful breath.
He gets obsessed with stuff.
Cleaning himself or his basket or worse the chair you have just sat down in. And all you get is lick, lick, lick, lick. Usually as you watch TV.
Oh he also snores.
Heavily
And very loudly!
Sounds a lot like my husband save my husband doesn't do the obsessive licking thing, or the barking thing or the chasing the postman bit...at least I don't think he does!

Schadenfreude terrier style...

Don't you believe that butter wouldn't melt in his mouth!

Never, ever think you've got your terrier taped, even if he is 11 years old. And never, ever even think that perhaps your terrier is better behaved than anyone else's.
Today, minding my own business or not as the case maybe, I perused the blogosphere and came across The Miracle courtesy of Asbo Jack, Exmoor Jane's wonderful JRT doing exactly what JRTs are supoposed to do - surprise you, lull you into a false sense of security and then do exactly what it is they've been wanting to do all day - pick a fight with somone larger than they are. Classic small dog syndrome. I laughed safe in the knowlegde that that sort of thing doesn't happen to me anymore on the basis that the JRT ( Jack Russel Terrier) in our house is permanently grounded and only taken on walks or runs when there is little chance of him meeting anyone at all let alone another dog. This can be facilitated by either walking said dog in the middle of the night or else at 5am in the morning.
Back to today and my slighly, dare I say it superior feeling about my JRT Tigger. No that sort of thing would never happen to me...but pride does come before fall and I have fallen hard. Just as I was writing my witty little comment ( I can dream people, I can dream and I can also expand the truth a little too) I heard a cacophony of barking, the postman had arrived. Every day we go through the same ritual. Post van drives up drive, Tigger goes bonkers and looks a little like Krull as he squashes his head against the kitchen window trying to bite the poor postman. We all laugh and indulge his little whims safe in the knowledge that he cannot get out. Sometimes I have noted the postman teases the dog a bit by deliberatley slowing his pace and waving the post about - bad move. Tigger has a long and ferocious memory even if he cannot see all that well anymore.
Everything should have been all right, the postman should have slotted post through the door into the wire cage and returned to the van, got in and driven away.
BUT...
But today, Bog Boy decided he'd help Mummy who was workign upstairs. He opened the door...
Ohmygodheopenedthedoor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tigger got out! I only saw it from the corner of my eye as my office window overlooks the back door. There was a horrendous barking and growling. The whippets took up the challenge and shot downstairs too woofing, I shot after them, didn't bother to put on shoes. There was shouting asnd growling and what seemed to my ears like somthing being dragged over the gravel - Oh please God! NO!! Not the Postman!!!
I bolted out the door slamming it shut on three demented whippets who then bounced up and down barking more ferociously than ever trying to get a better look out the glass panels on the back door.
It was a horrible sight, schadenfreude always is, with the Postman ineffectually batting at the terrier who kept leaping up at him trying to get a better purchase on the his shorts. I saw the dog make contact and the postman whizz him round all four feet off the ground. As he turned I lunged at the dog, grabbing him and in the process nearly pulling the poor Postman's shorts off. I have never had to apologise more profusley and so fast. Mortification was NOT the word. I HATE Jack Russels, I really do!
Needless to say Tigger went back into the house well satisfied with the day's work while Bog Boy round eyed handed me today's post. "Can we do that again tomorrow?"

A Fat Cat

A Fat Cat: Alice 2010

Fat Cat has never really moved about much, so it wasn't all that surprising that on Saturday morning she did not move. What was surprising is that the only time the Fat Cat ever deigned to move was when it involved food, so all things being equal she should have moved on Saturday morning to eat her food.
But perhaps she was eating.
Just not here on earth.
Fat Cat was born immovable, I'd like to say she was Sphynx-like but she never had that gravitas or mystery.
When I first saw her as a kitten in 1996 she was sitting with her front paws curled beneath her close to a radiator. In the whole twenty minute visitation she refused to move. Her litter sister Agatha was moving everywhere in fact she skittered around the corner with all her fur on end and has been skittering ever since. Fat Cat whose name was Slack Alice never skittered, she padded. In fact if she padded far she would have to lie down for a rest before she'd gone more than 20 yards.
She was a considered cat and I loved her for it because as well as being a Fat Cat she was also a Lap Cat. I loved having her sit there while I watched TV, feeling her throbbing purr beneath my hands as I stroked her. I'm going to miss that terribly.
She and her sister were bought by me for my 30th Birthday. I felt that as I was now officially over the hill and boyfriendless I might as well embrace my forthcomoing spinsterhood with good grace and get some cats to complete the picture.
Unfortunately my cheque bounced and after their breeder tracked me down to my work abode and harangued me on the street for fleecing her, it was my boss who actually paid for them. He stumped up the £300 quid and I paid him back in installements with interest. I called them the most expensive pussies in London and that's saying something as I worked just off Soho.
Fat Cat certainly pushed hard on her requisite nine lives. getting stuck under floor boards, eating a ball of wool (luckily I saw the end and was able to pull it from her mouth, I kid you not! I was stunned by how much she ate and how it all came out . Needless to say I used the episode as an excuse not to learn how to knit...). Then there was the time she got outside, now I know cats  should always go outside but Alice was an urban cat and not used to grass. She much preferred concrete or tarmac. When we moved to the countryside she took a stroll outside and just thought it was awful beating a hasty retreat indoors. Even though I always left doors and windows open she never went outside if she could help it. But  one day she felt brave and decided to follow the path outside the front door, down to the gate, along the drive until she got to the middle of the road where finding a nice sunny spot she lay down for a sunbathe and dust bath. We found her rolling around quite unpreturbed by the traffic slowly passing her by. She was quite relieved to see me and proceeded to miaow at me with great feeling. I think that was the most active I ever saw her. I also think she felt that the whole episode only confirmed what she already knew, the great outdoors is vastly overated!

Slack Alice aka Fat Cat

June 1 1996 - August 7 2010

RIP