hello again

Posted on February 3, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Sunday February 3rd 2019

 

Well, we’re using the iPad today. Still getting used to it so goodness knows what silly mistakes will appear. Wait until I try adding an image: now that really will be fun.

Little dog has lived a lot since she last posted so where to begin?

Just made mistake 1. My wandering fingers took me elsewhere. This happens often on the iPod. I’m not good at keeping my hand still, which, of course, doesn’t matter so much on the desktop.

Illogically, I’ll begin with a few days ago when something rather lovely happened. Isis is running about on the lower bowling green when, much to my surprise, she stops and walks towards me.

She does, as we know, come and check me out nowadays but this is almost always when I move from one spot to another, or when she is walking in front of me.

I’m even more surprised when she sits down at my side and waits for all the world like a small hairy statue. It’s as though she has been commanded to come to heel.

I stand and wonder, running all possible explanations through my mind. She looks perfectly confident so she’s not come to me because she’s afraid. She’s interrupted her play after only a few minutes so she’s definitely not ready to go home. The bowling green is empty except for the two of us and it’s a dull, damp day. Exactly as she likes things to be.

I know she’s not hoping for a treat. Outside the house she never does.

At last a most unlikely thought enters my head. She couldn’t possibly need help, could she?

I look down at her. There’s a long, thin, twangy twig caught in the hair of her left foreleg. I remove it, give her a little pat and a touch which means ‘off you go now’.

She stands. She promptly sits down again.

Oh well, it was a long shot anyway.

She waits in the same alert, expectant position as before, close to my side.

She couldn’t really have come to ask for the twig to be removed, could she?

There couldn’t be another one, could there?

There is. It’s stuck across her chest.

We go through the same routine as before: I carefully detatch the stick from her hair, give her a second comforting pat and then encourage her to run off and play. As before, she stands. As before, she immediately sits down again, the perfect demonstration of the finish to a perfect recall.

This is becoming ridiculous. I examine my Hairy One  from head to toe.

There, between her thighs and curling among the sparse hairs of her pink belly is the nastiest twig of all. Long and sinuous, it must be causing her extreme discomfort.

Poor little Isis.

I stand her up and slowly, slowly, hair by hair, I disentangle the long twig with its many ensnaring buds and off-shoots and lift it away from her skin.

This time, she pauses only for the briefest of  ‘all clear’ pats before racing off to resume her play.

I am amazed. And very impressed. I am also very touched.

Who could possibly believe that dogs can’t think?

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

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how to drive yourself crazy

Posted on February 1, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days : Wednesday and Sunday, and, sometimes, extra bits in between.

 

Friday February 1st 2019

 

Yes. It’s not difficult to drive yourself crazy. You do, of course, require a little help from fate; but that does not seem too difficult to come by.

Now,  I knew that I would have to replace my car. Fair enough, it was fifth hand and over nineteen years old.

The demise of the washing machine three weeks ago was unexpected but that was old too, I guess. Eventually that was sorted, though not before seven bags of washing had accumulated.

Never mind, one  must be philosophical: I’m OK. Isis and Daisy are OK. And last week was a new week, wasn’t it?

It was, and on Tuesday the computer screen departed.

Next day one of my front teeth dropped out.

Never mind, I have others.

M. diagnoses the screen problem: I need just a new monitor.

OK. New monitor.

What’s driving me crazy is trying to access the blog and everything else on the iPod. I love the iPod, which Adopted Niece gave me last year when she bought a new one, but being idle, I’ve only used it for catch up broadcasts.

Today it’s taken me three hours to order cat food, one canine item and to access the blog.

EEEK !

All I needed to tell  you was that Isis and I hope to resume normal service next Sunday ALL BEING WELL.

It was quite cathartic to moan though.

P

 

 

 

 

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Thank you for your response. ✨

 

 

k

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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oh dear, dear, dear

Posted on January 24, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Thursday January 23rd 2019

 

Many apologies. Owing to unforseen circumstances, Wednesday’s blog will now appear on Thursday.

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

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Isis walks alone

Posted on January 20, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Sunday January 20th 2019

 

I know Human’s always going on about Highbury Park, but I really have been having an amazingly good time there. Over the holidays, I went almost every day.

We had lovely weather. Lots of the days were grey and there was lots of lovely rain. There was wind as well.

Human came with me, but she didn’t need to.

 

 

I’m a confident dog now, so I can go a long way away on my own.

 

Can you see a tiny white spot by the middle tree? That’s me.

 

I’ll  walk into the beech wood by myself. I’m not scared.

But some of the trees are very, very big. This one might come after me.

 

Eeek! What’s that?

 

Yowk! There’s two of it.

And there’s another one up there.

 

Think I’ll get out of here

 

or perhaps if I just sit down, it’ll go away.

 

 

Ah, I smell Human. Tail up. Scared? What me?

 

 

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

Posted in clever girl, clever Isis, Highbury Park, I'm off my lead!, scary shadows, walking in the park, walking my deaf/blind dog | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Isis dines in

Posted on January 16, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Wednesday January 16th 2019

 

It’s a long time since I bewailed the return of Hairy One’s hysterical approach to mealtimes.

After she came to live here, it took at least two years of gentle training before she calmed down and began to modify her behaviour. Well, lets admit it, I modified her behaviour. She still believed that she needed to defend her dinner from the coyotes and vultures which, she was convinced, were closing in on her food bowl. She controlled herself with great difficulty and only because she realised that I would remove her food if she didn’t.

It was a precarious peace, and relapses were easily triggered.

Unfortunately, as I reported last autumn, when I was ill she had to stay in kennels for three weeks, and by the time she returned home, the old habits had returned.

Of course they had. There really were dozens of animals around her. She could smell them: big, fierce dogs who could swallow a small dog and her food; sly, predatory cats; trickster rabbits, bored with carrots; guinea pigs, horses, even a llama.

As for the birds, you could hardly imagine the hordes of those claw and beaked assassins. What do you expect a dog to do?

Climb the walls. What else?

Retraining has taken well over a year. You know the monotonous routine: Isis begins winding herself up with a few threatening growls and yaps before these rise to a crescendo of snarls, snaps, screeches and loud, strangled barks. Simultaneously, she twirls round to attack her tail and back legs before  launching herself repeatedly up the kitchen wall.

Donning leather gardening gloves, I remove her food.

The following morning, the process is repeated all over again. And again. And again. Ad nauseum.

It’s not until I raise the stakes and do not return the bowl, that her behaviour begins to improve.

Now, after about fifteen months, she follows her very nice sitting-to-wait-for-‘eat it’- signal with impeccable table manners.

It’s a strange thing, but I only become fully aware of the transformation when the winter sun is low in the sky. Isis hates low in the sky sun. It freaks her out, poor little dog. She flinches, cowers and slinks close to the ground, desperately seeking cover.

Over the last few weeks, we’ve had a lot of bright morning sunshine. At breakfast time, strong rays, distorted as they pass through the frosted glass of the front door, slice into the hall, and Isis barks loudly in annoyance.

At first my heart sinks. Oh no, not again, just when she’d got over her kennels experience.

But I’m wrong. The barking remains a response to the specific sun nuisance.

So far, she has not returned to the mealtime hysteria of earlier times.

Thank dog.

 

 

Although she is not, of course, in her dining room , this is exactly the position she takes up when waiting to eat!

 

 

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

Posted in food rage, Isis at home, poor Isis, self-harming, strange behaviour, teaching my deaf/blind dog, training, twirling, we don't like bright sun | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

enter Maisie

Posted on January 13, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Sunday January 13th 2019

 

I receive a delightful e-mail this week from L., whose poodles Dougie and Fergie featured more than once in the blog.

L. moved away from Birmingham last April and is very much missed by we  Kings Heath and Highbury Park dog walkers.

Isis took most of her earliest off-lead walks in their company. They were all very patient with her, even when she stopped for twenty minutes to dance on her grass mound, refused to move at all, or veered off the path causing us to dash after and retrieve her. She was very relaxed around them.

Dougie and Fergie, L, tells me a day or two ago, have a very new baby ‘sister’, Maisie.

L. has always had rescued or rehomed dogs, and longed to bring up a puppy. Her family clubbed together and for her Christmas and birthday got her a very special pup.

The photo below was taken when pup first arrived at her new home.

She’s on the right looking apprehensive; Dougie, in the middle, seems very smug. He definitely has the ‘I’m the one on her lap’ expression.

But it’s Fergie’s face which says it all: ‘Dougie’s on her lap, he’s holding someone smelly who shouldn’t be here, and no-one’s taking any notice of me.

 

 

 

 

 

Hmmm. First impressions can be very hard to abandon, Fergie.

Here is a close up of little sister.

 

 

 

 

 

Who could resist her?

What was that, Fergie?

Despite their misgivings, the boys have been good with Maisie (most of the time) says L.

Fergie remains unimpressed with her and tries to pretend she’s not there, while  Dougie tolerates her. Unfortunately for Dougie, she adores him. They play chase in the garden and Maisie finds little nooks and crannies to hide in.

Even so, according to L., Dougie must have been very deeply asleep for Maisie to have managed to do this ……………………………………

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the five litter mates. I think that Maisie may be the one who goes into reverse, but I’m not certain!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Maisie is too young to walk in public places yet, but, ensconced in a puppy papoose, accompanies her brothers on their walks!

I ask L. how she ever gets anything done with this squishable little charmer around. She doesn’t get much done beyond dog walking, she tells me.

Maisie has taken over.

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

Posted in Highbury Park, Kings Heath Park, park dogs, the dogs of King's Heath Park, walking in the park, walking my deaf/blind dog | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

post script

Posted on January 13, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Sunday January 13th 2019

 

Here’s a postscript to the last post.

Hairy One’s fourth and fifth presents, given to her by Hannah of Pawfect Dogsense were a lovely squeezy yellow ball – which I am keeping aside for when her present ball goes to ball heaven – and a large hide chew with which most sensible dogs would have been delighted.

Ingrate Isis does not acknowledge this chew as something edible and retreats  in disgust. I give it to a deserving and more grateful canine who enjoys it immensely).

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

 

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four presents for Isis: part 2

Posted on January 9, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Wednesday January 9th 2019

 

Since I am a silly, anthropomorphic human, I save one of the presents for Christmas Day. It’s the one which I am certain will be a sure fire hit.

It’s her tiger.

 

 

 

 

 

Tiger, the advertisement on Fetch’s website says, has nineteen squeakers. In fact, I count twenty. Brilliant! The toy is very soft and furry – Isis likes soft and furry – and has no stuffing to be pulled out.

This seems to me a very good idea. Isis, it so happens, isn’t a stuffing remover, but many dogs are, and it’s not good for the respiratory or the digestive system, I  imagine.

Anyway, I digress. There I am on Christmas Day, eagerly anticipating how my dear little dog will relish playing with her lovely toy.

“Happy Christmas, sweetheart,” and other soppy things, I say, holding out her amazing gift for her to smell.

Is she ecstatic?

Delighted?

Even faintly interested?

No.

She turns her head away.

Oh.

My Ellie would have been thrilled with a tiger, especially one which dangled limply, inviting a good shaking. She loved soft toys. (She even removed any label first. This always fascinated me. I guess it was a primitive umbilical cord severing instinct which made her do it.)

But again I digress. Isis is definitely less than thrilled. Silly Human is disappointed. But Isis is Isis. She’ll do things her way.

At dog’s bed time, interfering, as usual, I place tiger close to Hairy One’s pillow.

In the morning, obviously summarily evicted, tiger lies on the floor by the day bed.

All attempts to interest her in her new toy fail dismally.

I should have known they would: when Isis says no, she means no. Her toy remains where she dropped it.

A few days later, curious about how she’ll react, I take  the tiger into the front room and place it on the rug. If things belong to her, she keeps them in her room. Will she own it?

Isis potters in, finds it, and, without hesitation, picks it up, carries it carefully into the back room and places it next to her dog bed.

Ah. So she does know it’s hers.

But she still doesn’t play with it.

A few days later, Adopted Niece visits and I tell her the story. Then I fetch tiger and place it once more on the rug.

“She loves squeaky toys”,  I tell A.N. She’ll play with them in the garden all day, so why is she ignoring this one?”

At which, of course, Isis grasps tiger round its neck, shakes it vigorously, and

SQUEEEEAK, SQEEAKKKK, SQUEE-EE-EE-EE-EE-EE-EEK!

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

 

 

x

Posted in deaf/blind dog plays, dear little Isis, Isis at home, Isis says "No"., strange behaviour | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

four presents for Isis

Posted on January 6, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Sunday January 6th 2019

 

Isis has four Christmas presents.

Ji. buys her a pack of delicious Caesar meals. We’re sure she’ll be delighted with these.

 

 

 

 

 

She is. Every single pea disappears from her bowl in an instant.Yum! Yum!

 

 

 

 

 

The big orange squeaky comes from Wilkinsons. I’m very pleased to come across it as I’ve been looking for a squeaky toy which will last. Isis never destroys her toys: they just wear out, the squeaky ones particularly quickly. She’ll squeeze them passionately for forty minutes or so. And then they die.

I decide to give her the toy before Christmas. It’s a long time since I’ve bought her anything to play with, and she has two more presents left.

I offer it to her first in the front room. She flinches away from it.

Oh.

I put it on the rug and wait for her to ‘discover’ it. She twirls around on the rug, but every time a paw comes in contact with the toy, she withdraws the paw immediately and moves away.

Oh.

She sits down close to it but when she feels it touching a strand of her hair, she twitches and moves away.

I expect she’ll get used to it in time.

Two, three, four weeks pass. She continues to be affronted by my generous gift.

Oh.

On Monday I get up late. I have an appointment in two hours, so, rather than cut Hairy One’s walk time short, I take her into the lane behind the house.

Now, Isis always likes something to play with in the lane. It used to be sticks which stuck to the roof of her mouth when she snapped them, but now she’s a  grown up dog, she eschews sticks. Fortunately.

Usually she plays with one of her snakes, but sneaky Human just wonders whether, if there’s nothing else to play with, she just might ……….

I put the orange squeaky toy on the grass It’s a long time since she’s been in the lane and for the first fifteen minutes or so she runs around exploring. Then she begins hunting for something to play with. There’s nothing around except for a few soggy twigs. She picks one up but drops it again. She sniffs round the bushes and in the undergrowth. Even the brambles she likes to tug at are dead.

I watch as she picks up the scent of the toy, finds it, sniffs it, then leaves it where it is and hops off to dance in a small muddy patch – incidentally, the only mud in the lane.

Sigh.

She approaches the toy six times. Each time she hunts, picks up its scent,  sniffs it and retreats. She really, really, wants something to play with.

It’s now approach number seven. She sniffs it again. Then she shifts her position slightly and sniffs it from a different angle. She circles the toy, sniffing it carefully from every angle.

Will she? Won’t she?

Yeay! At last, she opens her reluctant little jaws wide enough to take it between her teeth. Tentatively, though, and she doesn’t lift it.

Uh-uh ………………………………..

Then,

 

 

 

 

she lifts from the grass, and, grasping it firmly, runs back to her mud patch with it, and back to the grass. To and fro she runs, joyfully squeaking.

Finally, she settles.

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, she’s definitely decided it’s hers.

One down and two to go, then.

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

Posted in deaf/blind dog plays, I'm off my lead!, Isis at home, Isis says "No"., scenting | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Isis refuses

Posted on January 3, 2019 by patinkingsheath

 

 

Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

 

Wednesday January 2nd 2019

 

Well, Human’s not had a good beginning to 2019.

On Tuesday the washing machine refuses to drain. ^*+!.

Never mind, we’ll have a relaxing walk in the park and then think about the washing machine.

Isis jumps happily into her car. I remove her lead and clip on her safety harness.

The car won’t start.

Great.

Isis is not impressed when I unclip her safety harness, clip her lead back on and set off along the pavement.

Although it’s a dull day, no sun to threaten her, she walks a few steps in one direction then sticks like a limpet to the pavement and refuses to move. After a minute or two, I set off in the opposite direction. Again, Isis walks a few steps and sits down again.

This little performance is repeated three or four times.

We cross the road and walk another three or four steps. She stiffens her legs and bucks like a bronco, dragging her harness down over her head.

Muttering extremely unladylike comments, and resisting the urge to strangle her, I gently unfasten all of the clips, remove the harness, replace it, fix all the clips again.

Then I try walking in the opposite direction.

Another refusal.

We recross the road, and, just when I’m about to give up and return home, she flicks up her tail and sets off in the direction I first thought of as though nothing untoward has happened.

I say more very rude things.

We walk to the park without further incident, but, unfortunately, she’s anxious while we are there and doesn’t enjoy herself.

Even more unfortunately, it’s late afternoon by the time we leave, and the sky has changed. She doesn’t care for the particular shade of grey it’s taken on.

No way, she decides, is she walking home.

She keeps sitting down and refusing to move. I have to stagger most of the way home bent double, attempting to reassure her.

Well, what a lovely relaxing walk. Not.

On Wednesday, it’s even more dull than the day before. Surely she’ll not object to walking today, will she?

Oh yes, she will.

It’s only five houses from our gate to the closest turn off, but, dog, is it a hassle to get her there. Alternately, I heave and shove. In the end, I carry the cross and very heavy little toad for the last few yards.

This time we stick to a road walk. We take a different route from usual and there  are numerous new smells to engage her; even so, at regular intervals, I have to persuade her to not to slow down and stop.

Now my shoulders are burning. I hope I’ve not damaged them hauling on her harness.

What else can you do with a dog who only wants to walk if she’s chauffered to the park?

Never mind, there’s a lot of 2019 left, and, as they say, tomorrow’s another day.

 

 

 

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk

Posted in Isis says "No"., poor Isis | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments