Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Indulge Me

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Every night around 9:00 pm, the dogs get their Kongs that have been stuffed with fruit and yogurt and then frozen.

I prefer to keep the dogs separated because one of them can be greedy and usually finishes before the other.  (Two guesses, the first one doesn’t count.) 🙂

Delilah gets hers in the living room and Sampson gets his on our bed in the bedroom.  I usually lay a towel down for Sampson since he’s on the bed covers.

Last night Delilah got her treat and as usual ran into the living room, Sampson was already on the couch.  He’s usually on the couch but when I go in with his Kong he will reluctantly rise and follow me into the bedroom.

I brought his Kong out to the living room and asked “Do you want your treat?”

He wagged his tail and gave me his best puppy dog eyes.

I said, “Ok, you wait here and I’ll go get your towel.”

Do you know he did?  It was like he understood exactly what I said!

I came out with his towel and he wagged his tail and smiled at me.

 

Thanks Mom. I was just really tired.

Do you indulge your pets?  If so, how?

Holy Smack Down Batman!

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When we got to the park last night the LaCrosse team was there. 🙁

Lately someone has been opening the gate to the park so most of the cars drive right in.  It was kind of overcast and pretty windy and at one point in our walk I said, “We’re going to get some weather tonight.”  Of course neither one of the dogs answered me because….well they’re dogs and they can’t talk.

While we were walking Hubby called and said he was on his way home, he said he’d meet us at the park.  I figured he’d be getting there pretty close to the time we were leaving and I was right.

Hubby drives a Jeep Wrangler, it’s his baby.  He’s had it lifted, he puts accessories on it, he loves it. He has a soft top and soft doors so the hard ones can come off in the summer and he can remove the soft doors when the weather is nice and he takes the top down.  It is a boy’s toy.  Did I mention he loves it?

I figured when Hubby came to the park he would drive the jeep right in and I was right, since the gate is rarely open and he likes driving his jeep in the woods. He thinks it’s cool. Go figure.  He was driving up the main path as we were walking down.

Sampson and Delilah were excited to see him but we were on our way out, so I asked them to sit so Hubby could pass (they did of course.)  Hubby said, “You can go ahead, I’ll go slow.”

So Sampson, Delilah and I started out of the park with Hubby driving behind us. Sampson kept running back to the jeep wanting to go with Daddy, but the jeep following us was freaking Delilah out.  She kept turning around and looking and after about 30 seconds of this I said to Hubby, “Go ahead, she doesn’t care to have you behind us.”

After we had exited the park Hubby asked Sampson if he would like to ride home with Daddy.  I’d like to say Sampson jumped at the chance but truthfully the jeep is so high that neither one of us can hike our fat butts into it.  Daddy had to help him up.

Delilah of course, went with me.

Hubby has this thing about parking behind me.  I could speculate about the reasoning, why men like to be behind women, but then I don’t really think this would be a dog blog. 🙂

So Hubby sat in the road while I drove around him.

Sometimes I have premonitions.  Scoff if you’d like but it’s true.  It is usually just a strange or random thought and I never realize it’s a premonition until after, and it’s usually fairly quickly after.

In this case, I drove by the jeep on the passenger side and noticed Sampson sitting there, with no seat belt and no doors.  I thought to myself, “I don’t like the idea of him in the jeep with no doors on it.”  This (in retrospect) was the premonition.

It’s a very quick trip from the park to our house with about seven houses on each side of the street.  From the park down the hill our house is on the left.  Since we are in America and not in Europe, I was driving on the right-hand side of the road.

Just as I got ready to pull into our driveway, I heard a very loud, whooshing sound.  I turned around just as this really large branch fell from the very top of a tree, missing the jeep by inches.

It may not look it, but it’s a VERY large branch.

I’m almost 100% certain that my eyes were wide and my mouth was open and I was doing a fairly good impression of a tree frog trapped by a snake.

We pulled into our driveway and Hubby and I got out of our vehicles in a bit of shock.  Hubby said the tree branch did in fact hit the top of the jeep and scared my punkin so, that he actually climbed onto Hubby’s lap.  (OMD I just got a case of the giggles thinking of  big ole Sampson squishing himself between Hubby’s tummy and the steering wheel.)  Hubby lifted up his shirt and had a huge scratch where Sampson scrabbled over him.  My poor, poor punkin was so scared.

Thankfully he seemed fine when he got out of the jeep.

We put the dogs in the house and went over to help the neighbor.  She’s an older woman suffering from MS and she uses a walker.  She was actually out there picking up the smaller pieces and putting them on her walker and chuffing them up the driveway.

So whaddaya say?  Was that a premonition or not?

I say it’s the Saturday morning blog hop hosted by our friends at Two Little Cavaliers, Confessions of the Plume, and Life With Dogs.

You can link up at any of the above hosts.  Enjoy your Saturday!

Exercising Challenges

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It’s been incredibly hot and humid in the northeast the last three or four days which makes exercising the dogs pretty challenging.  I haven’t been able to find any areas of water they can swim in and Sampson is not a big swimmer anyway, so we stuck to our walks.

I generally keep their walks short in this type of weather, anywhere from 20 to 25 minutes,because I worry about heat stroke. If I have the time in the morning before the heat of the day catches up, I like to take advantage of it.  Such was the case the past couple of days.

Yesterday I decided to take the dogs down to the back part of the woods.  This is an area I generally don’t go to for a number of reasons 1) the scare I had back there last year, 2) the path has very easy access to a much larger park so there are generally more people and dogs down there and 3) the path down and back is very steep.

It was only about 9:15 am, but it was already warm and very humid.  There is a lovely little brook (when we have our fair share of rain) down there and it gives the dogs a little drink and a place to cool off.  Plus there is less sun busting through the trees which it makes the hiking somewhat comfortable.

As Kristine indicated last week, The Leaves Are Back In Town which means when you are walking your dog off-leash it’s not as easy to see approaching people or dogs.

The nice thing about this area is there are a number of options for walking, one of which is a lovely wash, that is fairly wide (in terms of hiking trails) with quite a good view of the trail ahead.

Very good visibility.

We walked for about 10 to 12 minutes up the wash, then I turned around and headed back.  I knew this would be the toughest part due to the steepness of the climb.

Luckily there are lots of stones, both small and large embedded in the ground, as well as some areas where tree roots are exposed.  I use these stones and roots as a way to secure myself to keep from slipping and falling.

Almost like stairs.

When we are heading down these steep areas, I usually say, “Easy Delilah, Easy” and she actually does very little pulling and waits very patiently for me.

On the way back up however I have been heard to say, “Pull Delilah Pull.” 🙂

Delilah is spectacular on the hills.  She is also great on the giant rocks, sometimes I actually think she is part Mountain Goat as I have literally seen her go straight up the face of a rock.

We’d been out about 35 minutes by the time we reached the top of the cliff, and yes I’m calling that a cliff, so shut it.

I swear the picture doesn’t do it justice!

By the time we got back to the car it had been about 45 minutes, that coupled with the fact that they were sniffing and exploring a new area, helped tire them out.  After a quick cool off in the pool, they each found a comfy spot and settled in for a well deserved snooze.

Whoo, that was a tough one!

 

You can say that again!

Delilah did rally a little bit later to play a couple of rounds of fetch to help us make a showing in K-9 Kamp, but for the most part they had a pretty mellow, relaxing day. 🙂

Do you modify your dog’s exercise when it’s hot and/or humid?  If so, what types of things do you do?

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