Being Funny Again, While Just Being Himself.

Okay, so, I went to pick up my mother for Thanksgiving dinner and Rowdy went with us.  When I got to the farm, which was his early stomping grounds and where I initially got him from, I let him run around the yard while I transferred some items from my car to mom's.  When I was just about done, I noticed him wandering off behind a shed and hollered my usual "Where do you think you're going?"  He didn't reappear, so I said, "Get back here!"  Still no dog, so I gave him the usual whistle and told him he was going to get it if he didn't get back here.  Still no dog!  So then I turned around to finish up loading the car and he was sitting in the front seat ready to go.  I never noticed him reappear from behind the shed and how he got passed me and in the car, without me even hearing him was amazing.  I just had to laugh!

Rowdy Got Himself In Trouble!

Usually Rowdy is a good doggie and never hardly does anything wrong, but the other day he had to backslide and pull some napkins with food stuffs on them out of the trash and tear them up.  I have had to scold him a few times for this before, but he hasn't done it in quite a while.  He did this sometime during the middle of the night or early morning and I found the mess when I got up.  He certainly got an ear full of 'bad doggie' that morning, while I was cleaning up the mess and I was mad at him all day over this.  He even went without his morning meal because I was too pissed to feed him and after his scolding, he was not particularly interested in eating either.  He did however get a little extra food for his evening meal and everything had calmed down by then.  He's now back to good doggie mode. 

The Chirping Monster

It's been a while since I posted last.  I've either been way too busy this summer working long hours on the farm, or too tired to write posts when I get home, even though several things happened this summer worth posting.

However, this happened last night.  It was around 3 AM this morning and Rowdy was at the side of the bed and leaning up on the bed, licking at my face and trying to get may attention.  He succeeded in waking me up and I wondered what was bothering him.  He gets scared by the thunderstorms and we had one that evening but all was quiet now, but he still jumped up on the bed.  He is not supposed to be on the bed, except when there is a storm and I put a blanket for him to lay on.  Well, I made him get down, but he went to the other side of the bed and attempted to get up again.  He did this a third time and I was confused as to why he was acting this way, but then I heard it.......Chirp! 

Rowdy was beside himself panting, shaking and whining to get up on the bed and for me to protect him from the Chirping Monster.  A minute later and ....Chirp!...again.  I quickly figured out what it was and Rowdy has been scared by it before.   The smoke detector battery was low and chirping about once a minute. 

I sat up on the side of the bed and Rowdy jumped up on my leg with his front paws, just shaking and shivering.  I asked him in a calm tone, "Is it gonna get you?"  He looked up at me for help and to save him, so I got up and pulled the detector down and pulled the batteries out, so it wouldn't make any more noise.  Rowdy calmed down soon and everything was back to normal until I heard a distant boom-bu-boom.  Another thunderstorm was heading our way but it didn't seem to bother Rowdy this time, not like the Chirping Monster, or so I thought. 

The next morning when I woke up, Rowdy must have been still bothered, either from residuals from the chirping, or the thunderstorm, because sometime when I was asleep, he managed to get up on the bed again down by my feet. I ordered him off the bed and got up for the day.  I put new batteries in the detector, hung it back up and the world was back to normal, at least for a while anyway.

Storm Season Again

Now that it is storm season, last night a thunderstorm passed over us and scared poor little Rowdy.  I had to get his blanket and let him up on the bed with me, so he wouldn't be so scared.  Since he normally is not allowed on the bed, when he got up on it, he laid down and tried to be as inconspicuous as possible and laid very still.  I never felt him move and when I woke up the next morning, he was in the same place only inverted, lying on his back with his feet up in the air.  I don't know when he rolled over, but I guess he thought he would try to get a chest rub before he had to get off the bed.

Hot Dog, Cold Dog

On one of the really cold mornings this winter, I let Rowdy out to take care of business and when I went to let him back in about 30 minutes later, he was lying back by the back wooden privacy fence in the sun.  He jumped up and ran to the door when I called and when he came inside I felt of his body to see how the sun had been warming him on such a cold morning.  The half of his body that was facing the sun was warm and the other half that was against the fence was cold.

I could feel quite a temperature difference between the sides of his body and thought that it was a bit unusual.  I certainly didn't expect to feel that much difference.  I would have thought that the blood circulating in his body would have regulated a more even temperature and also thought there would only be a slight temperature difference.  At least being back inside, his cold side soon matched his warm side and he's back to being just a little Hot-Dog!

Ambush

Across the back of my yard is a wooden privacy fence that squirrels like to travel across the top from one end to the other.  Rowdy is always ready to go after a squirrel and when I saw him take a bead on the back fence, I knew he spotted one.  At the point that the squirrel was on the fence, if Rowdy had chased him, it would have been a short run to the end of the fence and up a tree and gone.  From where I was at that moment, I was in the perfect position to run around the garage and ambush the squirrel from the other side, which I did immediately.  The squirrel took off traversing across the top of the fence the long way as fast as he could and Rowdy was after him all the way across, till the squirrel made it to the other end and up another tree.  The fence is way too tall for Rowdy to jump up and get the squirrel, but the fun was in the chase! 

Dog Fight Deja Vu

At the consignment auction again, at the food area again, the black dog again, started slowly stalking Rowdy.  I hadn't seen the dog all morning, until we got in the food line.  Rowdy slightly cowed and tried to pull away in the opposite direction with his hair standing up a bit.  He remembered her too!  I shewed her away a couple of times as we were standing in line, but she managed to circle around and come up behind me.   About a three second fight took place and I immediately busted them up and shewed the black dog away again.  She tried to get close to Rowdy a couple more times during that afternoon, but would not come very close when I was looking at her. 

I'm growing a bit concerned because she has a bit of a pit bull head and could get much meaner as she gets older, at least to other dogs. She is still a large puppy and is very friendly with the people attending the auction.   If this continues I may not be able to take Rowdy with me, when I attend it.  This is not a stab at pit bulls in general, as I have come across some very friendly ones, but I have also heard that if they taste blood, they will start fighting and killing other dogs.  Since she is not my dog, I will have no way of knowing if she ever did. 

That's Not Your Bed!

Many nights Rowdy has been sneaking down the hall into the den and sleeping on the couch.  I can never hardly catch him there, because he usually hears me coming down the hall and promptly gets up and peers around the corner to see me.  The only reason I know he is down there is because I hear his toe nails clicking on the laminate floor and if I go down there I can feel the warm spot on the couch where he has been laying.  Even though it is not alright for him to blatantly be on the couch, it's really not that bad because it's an old couch that's probably ready to be thrown out to the curb.  But since I can't afford a new one, I still use it.

Well, this morning while in bed, I heard him come back from the den, fumble around and go back down to the den.  When the heater kicked on, for which the noise might provide me cover, I decided to see if I could catch him in the act.  With great stealth I slowly made my way down to the den and peered around the corner at him.  He was laying close to the doorway, sitting with his back toward me with his head down nibbling on himself.  I quietly reached down and with a clawed hand, goosed him and growled like a mad dog at him.  He spun around like lightening and gave me an ut-oh look and then jumped off the couch and half circled me with his tail between his legs.  Then he stopped and looked up at me and I said, "Get down there!" and he tore off running down the hall and got back in his bed.  I wasn't really mad at him and was actually laughing on the inside at the way he got caught in trouble and how he ran away from it, without really being punished.