Tag: humor

Sleeping Dogs

Have you ever watched your dog sleep? The way they curl up in a tight ball tucking their nose under their hind leg and wrapping their tail on top of that to ward off the chill. Or when they get too hot and roll over on their back and splay their back legs out to cool off. You can tell a lot about a dog’s life just by watching the way they sleep.

A dog that has been abused or abandoned sleeps very lightly sometimes laying on their stomachs front legs bent jutting out between their head and rear legs tucked under ready to leap up for fight or flight. It takes a long time for a dog that has had a rough life to relax and begin to trust that danger is not waiting just around the corner.

Our dogs, Charlie and Orso, are the poster dogs for living the good life. We got Charlie at the young age of ten weeks and has never know anything but pamperhood. We rescued Orso at nine months from a young man that couldn’t keep him any longer. Charlie is now nine years old and Orso is seven and a half years old so I have had lots of time viewing their sleeping habits.

Charlie snores, and very loudly for a seventy pound dog, louder than Mitch sometimes. Orso breathes heavy, sometimes he works up a snore but nothing like Charlie. Charlie sleeps so deeply his eyes are closed tight and lays stretched out taking up as much real estate as his little body can. He juts out his legs straight away from his body and at times they are limp and relaxed and other times his legs are stiff as boards, earning him the nickname “Rigor” for rigor mortis. Which is especially fun at night when he is sleeping next to you pushing against you with those stiff legs. Yes we are those weak people that let their dogs sleep with us. We lost that battle years ago.

Orso at one hundred pounds takes up a bit space when he stretches out and gets even heavier when he lays his head on your legs sound asleep. You will not easily escape the dead weight of a dog that is so sound asleep. His eyes roll up in the back of his head when he is sound asleep. He looks like a big brown speed bump when he stretches out to his full fifty-three inch long tip of his nose to the end of tail body.

Both dogs dream and it is a hoot to watch them deep in throes of R.E.M. Charlie’s eyes roll back and forth under his eyelids. Sometimes he squeaks and sometimes he growls, I guess it depends on what he’s dreaming about and who he’s chasing. It usually starts at his front legs with a slight twitch, then growing stronger adding his back legs, then his legs run at break neck speed chasing whatever it is he is after.

Orso does it a bit differently from Charlie, his back legs jerk first, not a mere twitch, oh no, a full on jerk and you don’t want to be anywhere close when he start jerking those legs, he has left marks. Then he moves up to his front legs and then in concert Orso’s legs run in tandem after the unseen target. His eyes roll back and forth and his lips twitch sometimes working up a growl or moan.

I’m telling you watching a dog sleep is better than the reality TV shows on cable.

Photo Shoot

Here are some photos from a play day with a new friend, Eddy, and because I’m not feeling very creative.

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Eddy and Orso face to face

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Orso

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Eddy checking out Orso’s pearly whites

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Charlie looking happy

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Who wants to play stick – come on let’s play stick

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Eddy and Orso winding down

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Two tired puppies

Photos taken with my Canon Rebel

So Many Choices

Oh what to do, what to do, so many choices. My fun options for the day, finish working on the tax return, clean out the closet or spend some quality time on my elliptical working out. I mean, these are some difficult choices to make. Which sounds like more fun, taxes or closet, closet or working up a sweat, I just can’t decide. How much fun can one person stand on a snowy cold Saturday? Any takers? No? Can’t say that I blame you, I even gave Mitch the choice of taxes or ironing and can you believe it, he would rather spend the afternoon ironing than work on the taxes.

I would make the dogs do the taxes, but they don’t have thumbs so they get out of it by default. They get to have all the fun. They lay around sleeping on our bed storing up energy to be able to eat, run around like lunatics and sleep some more. I shouldn’t complain, I have to do the taxes because we are lucky enough to have jobs to feed us and pay the bills. Sidebar to the jobs, I splurged and bought a Powerball ticket at the store so maybe next year we won’t have jobs. We’ll still have to fill out our tax return, but it will be more fun when I have a few extra zeroes and commas on the end.

And because of the jobs I have a closet full of clothes that I desperately need to clean out. I can also blame the jobs for me buying the elliptical to work out on at the odd hours of the day and night. Come to think of it, it’s all the jobs fault I have to make these choices. If we didn’t have jobs, I wouldn’t have to fill out a tax return (no earnings), clean out a closet (no clothes) or work out on the elliptical (no elliptical). We would starve and freeze to death, but that’s beside the point. I wouldn’t have to make a choice between the above options. I would have other more fun choices to make.

Choices, like which bridge to sleep under, which dumpster to go diving in for dinner, or searching for a job to be able to eat and stay warm. Okay, so I don’t have anything to really complain about, but it’s my Saturday, my day off from the grind, my day off to do something fun. I could be going hiking or shopping, something fun, but no I’m sitting here trying to decide between taxes, cleaning out the closet or working out. I would flip a coin, but then I would have to flip it twice and with my luck the coin would roll into the closet and I would have to clean it out to find out which choice won. I am such a drub.

He’s My Doofus

Question: Know anybody that wants a ninety eight pound drool machine? Answer: No one in their right mind. Don’t get me wrong, I have no intentions of getting rid of Orso or Charlie for that matter. I simply posed the question to examine on my own sanity or lack thereof. The main reason we have dogs is for pheasant hunting. The by-product of that is companionship, unconditional love (from both humans and dogs) and entertainment. So why is it that we own a ninety eight pound chocolate lab that doesn’t particularly like water that would prefer boat rides to swimming and doesn’t care at all for hunting? Oh sure he enjoys being out in the field with us, wandering around behind me so I can break down the brush ahead for him. But the idea of sticking his nose to the ground and searching for a bird is beneath him. That’s Charlie’s job. Orso will rush up and try to play tug of war with Charlie when he finds the downed bird. But the hunting part, that is not his style.

Orso’s main purpose in life is to eat anything and everything he can get in his mouth, sleep on our bed sprawled out to his full five and a half foot length and launch drool missiles on as many walls as possible. He is also the most vocal dog I have ever seen. He barks at me when I pick up my purse and put on my coat to leave because he wants to go too. He barks at me when I come home. He barks at me when I do take him with me, especially when he has to stay in the car. Orso has learned and memorized the routes to the store, the gas station and Mitch’s work and knows the difference in each. When I take Mitch to work in the morning he just sits patiently and barks once to tell Mitch goodbye. He knows when we go to the gas station and waits patiently while I fill the tank, watching all of the other people around. But when I go to the store he howls like a girl as soon as he figures out where we’re going. People turn and stare at the shrill high pitched wailing coming from this huge brown head hanging out of the car window. God forbid if I go someplace he is not familiar with or take a different route, he starts wailing before he even knows where we end up at. Sometimes he is the most annoying dog ever.

Orso is also totally devoted to me. He follows me everywhere. When I sit at the computer he jumps off the comfy bed to lay on the floor next me. Outside he follows me or lies down to watch me mow and when I’m done he runs down to meet me and walk back beside me while I push the mower to the shed. If I can’t go on the walk for some reason and Mitch has to take the dogs by himself, Orso turns his head back over his shoulder to watch for me. Mitch has said on numerous occasions that he spends the major part of the walk tugging on Orso’s leash to get the dog to walk with him

He’s a big a doofus, but he’s my big doofus.

Snow Dogs

What is it about snow that makes a seven year old dog think he is a one year old puppy again? We had about two inches of snow the other night, but the streets had been cleared making it easy to walk the dogs. I took the dogs on a walk and both acted like perfect gentlemen as we left the house and walked down the street. All three of us were on the lookout for deer or other wild animals in the dark. Charlie and Orso, because they want to chase something anything, me, because I don’t walk to get my arms ripped out of their sockets or knocked off my feet and slammed to the pavement left to freeze in the dark. I know, pretty selfish on my part, but I’m the one with the house key.

Everything was nice and peaceful, a great walk all the way to the dam. On the way back I spotted three deer standing in a yard up on the hill, but lucky for me the wind was blowing the other direction so the dogs didn’t pick up their scent. We walked past them, with the dogs oblivious and the deer stood very still waiting for us to get beyond them. Both dogs sniffed and peed on just about everything they could all the way back.

Just as we got back to our driveway, which hadn’t been shoveled yet, Orso decided that he was twelve months old again and spun around in a circle and jumped at Charlie for a full on tag team match, leaving me on the ground with my feet sticking out in front of me. Luckily I went down on my rear end and not on my face or we would have had dog stew for dinner. Orso turned around looking a bit contrite, not too contrite but a little and when he realized I wasn’t dead he turned back to Charlie for a snow romp. I let go of the leash too late to save myself but in time to not get dragged into a chest bumping dog wrestling match.

It took me ten minutes to get them back under control and into the house. It seems Charlie can still act like a puppy too when the mood strikes him.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from Orso, Charlie and me. Mitch too.
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Not for the Faint of Heart

The other day I shot my mouth off and said how much I love the hustle and bustle of the holidays, but that was before we went to Toys R Us. That store is only for the strong at heart, not amateurs like Mitch and me. The store was packed and the game of the day was avoiding being run down by mad shoppers pushing carts insanely about in search of the perfect toy. We were there to shop for our four granddaughters four years old down to one year old. I stood there looking very glassy eyed at all the options, while Mitch totally overloaded wandered off with a blank look on his face.

I walked down aisles and aisles of dolls, books and toys based on age looking very shell shocked. Did they already have this doll or was this toy too young or too old? I was in way over my head. I looked around for help from Mitch and he was gone. Off I went to try and find him, thinking maybe he had a stroke of brilliance and was getting the perfect gifts. I finally found him in the Star Wars section playing with light sabers and full size storm troopers. My nine year old boy had come out to play just when I needed adult help.

I reminded him that we were there for girl gifts and he wasn’t helping. I forced him to break away from the boy side of the store and tried to make our way back to the girl side fighting shoppers and their carts. Once again Mitch’s attention was drawn to a display of stick ball bats. I didn’t even know they made stick ball bats. He suggested that we buy one for each little girl and it could be “survival of the fittest”. I reminded him again that we were dealing with little girls and that the bats were taller than the girls.

After an hour of wandering up and down aisles, we finally came away with hopefully gifts that will get oohed and awed. I had no idea that Christmas shopping could be a full contact sport. Boy do I need a drink.

Orso, Orso

One of the downsides to Orso is that he drools, not a little oh no, he drools like a Saint Bernard. Sometimes I am not so sure that the breeder who sold him to kid that we rescued Orso from didn’t sell him a bill of goods. Chocolate lab my eye, this dog has all of the saliva glands of a Mastiff or other wet mouth breed. I am constantly doing walk throughs in the every room of the house looking for his drool shrapnel hits. He drools all the time. He also loves to get close and touch me leaving very large slobber marks on my sleeve or pant leg. So gross.

This morning on our walk in nine degree weather, I noticed something hanging from Orso’s mouth. At first I thought he had picked up a stick and was carrying it home to chew on later. It was hard to make out what it was exactly in the dark so I kept walking the dogs and watching. When we got back home and standing under porch light I got a good look at the five inch long frozen drool hanging from his mouth like an icicle on a house.

Any day now he is going magically change into a Mastiff I just know it.

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I am Tired of the Cold and it’s only December

I must be getting old. I’ve never been a super big fan of the cold, preferring to stay inside bundled up with about a hundred layers. I make the effort to take the dogs on their walks like a dedicated pet owner, but if there was a way to get them to hold it until say, March I wouldn’t complain. Of course that isn’t possible so I put on multiple layers and go tromping outside. But it is definitely not fun, since the temperatures have been bitterly cold the last few days with highs in the teens.

The up side is that both of the dogs are getting old too. Orso is now seven and Charlie is a senior citizen at nine. Neither one of them is too enamored with hanging outside too long. Charlie has short hair and gets cold quick and Orso is just a big sissy. This morning our first outing consisted of running outside after breakfast for a quick trot around the yard to do their business and a mad dash to get back inside where it was warm and carrots were waiting as treats. The second outing was later than usual around ten am, with us holding out hope for a heat wave, (didn’t happen), but at least the snow was very light by then. The temperature had warmed up to a sultry eighteen degrees Fahrenheit.

I had on a tee shirt, a flannel shirt, micro fleece jacket and a lined parka and that was just on the upper half of my body. The lower half I had on sweat pants and insulated wind pants, which work very well for keeping my legs warm and the wind out, I just swish when I walk. I even wore silk glove liners and down leather mittens. I am the bigger sissy here and I’m not afraid to admit it. I think it took longer to get dressed than it took for the walk. We did not dally on the walk, it was walk, get to the task at hand and get back home.

The third outing after they ate dinner was pretty much a repeat of the second outing, with me looking like a chunky monkey dressed in a gazillion layers with a drippy nose from the cold. Why couldn’t they have been litter trained like a cat? More importantly why don’t we live some place warmer?

Today is the First Day of the Rest of My Life

First I want to thank all of my readers and fellow bloggers that have hung in there with me for the past three and a half years. You’ve read my stories, laughed and cried with me and left me wonderful comments that have kept me writing all this time. I write because I love to write and would write with no audience, but because of you writing is more fun. You’ve kept me challenged to grow as a writer to try new ideas and travel down new roads in writing.

Recently I was diagnosed with breast cancer and last week underwent a bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction. Monday I received the pathology report on my follow up visit with my surgeon. The cancer was determined to be Stage 1 and there was nothing in my lymph nodes. The cancer was very small and with the mastectomy all of it was removed gone forever. (I hope) The surgeon told me that the survival rate was 95% for five years.

That was probably the best news I’ve ever received, so you can imagine how I felt. Me, who never gets excited over anything, was babbling pretty incoherently. Poor Mitch had to tie a rope around my waist just to keep me from floating six feet off the ground. I was walking around making plans, talking nonstop not letting Mitch get a word in edgewise.

Bottom line now I can move on and get back to the reason for this blog, to entertain you with stories about those spoiled rotten wretched dogs that love to use me as a boat anchor on their walks. Thank you so much for your continued support I promise I will not disappoint you.

PS. During my recovery time of lying around and healing, I decided to start another blog site, “Susan Uncorked”, this one dedicated to one of my other passions, wine. I love everything about wine, so it just seemed like a perfect match, I drink wine then I get to write about wine. When you have a moment, please check out http://susank456.wordpress.com/ and let me know what you think. I love hearing from you.