Food Lady, Food Lady, How Does Your Garden Grow?

With slugs and snails, and Dexter tails(!)

I don’t … I can’t even … I just don’t know.

I wish I could tell you this is a cool trick I have taught my dog, and that we call the trick “The Ostrich” and that he sproings out of the grass afterward and we all have a good laugh at what a clever dog I share my life with.  I WANT to be able to tell you that.  Instead, I have to tell you that my dog, for reasons unknown, “hides” in the grass when we are playing frisbee and remains motionless there sometimes for up to 3 or 4 throws, before exploding out of his “hiding spot” and turning in ecstatic circles with all his hair standing on end.

If I planted him, do you think I could grow more Dexters?

The bigger question – would I *want* to grow more Dexters?

He is a truly bizarre creature.  Growing more would probably be a mistake for all humankind.

I’m glad he – and the rest of us – got to enjoy the sunshine yesterday though, because today it’s snowing like crazy!  And it’s sticking too.  That’s going to make for one sad Addy, as she is no fan of snow.  She claims she can’t so much as even get her feet wet in a puddle.

But I’m calling bullsh*t on that one, because I have PROOF that Addy and mud puddles are synergistic.

For a dog who hates the cold and wet so much, she can sure go to town on a mud puddle.  I don’t have any idea what she is hoping to excavate from them, but she can spend a solid hour digging in deep mud.  After every walk, my dogs know that they have to hop into the kiddy pool one by one, turn in a circle to get the water moving and wash the mud off their feet and then go stand on the porch, wherein they all come into the mudroom one at a time, get their feet and bellies toweled off, and only then may they enter the domicile.  It’s a time consuming routine, but preferable to them tracking mud all over the place.

Addy HATES getting in the pool, and tries all kinds of evasive maneuvers to avoid it.  Her favourite trick is to sneak up on the porch from the side – in the “leafier” months of the year she will crawl through the flower boxes; in the winter, she will squeeze behind the barbeque – and then stand underneath a dog that has already done the pool routine and hope to not be noticed.  Usually  beneath Dexter or Easy, a dicey gamble since both of them move so much and have the potential to squash her.  A testament to how much she hates the pool.  A few times I have had to chase her through the writhing mass of dog on the porch, with her darting from dog to dog and snaking between their legs to avoid getting caught.  She’s a wily one, Mr. Grinch!

But after a mud-puddle-fest, she will hop into the pool of her own volition, because the pool is highly preferable to the Gush Monster, aka the dreaded hose.  No kiddy pool is going to get her clean when she is head-to-toe covered in mud, so she gets hosed off instead.  There’s a lot of thrashing and drama involved.  Sometimes there is screaming.

At least with snow there should be neither hosing nor kiddy-pooling.  It will be Easy’s first experience with snow too … I expect it will blow his mind, going from this to snow:

Isn’t he turning out to be a handsome booger though?  He’s smart too, though we do have to work on him understanding that Piper’s name is not a command for him to chase the ball or Frisbee.  He has only a passing and unsustained interest in retrieving, but as soon as I set it up for Piper to have a go (she is old, and her hind end isn’t great, so nobody is supposed to chase the toy when it’s her turn) he’s falling all over himself to get there first.  And *only* when it’s her turn.

Wootie sometimes likes to beat Piper to the toy too, but then again, he always has.  He too is not consistent when it comes to retrieving – sometimes he will become randomly ecstatic about the chance to play fetch with no catalyst whatsoever.

Other times, only the magical lure of cookies will convince him to go get something I throw for him.  This is contra-indicated to his diet and exercise plan.  You know, because he’s fat.

Did somebody say something about a cookie?

It’s best when he has a workout partner for motivation.

… or not.

Spring is also working out, trying to rid herself of the spay-paunch she has developed.  She’s still a lean machine, but she’s got a little droopy in the abdomen.  She said I could only post photos of her if she was sucking in her gut:

Or artfully posed to hide it.

Fae’s gotten a little tube-like herself.  I think it’s the dachshund in her; she can put on weight just looking at food.  She’s better at disguising it though, through the magic of props.

I can’t remember if I have asked this before, but for those of you with small dogs … do they pant?  When it’s really warm out all of my dogs pant, but when it’s cooler outside, no amount of running gets Fae open-mouthed.  I throw the ball (or frisbee) just as often and just as far for her as for the big dogs … and she has tiny little legs, so she has to work that much harder to get there.  But after a good play session, the big dogs will be standing around with tongues lolling out of their mouths

And Fae will be stoic as ever.  I guess she has a lot less mass to haul around, but I think the size to weight ratio is fairly equal, when scaled down, so you’d think she’d be at least somewhat winded.

I’m just in really super good shape.  You should try it sometime, Food Lady.

Well Merry Christmas to you too Fae!