Terrierists, they're sneaky!

Last Monday night was my first week back at agility training in forever. My agility servant had the cheek and the gall to leave me behind and go on holiday so I missed three weeks. I was very excited to be returning and despite my agility servants worries that I would be overly enthusiastic and silly I proved her wrong. I focused on the job at hand and only missed one jump and our instructor said that was because the servant hasn't built enough value for me working on the right side of the reinforcement zone. I totally blame all those boring days at obedience training where I stayed on the left and speed was not on the agenda but that's a whole 'nother story for another day.

Anyways I was waiting my turn to jump and tunnel and playing by the rules and focusing on my servant (it was the treats really but don't go telling her that. She'll just get depressed) and NOT barking at the other dogs while they ran the tunnel. When all of a sudden, completely out of the blue, the sneaky terrierist launched a pre-emptive attack.

One second I was focused on the treat in my servant's hand and the next I was hit in the side by a heat seeking cruise missile with teeth. Despite copping a direct hit I of course immediately launched a counter attack with a short range teeth seeking missile but unfortunately due to the stealth attack by the terrierist it was not only way to late to take evasive action but it was impossible to hit the enemy target without incurring massive collateral damage .......... to myself

.

I tried evasive manoeuvres despite being hampered by the agility servant on the end of the lead and I tried going on the offensive. But having the agility servant backing up with my lead, stymied my best attempts at self defense. I was unable to lock onto the terrierist, let alone get a hit.

The sneaky little beast of a terrierist had come up with a very clever strategy! He had attacked without provocation, from an unexpected direction and then used his electromagnetic teeth to clamp on to my ventral surface (chest hair you fool!) so that I was unable to retaliate as I couldn't reach the little sod while he was clinging under my chest.

Fortunately the hot headed fool had acted without the sanction of his superior officer who called off the attack before an damage was done. The last I saw of the renegade terrierist (after he was dragged off me by his left back leg that is) he was being subject to disciplinary action for insubordination.

There was a silver lining! Everyone from the instructor, to the other agility servants, was very worried about me and offered words of encouragement and praise for my bravery whilst telling my servant (who really didn't take the whole affair seriously enough if you ask me) to make sure I was OK and check out my under carriage for any damage. She did check it out but I heard her telling the instructor that she didn't think the terrierist had long enough teeth to do any damage through my coat.

Well that's sympathy for you isn't? Here am I injured in the line of duty and what do I get? Jokes and frivolity. It's really not acceptable!!! I deserved the purple heart and probably a medal of valor too, but no I got jokes.

Well it's a week off again today so I'll let you know if the terrierist tries anything sneaky again next week. Keep your eyes peeled you never know where a terrierist might be hiding.

Revenge Sweet Revenge

My uprights left and went on holidays without my permission. A lovely person stayed at my house and fed and played with me but I was worried about my uprights. I put on a brave face and even managed to distract myself with the odd jolly ball game. See below.

But really I was so worried all the time. Where were they? Were they coming back? Were they (gasp) dead?

Well they eventually turned up and they had sun tans and bags that smelled ....... well, they smelled I don't know ..... different, spicy and a bit kind of manky sock. I was very glad to have them back but after I got over the relief I started to get a bit narky. I mean I was WORRIED, fretting even despite the jolly ball games and loving all over the feeder person and her friends. I was worried that my proper pack would never return. How could they go and leave me like that?

So I took matters into my own hands and sought revenge. The uprights had the nerve to go and leave me home alone again less than 24 hours after they deigned to return, so while they were out (supermarket shopping for Pete's sake) I raided the kitchen cupboards.

I am an expert at removing lids from plastic bottles even if I do say so myself. So I removed the lid from a bottle of glucosamine (only about 15 tablets left, very tasty), a bottle of fish oil capsules (somewhere in the vicinity of 25 tablets, my favorite flavour), a nearly full bottle of vitamin B tablets (bleh tasted horrible only chewed on one of them) and a bottle of valerian capsules (I love capsules, so chewy. I ate the lot, somewhere in the vicinity of 20 capsules give or take a few).

My uprights were unhappy to see all the bottles with lids chewed off and the pile of Vitamin B tablets on the sofa. But when they discovered the empty valerian bottle they freaked. It was excellent!! One called the vet while the other got on the web and discovered valerian and dogs and liver failure all in the same sentence. Woo hoo that really got some action.

The short of it is the vet did some checking and called back after a tense wait and said "highly unlikely to affect my liver, may cause gastrointestinal upset especially combined with all the fish oil, and too late to bring me in for an injection to induce vomiting".

WHAT THE???!!!  Induced vomiting, are you joking? I had NO intention of things going that far! But the horrible vet did say 3 teaspoons of salt in water poured down my throat would induce vomiting and it was worth a try.

Oh the indignity! It was awful! And all that happened was I retched and hacked and brought up some gastric juices. The valerian capsules were long gone.

There was a silver lining though, my uprights were so worried that they decided I should sleep with them so they could monitor me. It was great. I slept on the bed and the floor and the bed and the floor and the bed and ........ you get the picture. I love the bed but it's hot so I needed to keep hopping off on the floor to cool down. My Dad says he didn't notice, my Mom was really tired and grumpy the next morning and kept muttering about valerian should have made me sleepy.

Well hears hoping I can sleep on and OFF the bed some more. Sleep well and think twice before you give your furkids valerian for insomnia.

It was about time!!

I hadn't been to agility training for ages. I'm sure it was months and months since I last was there and it was all due to the agility servant's mismanagement of life.

First it was the Queen's Birthday long weekend so there was no training. I always thought that I was the Queen and there were no par-tees happening here, so I am very suspicious about that excuse.

Then the agility servant started a new job and said she had a headache and was too tired after a long Monday to take me to a late agility class. What a tragic excuse!!! I start new jobs every other week, you know things like figuring out how to get the drawer to the fish food open or running off to network with other dog's at the off lead park and that has NEVER stopped me from going to a late agility class.

Then the next week it was an interview with the prospective pet sitters who are coming to live here while the agility servant goes on holidays. Well I ask you how fair is THAT! I miss out on agility while the servant organises to go away on a holiday without ME.

However enough complaining, last night I got back to agility training for the fist time in 4 weeks. How happy was I when the servant got my training bag out. Well just to give you an idea I got in some early agility warm ups by running down the corridor and bouncing of the front door a couple of times. The servant just rolls her eyes at me, it seems she doesn't understand the need for proper warm ups.

Then I stood up in the back of the car with my nose pressed to the window glass for the whole trip there. The car goes faster when I do that! I was sooo excited to get there and I just wanted to say hello to all the other dogs which I did, a lot.

We got started with the warm ups and all the excitement and running in circles got to me and I'd forgotten to potty because I was too busy saying hello to everyone. So a girl's gotta go when a girl's gotta go. And let's just say I had remembered to pee outside. It is of course the agility servants job to attend to these matters. I mean what use are they really unless it's for attending to the less fun but still necessary issues? After that I had a very enjoyable evening jumping jumps and eating roast chicken. I am still amazed at the fact that the agility servant will give me tasty food for doing fun stuff, but hey you can never tell what an upright will do.

I think that I made my point well though. It's really is best to stick to a routine otherwise surprises can and do happen.

Forget shurtling I've taken up the deadly martial art of Tiggeroo

Forget the fine art of shurtling! I have started training in the martial art of Tiggeroo.

This is a deadly form of combat that I have created myself by combining the strength of the sheepie paw with the claws of the tiger and the boxing paw of the kangaroo, I am from Australia you see. I have added an extra 'g' to the name in honour of myself as the creator of this amazing form of self defence.

For those of you who would like to achieve a black belt in Tiggeroo ........................ listen up grasshoppers!

As with any martial art the element of surprise is helpful so it pays to wait until your upright isn't paying attention or is otherwise occupied and then you combine the claws of the tiger with the speed of the kangaroo and the power of sheepie paw bashing.

I was amazed at the result when I first attempted this manoeuvre. My upright had knelt down to do my topknot and was taking too long about it so I gave her the Tiggeroo paw. Wow, it almost hurt my ears she yelped so loud and the swearing was dreadful. It took a full two weeks for the black and purple bruising around the large red welts to begin to fade and three weeks later there are still some bits of bruising left. My upright is complaining about the small haematoma that is left there. I'm not sure what that is but she rubs at her leg and complains about the lump under the skin.

My upright threatened to take a photo of her injuries and send it to the sheepie police but she decided that photos of her leg might offend so she just mutters to herself about it. So for those of you who enjoy your martial arts you need to try this one out it is awesome. Simple but deadly!!

Chicken necks and sheepie butts

Uprights; they always find something to complain about!!

My Mum bought the cat some chicken necks. Disgraceful, what about me?? So what if the cat needs to keep his teeth clean, what about my teeth?

So Saturday when Mum was giving the cat a chicken neck I acted really sad and looked like I was starving to death and guess what? It worked!!! How great was that? Mum got a chicken neck each for Rastus and I and said we had to go outside so we wouldn't make a mess while we were chewing them up.

We both rushed as fast as we could out the back door and waited impatiently for Mum to catch up with the chicken necks, uprights are so slow.

Mum handed me my chicken neck first and then gave Rastus his. We were standing a foot apart. Mum turned back to ask me if I liked my chicken neck and gasped in horror. Well it wasn't the end of the world. So what if I was waiting hopeful that she had another one for me? SO WHAT if I swallowed a whole chicken neck in one gulp? They smelt really good, I couldn't help it.

And I bet it wasn't the chicken neck that caused me to have runny poop at the park on Sunday morning. I bet it would have happened whether I chewed or not. And I really don't know why uprights get so stressed about a bunch of sloppy poop in my skirts. I think it's completely over reacting to have to get baby powder and brushes out and spend ages bending over my butt brushing it till there's no poop left, it's just unnecessary. And you should have heard the naughty words my Mum was saying and the groaning about her back. Worse things could happen, like there could be NO chicken necks ever again.

I did hear my Mum threaten that but I don't believe her. I will use my sheepie powers of persuasion on her.

Interrupted Beauty Sleep

My Mum is losing her marbles, I'm quite sure of it!!!

I was having a lovely dream the other night when suddenly she woke me up by running down the hall and switching lights on and then grabbing me and poking me in the tummy. What the heck??!!! How's a girl to get her beauty sleep with those kinds of shenanigans going on?

Being the obliging kinda girl that I am, I rolled over and offered her my tummy for a scratch. "May as well make the best of it", I thought.

I heard her muttering something to my Dad when she went back to bed about bloodcurdling howls and injured or ill dogs. Que??? Who was howling? I didn't hear any howling. Anyway I went straight back to sleep but I couldn't get my dream back and I can't remember what it was about.

I'm kinda tired today.

So I didn't feel like running - ok!

Monday night we went to the big shed to do agility training. I'm always happy about it. I get a ride in the car and lots of treats. I always know when we're going because my Mum cuts up lots of yummy treats and puts them in a special pouch that she wears.

She was busy cutting up treats on Monday when the phone rang, so she filled up the pouch and then left without me. I wasn't happy about that so I needed a way to ease the disappointment. And lo and behold my Mum had left the luncheon meat loaf on the island bar. It was a bit of a stretch but I got it and it was so tasty that before I new it I'd finished the lot. 

Mum was back fairly soon with my Dad, something about problems with the train. And she and I set off straight away for the drive to agility. Usually I like to run and jump as much as I can get away with at agility. But this week I was quite sedate. I still ate my  treats, "never knock back a treat" is my motto. But I was feeling pretty full so the running and jumping wasn't as attractive as usual. I could see my Mum was puzzled and I heard her tell my Dad when we got home. She was wondering if I felt sick or if I was grumpy because I hadn't had a walk all day.

I was feeling quite pleased with myself as I figured I'd gotten away scot free with eating a half a loaf of luncheon meat. But my Mum came home from work and wanted to do some training and searched all through the fridge for the meat and then remembered the plastic bag she found on the floor at breakfast that she thought my Dad left there from the shopping. And then she cast her evil eye in my direction. I of course looked innocent. There was NO WAY she could categorically pin it on me. It could have been Rastus, it could have been burglars, it could have been anyone.

Unfortunately nature took it's course and I had to poop. My Mum was on "poop patrol" so she saw the bits of white plastic that looked just like the wrapper of the luncheon meat in my poop. Now she has evidence and she says she understands why I drank so much water on Monday night that I peed a lake on the living room floor. Apparently there's a quite a lot of salt in luncheon meat so that's why I was so thirsty. She says at least she knows she doesn't have to take me to the vets in case of urinary infection or other illness.

She says my name is Piggy Tiggy!

Uprights are weird!

And I'm not sure if it's a good or a bad thing. On the one hand they're hard to work out but on the other hand they hand out yummy treats for the dumbest of things.

For the last 7 weeks I've been chauffeured to a funny shed with, get this, plastic grass in it. Go figure, plastic grass!!! The first two weeks I tried to pee all over wherever any other dog had pee'd but I'm kinda getting the vibe that this makes my chauffeur a tad upset so I've given up and pee on the real grass outside now.

It's kind of fun. There are other dogs there but we're all busy doing crazy stuff to get treats. The dumb thing is I actually get treats for standing on a plank. At first I didn't get it, it seemed too crazy that all I had to do was plomp all 4 feet on a 30 x 120 cm board and then just stand there but like I said the uprights are a little bit mental. Don't get me wrong; now that I've worked it out I'm perfectly happy to stand on a plank and get fed treats, it's just that at first I couldn't believe that treats would be doled out for something so simple.

But there you have it. Uprights are weird and probably a little bit mental too.

Just in case you thought I was getting old and boring

There's been a lot of talk about sheepies growing brains when they're 3 years old. I don't know what's so magical about 3 years old but now that I can speak from experience I'd like to dispel any rumours about me.

I am now officially 3 years old and just to prove that I am not getting boring in my old age I stole the video camera from off the island bar and stashed it in the dog bed. My Mum was shocked! She says she thought that I'd grown out of stealing electronic equipment two years ago. She's very glad that I didn't chew it up like the two mobile phones and the memory peg and all the other stuff.

I was just keeping her on her toes.

Then I resorted to an old favorite. The drawer with the fish food in it was left a bit open so I helped myself while Mum was out. I finished off three containers and was part way onto the fourth before she got home. Yummy, I shared a little bit with Rastus and Rowdy, well I let them lick the crumbs that fell off the edges of the dog bed.

Mum wants to know why fish food is red. I want to know what's wrong with a red beard and legs. And I quite liked the little red blobs on the straw coloured carpet. I don't think Mum should have brushed out my beard and muzzle with potato flour. I hate having my face brushed and I was saving those little bits for later.

Here's a picture. It doesn't really do justice to the mess I made but it's hard to see tiny little granules of fish food when they're strewn all about.

And in this one you can just see a few of the bits in by face hair that I was saving for later and notice how nice and gingery my beard is.

I like Birthdays especially when they're mine

I've had 3 birthdays now and I definitely know that I like them, a LOT! There's treats and pats and presents. This year I got my first ever jolly ball and I love it. I can carry it around by it's handle or I can play soccer keeping's off with my uprights. I've even taken it to bed with me and it's very accommodating and moves over when I push it.

It's a shame birthdays happen so infrequently, there's eons between one birthday and the next. But I plan to have as many of them as I possibly can.

A girl could starve around here

What does a hungry sheep dog have to do to get tucker around here. The service has gone to the dogs, I mean to the humans. It's completely unacceptable to torment and torture dogs like this, someone will have to contact the RSPCA. Wait till you hear how bad it's gotten around here.

This morning my Mum was preparing our breakfast, some tasty little nibbles for the cat, special "itchy dog" food for Rastus and some yummy chicken kibbles for me. She'd given the cat his breakfast, so he was up on his cat pole where we can't reach chowing down and she was in the middle of putting the yoghurt on our breakfast when Dad started asking what was wrong with the coffee machine.

Mum is the maintainer of the coffee machine so she stopped breakfast to work it out. It took ages and ages, at least 5 minutes probably more. All the while I could smell my breakfast and I reckon that cat was eating louder than usual just to torment me.

Finally I decided enough was enough!!!! Rastus wasn't going to do anything so I took matters into my own hands. I got up went over, and said my piece. Which was "BREAKFAST, NOW!" I decided to be forceful given the shoddy service, so I did raise my voice a little, well a lot. Then I calmly went back to my bed to await the sadly delayed breakfast. Sheesh!

Anyways they both jumped so I must have gotten my point across. The breakfast was still a bit tardy but it did arrive, mind you the cat had already finished his and was angling for some of my yoghurt. There was NO way I was sharing though. I'd had to wait long enough as it was.

Granted it was the usual tastiness, so I'm off for a post-prandial nap now.

I'm in trouble about the wool again.

You'll remember I posted a while ago about the little sheepie my Mum is knitting? Well it got me in trouble again tonight. But it's really all that cat's fault.

My Mum has finished knitting and is at the stuffing and sewing stage, nearly finished apparently. Anyways the cat stole a front leg out of the work bag but I was quick and quiet and a very sneaky sheepie and I stole it right off him.

So by the time my Mum rushed over to rescue the knitting the cat was sitting empty pawed by the work bag and I was gone. So the work bag got put away and Mum thought all was well and I did too. Only the cat was unhappy.

I went and lay on my bed and had a good chew and a fine disemboweling of that sheepie leg. There was a wiry thing inside it but it didn't taste good so I spat it out. I was having great fun but then my Mum noticed and came and investigated.

She wasn't happy to discover that I wasn't chewing my front leg but instead I was chewing the knitted sheepie's front leg. She did crack a grin though when she told my Dad that I was chewing a front leg and then threw it at him.

This is all that's left. I could have done a better job really if I'd had more time.

Back to the cat theme.

As you know, I think cats are a bit mental.

However, I have discovered some uses for them. The best one being practising my sheep herding with them. There is also stealing their food and I've tried hairdressing with my cat. He didn't like the sheepie spit mohawk hair style I gave him though and it took me quite a while to detach his claws and teeth from my front leg. I think it was his attempt at revenge but I couldn't feel a thing, except that the leg was heavier when I walked, so eventually I got sick of dragging a cat around like a ball and chain and made a concerted effort at removing him.

But the latest use for cats, that I've discovered, is that they're are not bad at "the staring game".

This game involves the cat and I sitting a goodly distance apart and staring at each other. But there is more to it than meets the eye. While I'm staring at the cat I am sending subconscious thoughts at his teeny, tiny brain telling him to "Run, run while you still can!" And he sits and stares at me and tries to deflect the power of my thoughts and NOT run. 

To give him due credit, some days he actually not half bad at it and we sit and stare at each other for minutes on end, until he finally gives in and moves and then I chase him. Or until Mum starts in telling me to look at her and leave the cat. For reasons unfathomable to my superior sheepie brain my Mum doesn't like me chasing the cat.

Well, excuse me now I'm off to find my staring partner.

Clean teeth, dirty air.

Mum decided that Rastus and my teeth were looking grubby and neither of us like the stupid doggy toothbrush and toothpaste. In my opinion the only thing that should go in your mouth apart from you tongue is food; and water if you're thirsty. So she said she'd give up trying to brush our teeth - yes!! And get this! Buy us some bones, woo hoo!!!

She went to a place called the market and came back with bags of bones, they smell great. I want to go to the market it must be fantastic if they've got all those bones. They all got divided up and put in the freezer and every couple of days two come out and after a few hours we take them outside and chew, chew, chew. YUM.

Mum was really happy. She says our teeth are looking cleaner, whatever. Who cares it only matters that they look scary when you show them to some bad dude. They don't need to look clean if you ask me. But I don't mind Mum being fussed because it means I get bones to chew on.

The day before yesterday we got a bone that Mum called brisket. Extra yummy with fat on it. I just heard her tell my Dad on the phone that she is NEVER getting it again. You see all the fat upset Rastus's tummy. Not mine, my tummy is perfectly happy. Nearly as happy as my tongue. Well the result of the upset is that Rastus has bad gas.

Sorry understatement of the year. VERY, extremely, awfully bad gas. Mum says she needs a gas mask, the cat has just gone out his cat door. Even Rastus lifted his head and stared at his rear end as if to say "what the heck?" I'm going to go and ask to get let out now.

Ewwwwww. See ya, gotta go in a hurry.

Yum, Yum

There was scotch fillet steak cooked medium rare the other night.

And no one was offering any to me. So I decided to take matters into my own paws. My Mom left her plate on the coffee table and turned her back for a few seconds, plenty long enough for me to snarf down one whole scotch fillet steak.

I am very good at plate snatching, if I do say so myself. I was so quick at stealing the steak and swallowing it down that my Mom didn't even notice me do it. So I got a chance to go back and grab a nice big piece of pumpkin. Not bad either.

At that point my Mum noticed her plate was looking a bit empty and she just caught me doing a final lip lick to hide the evidence. So unfortunately she knew it was me. She was really mad! I don't think it was a big problem, there were still a few veggies left for her.

Snack Van

Woo Hoo!! I've just discovered there's a snack van in my backyard.

My Dad cooks yummy stuff on it but it has a lid so I never get a chance to try the tasty stuff. Well yesterday I discovered something new. There's all tasty grease dripping out of a tray in the bottom. It's dripped down onto the wood at the bottom and through onto the concrete.

So I'm going out regularly to have a little snack. Yummy!

Mum is going crazy about it. When I stick my head in to lick up a tasty little something I get grease all over my face and topknot. She's already gone wild with the potato flour 3 times and now that I've rubbed it all over the top of my nose she says I'll need to have my face bathed.

I think that's going entirely too far myself. So what if there's a bit of brown grease on my face and head. It smells beautiful and is quite decorative.

I'm off to ring my door bells and see if anyone will let me out again. Dad says he's too busy to clean the BBQ, I mean snack van, so I'm set for tasty snacks for a while longer. And Mum's hip is still sore so she can't reach down there. That's why my face isn't bathed yet too. :-)

Birthday Celebrations

Why was I not invited to my Mum's birthday dinner?!

She and my Dad went to a spiffy restaurant on the beach last night. I hear that they sat on a balcony in the balmy breeze watching the ships coming in and out of the bay and sipping champagne cocktails.

Well it's not acceptable! I have no idea what a champagne cocktail tastes like and that's my point really. How am I to find out if I'm not invited? So there was a dress code, I could have put a new bow in my topknot. There was prime Angus steak and lamb cutlets for Pete's sake, how is it possible that I should miss out on that?

I am not amused!

PS there better be a birthday dinner when it's my birthday or I'll have to consider a complaint to the RSPCA!