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!

I don't like New Year's Eve.

Last night was something called New Year's Eve. I don't really get it and I definitely don't like it.

I've woken up this morning and as far as I can tell nothings new. Same breakfast in the same bowl in the same house with the same family. So what's new about it?? And I must say I'm glad, I like my life just how it is! Well except for the sore toe but that too shall pass.

What I don't like, is this New Year's Eve business. It's very loud and very scary. There were all these exploding bangs and fizzes happening in the sky last night. And some of them were just over my back fence. I was worried the sky was going to fall or maybe there wouldn't be a new year at all because the world was ending right over our heads. I don't know how my Mum and Dad could be so calm about it, they were just sitting on the couch handing out dog treats. But I couldn't enjoy them properly what with worrying about the world ending or at the very least the sky falling. I couldn't even have a pee. Every time Mum took me out back I'd just get started and another bang would happen so I'd have to run back inside, it was very disconcerting.

My brother Rastus was even more scared than me and that just made me sure that something was wrong. In the end Dad took us in the spare room with him because we kept jumping on the bed and landing on Mum's sore leg. Rastus sat next to Dad and shook like a leaf and I sat on Dad's head and panted (it's a sheepie thing, sitting on heads). It took a very long time, weeks maybe, but finally the noises stopped and we all got some sleep. I plan on taking a lot of naps today.

I hope your part of the world is safe and the sky hasn't fallen or the world ended.

Mum says we are a bunch of cripples.

Mum says we; that is me, Rastus and her are a bunch of cripples! Is that a cruel thing for her to say? I can't decide as she's included herself on the list but it sounds a bit mean to me.

I hurt my toenail AGAIN.

I can't help it, when I go to the park I feel the need for speed! So I run, run, run like the wind. And when I chase my squeakie ball and miss it I have to do very sharp turns so it doesn't escape. You know how sneakie those squeakie balls are, they'll escape in the blink of an eye. The vets think maybe that's how I do it. But I'm tough and I never cry when it happens so no one's sure.

Dad didn't notice but my Mum did. I think Mum's are just good at noticing stuff especially stuff that tells them if you're sick or injured. She notice me licking my foot when I got home from the walk and got Dad to check it out in case there was a prickle. Dad said it was fine but I kept licking so Mum got Dad to put me up where she can see my foot without bending. She's had an operation on her hip and is limping and isn't allowed to bend. And she found that I had split my nail and it was bleeding a bit.

I've done the same thing twice before and last time it took months of antibiotics and bathing my toe twice a day to get it better. So Mum sent me straight to the vet's just in case and he gave me antibiotics. It's lucky she did. By yesterday my toe was so sore I couldn't put my foot to the ground. So she phoned up the vet and Dad went and got some meds for me so I wouldn't have so much pain. I'm so glad they did because today I'm feeling so much better. It's even ok to take the antibiotics because they come with peanut butter. YUMMY I love peanut butter.

Back to the cripple story. Rastus ate too much people food at Christmas and got the itchies so he's been chewing his feet, especially the back right one and now he's limping. So every night Dad lifts us both up on the outdoor table one at a time so Mum can bath our feet. It seems an awful lot of bother but I guess Mum's sick of us being a bunch of cripples. :-)

I hope we're all fixed soon. I don't really like having my foot dunked in a tub and I don't like the smell of the toe stuff. But I get a treat after, so it could be worse. And I'm not a big wuss like Rastus, he kicks and wiggles and cringes like they're trying to cut his foot off. Such a sook!

I don't get it!

I'm confused! The last week or two has been great, there's been heaps of treats and tons of yummy upright food for the begging. A guy called Santa Paws managed to sneak past my vigilant guarding of the house and left treats for us as well as a pedestal fan for the hot weather. We've eaten them all :-(  I haven't eaten the fan, it doesn't smell tasty and 'sides it'll come in handy for the hot weather.

But now its all eaten and it doesn't look like its getting replaced any time soon. There's bottles of what Mum calls "bubbly" in the fridge but I don't like bubbly it smells yuk and the fizz makes me sneeze.

What happened to the Christmas spirit of overindulgence?? I liked it! I want it back, bring on overindulgence all year. There's a lot to be said for over indulgence, sore tummies not withstanding.

As I'm not in charge of the supplies department I'm going to have to go and have a nap so I can dream of a house full of treats.

Santa Paws Visited

Santa Paws visited our house yesterday! Yes he did!!

I don't know how he managed to come and go without me hearing him. I'm usually very good at hearing anyone about - much better than Rastus if I do say so myself - and I didn't hear a thing. But he must have come because there were presents for us in the morning. Bags with red bows on them all full of yummy treats.

Mum has taken custody of them, which is not fair, as they're our presents. She says that one night of piggishness on my behalf is enough. She is still calling me Tiggy Piggy which is very mean of her, but at least I'm back on full rations at meal times. I didn't think much of the couple of half sized meals that I got after I ate so much of Rastus fishy kibble.

We left out some wine and mince tarts for Santa Claus and a treat for Santa Paws and they were all gone in the morning with the presents there instead. It's very weird; I sleep right near the chimney and I didn't hear, smell or see anyone in the house all night except Mum and Dad. But they say Santa is magic and I'm thinking it must be true!

I hope you all were good dogs this year so that Santa Paws visited you and left you something nice too. I was a bit worried to tell you the truth! I have done a few things this year that caused a bit of trouble and no one else seemed to think that me eating all that fishy kibble was me entering into the spirit of Christmas. But Santa Paws is very understanding so I'm betting he left you something too.

Here is a picture of me dressed up as Santa Paws. Merry Christmas to you all.

Love Tiggy.

Christmas and overindulging

My understanding is that Christmas is about overindulging. You know ........ lots of wine, food and merriment. So last night I decided to get into the spirit of Christmas in a big way.

Mom and Dad were out for a family Christmas dinner and they didn't take us so I had to take matters into my own hands. No wine has been provided for us but my Dad didn't put the lid on Rastus's kibble tub properly so Rowdy had a bit of a go at it and then I helped him. It was great, kilos of Proplan sensitive skin and stomach fishy kibble. Yummy, yummy, yummy!

I may have gone a little overboard in the spirit of Christmas overindulgefest though. Mom says no one else's tummys were bulging as much as mine. She was very worried and took our water bowl up and then the good bit was she decided I better sleep up in the bedroom with her in case things got bad in the night.

I wouldn't say things got bad but lets just say they got stretched a bit, well quite a bit really. Who would have thought eating too much kibble could be a bad thing. But I must say my tummy was a bit upset with me. I got very thirsty too and mean Mum only let me have the tiniest drink of water so I went in the shower and licked up the water there then I came back and jumped on the bed and stuck my wet beard in Mom's ear. I really don't know why she carried on about it so much. I thought she would enjoy a refreshingly, cool sheepie kiss. Some people are a bit ungrateful at times but I guess it was late at night and she was trying to sleep.

What with being thirsty and having a sore tummy I didn't feel much like sleeping so I wandered around a lot and I panted a lot, it just seemed to make me feel better. I chased Rowdy off the bed at intervals and got in trouble for that too. But really when you think about it, it was really all his fault as he started it.

Eventually Mum opened the window, even though Dad said it was too cold, and I felt cool enough to lie on the bed and have my tummy scratched. Mum kept asking Dad to listen to my tummy but he said all he could hear was puffing and panting. After I while Mum turned off the light and went to sleep. '

It was about then that I felt the call of nature so I hopped off the bed and had a poop in the corridor. The smell woke my Mum up but not my Dad so she got up and cleaned up. Mum gave me another measly, small drink but I was feeling a lot better by then so I asked Mum to let me out. She said she knew what I was up to and opened the door. I ran straight to our outdoors water bowl and ................. it was gone, vanished, kapoof just like that. I scouted around for it and it was definitely missing so I came back inside bitterly disappointed and Mum just looked smug.

She decided that I was well enough to sleep in my own bed and went back to her bed, so I rang my doorbell over and over till she got up again and put me outside. I fancied a bit of fresh 4 am morning air you see. She's up again now and hasn't given me any breakfast which is really not fair. She hasn't had any breakfast either just a coffee. She's sitting on the couch now and I must say she's looking a bit dopey and vague.

Well I didn't get much sleep last night so I'll just head off to my favorite napping place behind the curtains. Bye.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Wishing all my family and friends a great Christmas and a fantastic 2011 full of fun and lots of sheep herding.
Sheepie kisses from Tiggy.

Well it smells kinda like sheep so I bit it!

Hi, me again.

I am in trouble! Yeah well, its not truly unusual and you can laugh but this time its not fair.

My Mum is knitting a little sheepie toy to pass away the boring hours sitting around at home. She's using this fluffy mohair wool to make the little sheepie all fluffy like me.

Rowdy and I really, really want that wool. We are working on getting it no matter what. Rowdy has the advantage as he can jump up on benches and get into places that I can't. Just before; he managed to steal a ball out of the bag and he sneaked off into the dining room to kill it all by himself.

Well I couldn't have that could I? So I nipped in and stole it off him! Then I made a fatal error, I was so happy at my success, that I ran back into the living room to rip and shred that ball of wool and Mum saw me. She gave a shriek and leaped off the couch and grabbed it off me.

She's not very happy right now. The ball is all slobbered on and I've ripped it apart so it's not really a ball anymore. Also she says her hip is sore from jumping up off the couch all wrong.

Sigh, it smelt kinda sheepish, so I just wanted a little taste.

But then the need to shred overtook me.

IT'S ALL THAT CAT'S FAULT!!!