I’ll never forget the time my brother-in-law was telling me about the movie,
Like Water for Chocolate. In trying to
sound worldly and hip, he enthused, “I love French films!”
If you’ve ever really used Google in anger, you’ve no doubt come across search
hits in a foreign language, and been offered a link to read a translated
version. Google Translate is a wonderful
service, but they recently added even more awesome with the ability to
translate
Latin!
Now we can all sound like pretentious scholars. I’m hoping the next addition
will be either Pig Latin or Tok
Pisin.
If Pavlov used a Labrador I think his experiments are void.
Well the cats are still at it. Last night Michelle was dishing up dinner and
turned her back for a second and one of the cats nipped up onto the bench and
tried to take off with a chicken drumstick.
It turned out to be a bit too heavy and while trying to dodge various objects
being thrown at him he dropped it onto the floor, where of course Toby
instantly vacuumed it up. (Toby is actually very well behaved – we’ve left food
out on the coffee table and he knows not to touch it – but once it hits the
floor it’s his domain.)
For the non-dog owners out there, cooked chicken bones are generally not very
good for dogs. They can splinter and cause problems, so when you see your dog
gobble down a drumstick you react with some urgency.
I immediately stuck my hand down his throat to try and retrieve the drumstick
– which has left me with a very nice imprint of one of his molars on the side
of my finger and taught the children a few new expressions they’re not allowed
to repeat.
Thus, with one hand covered in slimy dog spit, and the other holding on to his
collar, I took the last action left to me and hoicked up on his collar so he
couldn’t swallow. We danced that way for a little bit until he finally dropped
the bone.
At this point all pets were encouraged into the laundry either by the scruff of
their necks or pure inertia and locked away until after dinner.
It was actually quite nice to eat a meal without having furry eyes watching
your every move for a change.
“Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend. Inside a dog, it’s too dark to read.” — Groucho Marx
We have a three year old Labrador named Tobius or “Toby” for short. He was
supposedly the runt of the litter, but turned out to be a big black doofus with
an attention span about as wide as the space between his eyeballs.
He is not especially good at playing fetch. He'll be running along after the
ball and something will divert his attention --- one sharp left later he's off
rolling in God knows what and you're the one fetching the ball. About the only
time he's any good at fetch is if we play it in the house, up and down the
hallway.
So of course, Toby swallowed a ball a few weeks ago. It was one of those small
rubber super-balls that I’m continuously telling my daughter not to play with
or the dog will eat it which, sure enough, is what happened. She was bouncing
it up and down the hall, there was a flash of black and a scream of, “No Toby!”
and the ball was breakfast.
The advice from the vet was to wait and see, and to check his poop for the next
few days to see if the ball appears (a task that was delegated to my daughter
for obvious reasons – that and because it was her fault he ate the ball in the
first place). If it didn’t turn up in a few days or he showed signs of distress
then call them back.
Luckily he threw up the ball sometime during the second night as we found it in
the laundry the next morning. None of the animals have been inclined to play
with it for some reason.
Coda
Being the first dog I’ve ever had, he has certainly been a learning experience
for me. The general failure with the whole fetch thing for one. Toby has had
surgery twice on his left eye to laser out a growth, so perhaps his vision
isn’t all it could be and he has trouble tracking the ball. He’s certainly not
always the most visually observant.
At the start of June I had my head shaved for a good cause. Shaggy hair and
beard completely gone, run over twice with a straight razor, the whole nine
yards. After which we went bowling — but I digress. When we got home, with
the excitement of everyone arriving and pats and such he just didn’t notice,
but a while later, after I have been sitting at the computer for 20 minutes or
so then got up and turned around he totally freaked. He jumped up and barked,
“Who the hell are YOU?!” His nose and eyes were telling him two different
things.
Fortunately he calmed down quickly once I gave him a cuddle and distracted him
with a cat to chase.
“A cat by any other name is still a scheming little fur ball that craps
behind the couch.” — Unknown
The two new cats we’ve got are incorrigible. Despite our best efforts to date
they will still go on the kitchen benches whenever they can get away with it.
Every other cat we’ve had we’ve been able to train to stay off the benches, but
not these two.
They will also steal any food that is left unattended for even twenty
seconds. The little buggers have gotten into meat that was left out to defrost
(in the sink with a heavy glass breadboard over the top to keep them away, mind
you) and even steal bread left out on the bench.
They will literally try to steal food off the kids plates while they are eating
their dinners if adults are not around.
Ever since Michelle and I got our first cat the day after we got back from our
honeymoon, we’ve maintained the habit that the animals get shut in the laundry
at bed time and let out again in the morning. They’ve got baskets, water and
other amenities to make it comfy. They soon get use to it and it becomes part
of the routine. These days, with two cats (Kismet and Bazyl) and a hulking
black Labrador (Toby), it’s the only way to get a peaceful nights sleep without
something four legged tearing over you in the middle of the night.
Kismet, however, has gotten into the habit, when it comes that time of night to
put them into the laundry, to sneak under the table and only be lured out by
food --- which grates because if I give in a put some food down I feel like I'm
rewarding him for being a sneaky prick. And he is sneaky too, because he can be
fast asleep in my daughter's room, but will hear me let Toby out the backyard
for his pre-bedtime ablutions. So while doing this I see him slink out of her
room and under the table were I can't get him.
Then last night absolutely tore it. I’d done the trick of looking like I was
getting food out of and panty, and when he runs into the laundry I’m was empty
handed one too many times, and he wasn’t buying it, even when I actually put
food down. I would chase him out from under the dining table, and he would run
up the other end of the house and hide under the couch. I would chase him out
from under there and he would move on to the next bit of cover, ducking and
weaving commando style until he makes it back to the dining table, and around
we’d go again. The very last thing you want late at night before heading to bed
is to be playing a game of tiggy with a damn cat.
Let’s just say that as 12:30 last night the house was neat and by 12:40 half of
the furniture had been upended so the cat couldn’t get under it, the little
bugger had finally been cornered behind my bed, carried by the scruff of the
neck and given a lesson in aerodynamics as he was jettisoned into the laundry.
Since that night, we’ve come to a certain understanding. I invested in a water
pistol, you see, and so now it usually takes no more than two circuits around
the house before he declares defeat and slinks damply into the laundry, while
the other pets try not to giggle too conspicuously.
The cats’ continued and brazen brattishness led me to research these electric
fence type things where they wear a collar that gives them a jolt if they get
too close to the proximity sensor. This would be ideal to set put the sensor in
the kitchen to just keep them out of there, but there are two problems:
It appears to cost in the order of $600 or more to get the equipment for two
cats. This seems hideously overpriced. I guess they’ve gotta make sure the
equipment is safe and wont kill the animal (although that’s not a deal-breaker
at this point), but still overpriced.
None of them come with a remote where I can trigger the jolt on demand. I
know this can be abused, but would be damn useful in encouraging them out from
under furniture and as stress relief. I would call it, “the joy buzzer”.
Ah well. For now, the war of attrition will continue unabated.
I’m happy to say the number of gadgets I own has been growing a bit
unmanageable in the last few years, in particular the number that need USB
either for power, communications or both. The downside is the number of cables
and other debris that gets strewn around my desk. So I made a USB box to tidy
it all up:
Internally it has two powered USB hubs, one of which is connected to the
computer, the other is just for use as a power supply (for the GPS and battery
charger, which don’t need to talk to the computer).
The seven port USB hub, with five in the front and two in the back, is hot
glued into the front of the container for each ad hoc USB access.
Keyboard, mouse and backup drive are all direct into the computer as the
motherboard has plenty of ports.
For the non-dog owners out there, cooked chicken bones are generally not very
good for dogs. They can splinter and cause problems, so when you see your dog
gobble down a drumstick you react with some urgency.
He is not especially good at playing fetch. He'll be running along after the
ball and something will divert his attention --- one sharp left later he's off
rolling in God knows what and you're the one fetching the ball. About the only
time he's any good at fetch is if we play it in the house, up and down the
hallway.
Kismet, however, has gotten into the habit, when it comes that time of night to
put them into the laundry, to sneak under the table and only be lured out by
food --- which grates because if I give in a put some food down I feel like I'm
rewarding him for being a sneaky prick. And he is sneaky too, because he can be
fast asleep in my daughter's room, but will hear me let Toby out the backyard
for his pre-bedtime ablutions. So while doing this I see him slink out of her
room and under the table were I can't get him.
Sitewide Feed
