I am house-sitting at the moment for my sister she is away for a week. Well actually I am just continuing to stay here whilst she is away and looking after the pets. I am minding the family dog, a black lab called Sam, who is lovely, placid and intelligent and a sweet ginger cat, called Rusty.
Rusty and Sam are good buddies. They hang out together, especially around dinner time (actually exactly 2 hours before dinner they are already hanging around). And I have even seen them tag teaming on another cat who wandered into their territory from next door. Luckily that cat was faster than Sam who is built for comfort not speed if you get my drift. He is a lot different from Sebastian and it took me a while to get used to his character again since I have been back. Sam is very smart (did I already say that?) and often tries to tell you what he wants by a series of groans, grunts and barks. He also knows the names of all his toys, his collar, his lead, and will bring you exactly what you ask him to.
He is also getting good at spelling. We can't use the words "walk", "beach" or "swim" and so we have to spell them but he always pricks up his ears anyway and starts to look excited. He loves food and sticks the most in the world. Luckily he lives on the west coast where there are sticks galore on the beaches that need a good thrashing.
However, Sam also has a rather delicate constitution. This is the total opposite of Sebastian who I have named Sebastian Iron Guts the second.
Iron Guts the first was another black lab we used to have, Zak, who famously ate, amongst other things, a huge block of chocolate and suffered no ill effects.
So last night, when I let Sam out to relieve himself before bed time, he wandered off and didn't come back for 3 hours. This is very unusual for him. We are out in the country a bit here and he is good about not wondering off so we don't keep him on a lead, he just hangs around….until last night when he hadn't returned after an hour I started to get worried about him. After 2 hours, I headed outside with a torch and walked around calling him, got in the car and drove up and down the road a bit, no Sam. Finally 3 hours later at , he showed up looking very pleased with himself. I was a bit annoyed by this time as I was so tired and had spent hours calling out to him and really wanted to go to bed but I was thankful that he came back safely from his little adventure. This morning, the rest of the puzzle fell into place. Sam had smelled a rotten old bone somewhere, probably on a neighbouring property and had gone and chewed it up, and then was sick several times in the garage where he sleeps. I had shut him in there as usual but left all the other doors open so I could hear him if he barked in the night (which he usually does when he needs to go out and be sick). Unfortunately I didn't hear a thing – perhaps I was in a deep slumber after being kept up to . That's why we don't give him bones. But he can't help himself- obviously. He is mostly fine today, but seems to be a bit sleepier than usual. I would be too if I had been out till and then up half the night being sick.
So that's been keeping me busy today, cleaning up dog barf.
0 comments:
Post a Comment