[saveagrey]
by James Brush
Category: Pets
The adventures of greyhounds and cats around the house.
Since nobody did anything of note this week and after reading about the IM Needle Nose Crew, I felt that reintroductions might be in order. And as Morrison has pointed out, this blog can get a bit dog-o-centric and needs an occasional feline presence to be more politically correct.
Morrison, of course, is the king of the Brush beasts. Why an eighteen pound cat can lord it over 120 pounds of dog, I’ll never quite know, although a friend of my wife’s suggests that dogs will defer to any animal who can “shit in the house without getting in trouble.” Perhaps it’s that simple.
In many ways, the big guy is more dog than cat: outgoing, friendly, and very sociable. He’s often the first to greet visitors. He snores when he sleeps upside down and offers a squeeky meow when we wake him up so we can sleep.
Likes:
- Lounging on shoes and purses (especially when they belong to visitors)
- Frank Sinatra
- Green beans
- Newpapers, paper bags and boxes
Dislikes:
- Cars
- Chicken
The adventures of the hounds are better documented elsewhere in this blog, but they wanted to share their likes and dislikes.
Daphne is the blue-fawn brindle beauty on the right. She is a very small greyhound (53 pounds) with yellow wolfy eyes who has just discovered the art of begging. She’s probably five (no tattoos) and was found running through the woods of Lockhart by animal control. We met her three years ago at a GPA meet and greet where she was curled into a tight little ball, shivering, and hoping not to be noticed. We fell in love immediately. A person needs to visit our house several time before they see the ‘real’ Daphne, a very affectionate, playful, and goofy dog. There is very little brain in that pointy little head of hers, making her untrainable, but her heart is enormous.
Daphne likes:
- Peanut butter Kongs
- The word ‘greyhound’ (one of only a few that she knows)
- New clothes to sniff
- Nesting in the pillows on the bed
Daphne does not like:
- Car rides
- Walks
- Anything new and different
- Anyone new and different
- Anywhere new and different
Phoebe came to us in October and was thought to be a spook, but is far more outgoing than Daphne. She weighs around 65 pounds and is still getting used to living amongst the humans. Everything is new, exciting and fun. She adheres to Emerson’s advice to do something everyday that scares you, and is quickly overcoming her fears.
Phoebe likes:
- Squeeky toys
- Walks
- Car rides
- Soft couches
- People she’s never met
- Being outside
Phoebe does not like:
- Fireworks
- Being told ‘No.’
So there’s the pack. Or is it pride? I suppose that would be Morrison’s call.
[saveagrey]
Initially, I didn’t have much to say and was just going to post a picture, but that didn’t feel like a Weekend Hound Report, so instead of sitting at the computer wishing for something to blog about, which seems to be very dangerous, I decided to just change the name from ‘Report’ to ‘Blogging,’ thus freeing myself from the tryranny of the word ‘report’ and opening the way to just put up a cute picture. Then I thought of something to write, but I went ahead and left ‘Blogging’ up to keep the pressure down and thus it is that we now have Weekend Hound (or Cat) Blogging:
I’ve heard that greyhounds have very accurate internal clocks due to the regimented life they live in the concentration camps… er… kennels at the tracks. You know, early to bed, early to rise makes a hound faster and smarter and postpones his demise. Well, since Phoebe is a retired fired racer, I’ve been watching since she came to us for evidence of this internal clock. Well, it started going off this week. 4:30 am. Usually, I get up at 5:30 and Phoebe follows me out of the bedroom and joins me for breakfast and a trip to the backyard (for her, not me).
This week, however, every morning at 4:30am we hear the squeek-squeek-squeek of a squeeky chew toy growing louder and louder as it begs for mercy. After that comes the beating of her weedwhacker tail against the wall until finally she starts running laps around the room. The room is small – at least for a speeding greyhound – so bouncing off the walls is more like it.
Every morning this week.
4:30am.
It’s apparent that Phoebe’s internal clock ticks just fine, but somewhere in that pointy little canine head it seems that a switch has been made in which the internal clock has skipped ahead an hour. A friend suggested that she has perhaps switched to greyhound daylight time.
Or perhaps it’s just youth. She turned two in November, which is pretty much adult for most dogs, but according to my copy of Retired Racing Greyhounds for Dummies, (She came with the book, can you believe it? Adopt a dog and get a book. What’s not to love?) greys mature more slowly:
Because greyhounds don’t mature until they are about three years of age, a two-year-old retired racer may still be very much a puppy and quite full of himself. He may need more exercise and supervision than a dog who is just a few months or a year older.
I wondered if perhaps she needs a bit more exercise. So I took her for an especially long walk on Saturday night, but it only helped a little bit. She started working over the squeeky toy at 4:37. Better, but we still need to adjust that clock.
[saveagrey]
Readers of my previous post will be aware that though the week may begin on a Sunday or a Monday depending on one’s language and location, Monday is never part of the weekend, and yet, a Weekend Hound Report. Just a little temporal paradox to enrich your experience.
The hounds had an interesting week. Some friends came over for the UT game, and as Vince Young charged into the end zone to seal the game, much celebration ensued. Quite terrifying.
The hounds leapt from the sofa and ran into the cave in the back of the house study to hide from the crazed apes who were beating their hands together, screaming and generally whooping it up. Morrison sauntered off into another room with his tail fluffed out like a bottle brush. When the humans settled down, he walked in to check on the dogs. He found Phoebe (the sixty-five pound greyhound) huddled in a corner so he naturally hissed at her, which caused her to tremble and cry in terror until my wife rescued her. Morrison (the seventeen-pound cat) was sent to time out. He must have been pulling for USC.
On Saturday, we went to visit some friends who just bought a house on the north shore of Lake Travis. They invited the hounds so we all cruised out through the hills to Lago Vista. This time it was Daphne’s turn to be afraid. She loves our friends when they come to our house. The drive was too much, though, and she spent the evening sleeping and recovering in a corner of the bathroom.
Phoebe loved the whole adventure. This was the first time she’d met these friends and she was very into them. It seems like each day, Phoebe comes out more and more, becoming more adventurous, more of a dog. Daphne is also coming out, but her progress is measured in years.
[saveagrey]
Wanting to start the new year off with a clean slate of sorts, we decided that yesterday would be the day to scatter Zephyr’s ashes. She loved hiking with me more than anything else, and I always knew that when she died, I’d take her for one last hike. So off we went to a trail along a nearby river that we’ve hiked many times.
Yesterday’s weather was beautiful, sunny with a slight breeze, probably upper 70s. We walked through the cedar forest until we came to a place where the trail takes a westward bend on a bluff overlooking the river. That’s where we left her. It’s a beautiful spot and a place where we often stop to rest.
Whenever I think of her, I think of summer hikes along narrow hill country streams where she used to bite the water before drinking, the way she strained the leash to chase after squirrels and rabbits, the way she used to constantly turn around to make sure I was still there on the other end of the leash. I miss all that, but I’m not sad, not anymore. In fact I’m smiling from ear-to-ear as I type this.
It’s never easy to lose them, but as someone once told me, it gives us the chance to make new friends such as Phoebe, whose middle name is Grace because she sort of became the saving grace of 2005 when we realized how badly Daphne needed another dog.
[saveagrey]
The unexpected seems to have occurred. Phoebe, it turns out, is not afraid of people. As mentioned in last week’s Very Special Weekend Hound & Cat Report, Phoebe was a mass of tail-wagging excitement for the road trip, and she seemed to really enjoy the company of all the new bipedal apes she met. By my estimate, she was introduced to fifteen new people over the weekend and wasn’t afraid of any of them. In fact whenever someone would leave and then return a few hours later, she was thrilled to see them again. When we got her, we were told she was a spook, but she seems to have gotten over that and is now a definite fan of the humans.
On Monday, my mother-in-law followed us back to Austin to hang out with my wife and have her own little vacation for a few days. Phoebe was naturally happy to see her, and greeted her with much tail-wagging and barking each morning. Now, whenever someone comes over, if Phoebe has previously met that person, they get the whole canine welcome routine.
Who’d have thought.
***
Want to save a greyhound in Central Texas? Check these pups out. Or go here to find a greyhound near you.
I’m not sure it’s that special, but I always wanted to do a Very Special something along the lines of all the Very Special episodes that certain TV shows run this time of year. I also like the fact that the title of this post double categorizes itself. Is this a Days till Christmas post? Is it a Weekend Hound & Cat Report? Is it just a post with an overlong title involving too many colons? Am I rambling too much on this? Probably, so here it is with, oh what the hell, a colon:
Because there was no room at the inn kennel and not a single shepard watching his flock by night person we know who felt comfortable giving Morrison his insulin injections, he accompanied us on our journey to visit my wife’s family in east Texas. He travels pretty well in the car, and considering there were two large greyhounds and one cat, the trip went uneventfully.
Daphne hid under a pile of blankets. Morrison slept mostly in his cat carrier. Phoebe seemed to have had a good time on the road. This was the first time she’d gone farther than the vet, and she was excited about this opportunity to slay the dragon, destroy the One Ring, learn the ways of The Force, and sit in a car for six hours. The excitement lasted about half-way to Houston and then she just curled up and slept through the rest of the drive.
As we progressed down I-10 and into the Golden Triangle, it was nice to see Christmas lights and other decorations on so many buildings and homes despite the FEMA tarps that still cover most of the roofs. East Texas still looks “all tore up” but not as bad as the last time we were here, though, I couldn’t believe some of the damage in Port Arthur that we hadn’t seen last month since we didn’t go that way. Port Arthur was the town where Morrison decided the trip was over and began meowing and singing his Blues of the Lonesome Road. Fortunately, by that point we were almost there.
When we arrived, Phoebe was introduced to this side of the family and they all seem to like her, and more importantly she isn’t afraid of them. She’s exploring, Daphne is hiding, and Morrison is following my father-in-law around. Hopefully they’ll all enjoy tolerate the drive home as well as they did the drive here.
Tomorrow…the tree.
Until then, stop off at Ironicus Maximus to find out if greyhounds really are dogs.
[saveagrey]
The greyhounds are taking the week off in order to give Morrison a chance to share some of his adventures. He’s a twelve year old black-and-white goodboy who is probably more outgoing and gregarious than either of the dogs. He is also in charge.
Last week, we got an ottoman so as to kick up our feet when watching movies, but Morrison quickly realized that what we had actually purchased was a king-size cat bed. The hounds have attempted to turn it into a greyhound bed, but as much as he likes them and will often sleep next to them, he has had to draw a bright line and make his stand here upon the ottoman. So the dogs have been chased off the ottoman and generally reminded with a good hiss about the workings of the heirarchy around here.
After conquering the ottoman and deciding that the couch is better anyway, we all settled in to watch The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys, a thriller in which a group of cruel Catholic school boys set out to poison a beautiful panther with narcotics and then frame it for tearing up their teacher’s classroom. The film spends too much time detailing the mundane and trivial lives of the twisted cat-hating altar boys and not enough time focusing on their innocent (“Animals are without sin”, we are reminded at one point in the film) victim, the majestic cat. Morrison found himself at the point of tears when the cat succumbed to the drugs, but cheering mightily when the cat’s friend came to rescue his buddy and engage the cowardly human in combat. The battle scenes were a bit tame and went by too quickly for Morrison’s taste, but he loves movies in which justice is done even when the filmmakers attempt to align the audience’s symapthies with the bad guys. Hopefully there will be a sequel that focuses on the panthers attempting to put their lives back together.