Things that make you go NUTTY!!

I am new to DOGSEY but have tried to be active and read as much as I can on here. However, I get sidetracked sometimes and go off on a tangent on a topic, so this seemed a good idea for somewhere to put my little stories to share with everyone, and so that you can all get to know me a bit better maybe, without me spamming important thread issues!

I don't mind if you answer them, but please don't be judgemental. I'm sharing, not asking for any opinions! Sometimes the best learnt lesson is the one learnt through a mistake made.

I will add little anecdotes from time to time, as the memories come to me. I hope you enjoy them.

Tracy xxx

Years ago my Grandparents, Mum and me would spend a lot of time visiting my Uncle and Aunt in France. Way up in the Alps was a little fondue restaurant which we often visited. Now the owner of the restaurant had a German Shepherd of immense size, which was old and tetchy. All the customers were told to ignore the dog, especially me as a child at the time. He was dangerous. (Why he was allowed in the dining area considering this God only knows!!) However, my lovely Grandmother would ALWAYS ignore the warnings and give the dog a big rub behind the ears as soon as she entered. My Uncle would be pleading with her not to, the owner would be warning her in French and the dog would be growling his head off. All the time she would be saying "Oh he's fine, he's just a big pussy cat really!" The dog would spend the entire meal with his head placed firmly in my Grandmother's lap. From time to time she would give him a stroke and he would growl at her for doing it. She always ignored him and he never bit her. This happened for many years and countless visits, same scenario every time. The dog and my nan have long since passed away, but i like to think she's still scratching his ears and making him growl up in heaven

With previous dogs I would do a lot of tug-of-war with toys and then get them to leave it, sit and kiss and then return to the game. Maybe that taught them to share better. I remember my whippet lurcher that used to snatch treats out of my hand. I taught her to gently take them out of my mouth but I got a few bit lips in the process! However, one day when I had babysat a friends baby overnight, I heard my dog whimper. A bit like a yelp, but not one. I opened my eyes to find a wide-awake baby with both hands firmly grasped on the side flap of my dog's mouth, and pulling! I'm sure most of us have had a baby pull our hair before, and they have a good yank in them! Bless my dog, she wouldn't even open her jaws up to give out a decent yelp! She just looked at me in the same way she would look at me when the cat was attached to her face and biting her nose.....in kinda said "Get this thing the hell off of me!!"

I took a dog to the vets once because I had a feeling she might be pregnant. He expertly informed me that he very much doubts it but if she was then it was only one puppy and it was up under her rib cage. 2 weeks later she gave birth to 8 very fat and healthy pups. Now I know she had a bit of Irish Wolfound in her many breeds because that's what her Mum was, but I didn't know they had such a BIG rib cage to hide 8 puppies in!!!

I had a Samoyd/Border Collie when I was a kid. While he was still a puppy he got hit on the side of his head by a car and from then on had a bit of a viscous streak in him. We had to warn people who came in the house not to touch the dog, and in the main it was fine. however, he would have a habit of jumping up next to people on the couch and then stare at them until they unconsciously would start to stroke him, which he would allow. Only if they tried to take their hand AWAY would he snap at them. He also went for feet, which amused a boyfriend of mine who wore boots with steel-capped toes. He hated anything with a hat on and there was an unfortunate incident when he went around a corner before my Mum and came head to head with a bobby on the beat! Years later a friend was laying paving slabs in the garden. The dog thought he was attacking the ground and went in for the kill on the paving slab, just as it was being slammed into place. Took the skin on his foreleg straight down to the bone, and on Good Friday too! Mum was not impressed! He attacked anything that came through the letterbox and after Mum had taken me to the hospital one time we came home to find him foaming at the mouth. Mum shoved me in the front room while she ascertained the problem. Seems the dog had got the weekly paper and gnashed it as it came through the door then went back to sleep with his mouth full of chewed up newspaper. It had turned into paper mache! Mum just couldn't budge his jaw open. On the way to the vets he tried barking at all the usual things, but it sort of lost it's impact! The vet said we were lucky to have got him there because he could have died if we hadn't. In his old age he became blind and deaf and arthritic. Mum would carry him up and down the stairs but it was when he went out to the toilet I had to laugh. Once he had done his business he would just wait patiently and every time, without fail, the cat would walk over to him, walk under his nose so it's tail would brush against his jaw and he would turn with the tail and follow the cat back indoors. Amazing bonding between them I reckon!

My "bitsa" dog had a bad habit of chasing cats up the tree outside my flat. I was never concerned about the behaviour because there was no malice involved, she just liked the game! On the rare occasions a cat would stop and turn, ready to fight, she would immediately give up and if i recalled her she would come straight away. Now my husband, (at the time), kept one of her puppies to have as his own dog. Having walked her one day he came home proud as punch. "Your dog only chases cats up trees." he bragged, "mine chases kids up them!"
It seems some local boys had startled his dog and she had barked. 2 ran off one way and the other went straight up the nearest tree. If they'd stopped to look they would have noticed she was on a lead, as she was still in training. Still, we had to laugh.

I had an Irish greyhound, (ex-racer), for many years. He had to have been the worst chocaholic dog I have ever encountered. How he never got more than a couple of days of 'the runs' I will never know! It started when he unwrapped a Christmas present, got into the sealed cardboard box and ate a bar of chocolate which was all ready for posting. then he managed to open a bedroom door to get at a whole bag of chocolate delicacies given to me by a friend who worked at Cadbury's. How he managed to get from the boot of an estate car to a bar of Aero on the dashboard though I will never know! The gap over the back seat was surely not big enough for him to climb through, but he did!
Never underestimate the capabilities of a determined dog!