Day 108 Playing tubes with the ferret

I played with a dog my shape but not my colors,
and a dog my color, but not my shape

Horses suck

Today nothing much, we went to the park a few hours and I found many dogs to play with, and then we went  school to learn about horses (not my favorite subject).

Kiwi stole my icecream

Oh right, now she is pretending to be innocent for the camera

Jen is preparing for exams so I played with Kiwi.

The more Kiwi plays with my tail, the more I get happy
the more I wag my tail, and the more she plays with it

There is construction work not far from the house, and Jen found a few tubes lying unused. So Kiwi got a free personnal amusement park!

Day 63 Rainy day

Me, bored out of my mind

Today was a rainy day. We did get to walk this morning, around lunch and in the afternoon, but because of the weather, there were barely any other dogs, and since Jen refuses to play with the ball with me, I was full of energy and begging Jennifer to find something to palliate to my boredom.

Jen chases me with the vacuum cleaner
I'm NOT counting that as a game!

When this happens, we play indoor games. Here are the games we play:

• hide-n-seek. Jen waits for a moment of inattention on my part and hides. When I realize she is missing I look for her in a hurry. When I find her, I am as happy as if she'd left the house for 12 hours! But Jen is quite big, and there are not so many hiding spots for her, which brings us to the second game...
• hide a toy. I have to sit and stay, while Jen hides a toy in the house. This can be quite tricky, as now she even hides a toy on, under and behind other things. I'm happy Molly and Kiwi had the courtesy to leave most of my nose intact as it is quite handy,
• tug-of-war. I'm progressively getting stronger, but I slip on the floor while Jen has a better grip. Harumpf, one day I will be stronger than Jen!
• getting treats out of a kong. Later in summer she said she'd make a popsicle out of the kong, but only to eat out on the porch because it can make a mess,
• wrestling. Not a fair game though because I am not allowed to use my mouth. So I either lick Jen madly, or find a toy to chew on while Jen is pushing me around. Still one of my favorite games though,
• some kind of training. Last to date was "clean". What Jen means by this is to clean the floor of my toys and drop them in the toy box. But unless she is really on my back checking I am doing it properly, I get very distracted and even the most boring toys suddenly become super interesting. Jen can't complain, she does the exact same thing when she is putting away her stuff!

Sitting and staying while Jen goes and hides a toy

Also, I play with Kiwi a lot. We became friends. Or she is my friend, and I am her... well she tolerates me more now!

I never talk about my night walks, because Jen is bad at taking pictures at night, and I prefer to illustrate my activities with photo material.

But anyway, tonight in the park I met 3 other future guide dogs: Cassy, Oliver and Monty.

Jen is not good at aiming with the camera at night
so Cassy is cut out.
Here is Monty, Oli and I

And I found my first hedgehog tonight! It's basically a ball, but not a fun ball, because I can't pick it up.

Jen told me StinkyR...hum I mean Kiwi is an expert at finding them. She once spotted 8 in one evening! Jen used to prevent her from bugging the hedgehogs (Kiwi is always on leash so it's easy for Jen). But every night, Kiwi would pull and pull and try to play with them. One night Jen got the brilliant idea to let Kiwi play with one, hoping Kiwi would get mildly hurt and would stop tugging on the leash.

Kiwi played a long time with the hedgehog, the hedgehog got a bit stressed and rolled up into a ball much to Kiwi's delight who rolled it around. Eventually Jen decided the hedgehog had enough and took Kiwi home.

Only home she realized what a mistake this had been. She found 17 baby ticks on Kiwi's face! (apparently hedgehogs are the perfect tick vectors...).

So tonight, when I found the hedgehog, I was careful not to get to close to it!

Day 33 Stick factory!

I found out how sticks are made!!
They come from trees! There were two people cutting off branches into smaller pieces, until they were perfect size to play with!

Amazing! a thousand sticks maybe!

Picking the perfect one for me

That makes sense actually. Around Christmas time I saw ball-trees.

It's been a while since I played with a ball. Usually I have to sneak into Molly's room and discretely steal one. But more often then not, Jen catches me and makes me drop it.


Speaking of stealing, it was Kiwi's birthday today!

Caught in the act... on another occasion

But we couldn't celebrate, because Kiwi stole a whole pack of dog treats this morning, and ate so much of it she got diarrhea of a lot of funny colors! She has been sleeping under the bed the whole day...

When we play in the kitchen
it looks like it's from a black-and-white movie!

Day 27 Old and wise

Today we went to the vegetable market with Nicky. Nicky is the older brown little dog. She barks at us young kids when we run to fast or play too rough.

Jen said I should listen to her, she is old and wise.

I noticed that the wise and smart people in movies always wear a white beard. Today I decided to try that look on me.

You shall not pass!

Jen washed the smudged mud away. She's right. It doesn't suit my personality ... yet :)


A few updates:

I would like to report that Jennifer is walking a lot better on the streets. We are stopping less and she is not often lagging behind. She has the compulsive behavior of shoving a treat in my mouth whenever we pass another dog, before I even get the chance to give them a piece of my mind (well too bad for her, the neighborhood won't know how well she is protected by a fierce dog, moi!)

Roar! 

I will report that Kiwi is still stealing my food whenever I don't finish my meal immediately. The nerve of her! She steals one kibble, one whole kibble!, and goes and chews it under the bed for 5 min. That usually gives me the time to finish the whole foodbowl before she gets back.

I wonder why she wears that mask over her eyes all the time. I wonder if it was Nature's way of warning people "Careful, this animal has no sense of private property". Stinky Rat said she does know what property is. But she said she follows these simples rules:

1. If I touch, it it's mine
2. If it's yours, it's mine
3. If rule 1 couldn't be applied, then me calling dibs works just as well
4. Once it's mine you can't have it back
5. I probably will hide it to ensure rule 4
Luckily she hides most things under the desk, behind her cage or under the bed. So I find everything easily again!


Speaking about eating, Molly decided to not eat my nose anymore. I appreciate that very much, as I use it to read my messages in the park.

Fido said he gained some weight and went on a diet

Hey guys! Trixie just left the funniest urine! Come smell it!

Day 10 Griffin's sleepover

Day 10

New day, new adventures.

I figured ambulances are not so amazing.

Back in my day, artists had talent. Now they play repetitive rhythms, way too loud for my eardrums. Ah... young people!...

Crappy ambulance.

Jennifer has no tact. Maybe it has to do with her lack of socialization I suspected yesterday. Anyway, when today I didn't sing with the ambulance, Jen was so extremely happy she kept on petting me. Keep your cuddles to yourself, thank you very much :(


I invited my friend Griffin to stay over at my place for a few days.

Playing tug-of-war between beds, notice how lazy we are so we are laying down

Griffin has many toys, which he keeps really tidy.
----Wait, let me rephrase that----
Griffin has many toys, which I like to destroy.

Griffin's toy

Griffin was so happy to be at our place. He told me I was lucky to live in the same room where Juicy Hotdog lives.
"Don't you even think about it!" hissed Stinky Rat, who had overheard the conversation.
"Now now, be good with little Kiwi" said Jen, watching over us.
"No!!! My name is Destructerminator!!!"
Now I am really confused as what to call her...

Stinky Kiwi Hotdogminator

We also went to the park and we met dogs from Jennifer's school. Griffin didn't like so much Tarzan, the ridgeback, so me neither.

Griffin, Tarzan and I

Jennifer likes Tarzan, however her opinion doesn't count because she is biased: she likes all dogs. 

First day in a new home

I think my human's name is Jennifer. I'm really not lucky, I think she might have some behavioral problems...

• First of all, she can't speak normal human language. She speaks with different intonations and stuff. I had been studying how humans communicate, but I noticed, apart from a few commands like "Sedni", "Lehni" and a few other words like "Hodna!..." human language is just garble. Most of the time they are making useless sounds. However they are pretty good at understanding my name Mety.

• Secondly, my human is pretty bad at keeping objects. Today she was holding a ball. She accidently dropped/threw it. So then I bring it back to her, polite little puppy as I am. And I kid you not, about 10 seconds later she lost is again!! Again I had to run and bring it back. This went on for a good 5 to 10 min! sometimes she would make me sit, other times k noze, and as soon as I obeyed her silly commands, she got so happy she would throw the ball again!

My human with the toy she keeps dropping

• Thirdly, she lives in a bedroom owned by a little stinky rat. The moment I stepped in, the little rat glared at me. Little rat said she doesn't like me calling her "little rat". She said her name is "Emperesse Destruterminator". And that the big foodbowl was hers. And the ball too. And the other toys too. And that if I leave her alone she will tolerate me on her territory. I gulped and went to hide in the corner. " Oh no, where have I ended up?" I thought. 

Stinky rat

 Anyway right after that, Jennifer took Stinky rat and made all sorts of baby sounds "oooh baby Kiwi sweetie, wook a the wittle puppy, she will be your sister for a wittle while, yeah? Goozie goozie that's a baby...". She tickled her on the belly and gave her a little kiss on the forehead. Stinky rat was so embarassed, mumbled something about parents cramping her style, and returned furious to her cage. I was laughing my head off. Turns out she is maybe not so bad after all.

Stinky rat and me