Thursday 13 November 2008

Inspector Rex plays music, clever as always

Penny and I watched the Austrian crime show Inspector Rex again tonight and Rex was a canine genius as usual. One trick was to play a toy that involved pressing a section of the game to make a musical note sound. The part to be pressed was large and easily manipulated by a dog's paw.

It was an episode from season four, when he is with Brandtner - a story about a classical pianist who wants his son to be a famous performer. Of course, seeing it's such a great show for us dog-lovers, I won't give away any more of the plot.

He learned to play four notes, repeating them after a child character played them a couple of times for him. I think the piece that was played repeatedly in the show was Kinderszenen by Robert Schumann, and maybe the notes Rex played were from that piece. I've got a memory like a sieve, so the memory of what Rex played was gone half a minute after he did it.

But I'd certainly like to get my hands on the toy. I reckon Penny and I could have fun on it. I'd love to know how many notes she could memorise and I feel sure she could learn the basic idea of pressing buttons - for treats, of course. Penny's not inclined to work without being paid a fair wage!

I've browsed the internet, searching 'musical toys' but I guess I'd have to be lucky to stumble across the toy I want. But, as they say, you never know your luck in a big city, so I'll keep my eyes open when I'm in toy shops.

6 comments:

Slavenka said...

Inspector Rex is also one of my favorite show.Rex is always so good.

parlance said...

Slavenka, when I watch Rex do things, I'm always thinking, how could I teach Penny to do something like that?

Anonymous said...

The game is called Simon, and I think it is still available, possibly made by Hasbro now.

parlance said...

Thanks for that! I'm off to search the Net for the Simon game.

parlance said...

Oh, anonymous, now you've got me yearning for that game! It's on eBay Australia right now! $53 is the bid at the moment. I'm watching it to see how high it goes. Sigh...

But at least I know what I'm looking for next time I'm browsing the second-hand shops.

Anonymous said...

Hello, I absolutely love inspector rex too!1 its like one of my favourite shows!!