Peppa is a very different dog from Penny

 Peppa and I go to play-and-train most Sunday mornings. It's great fun and a chance for Peppa to be around other dogs. 

In going there, I've definitely confirmed that Penny was a very different creature from Peppa. Penny was not afraid of anyone or anything, a calm presence and a confident explorer of new situations and people.

Peppa is timid. I'm not sure whether this is because she is a 'Covid baby' and spent the first months of her life in a quiet household in a basically silent neighbourhood. It has been said that we had 'the longest lockdown in the world.' Perhaps it wasn't the longest, but it did teach Peppa that there should be no sound out on the street after nine pm, and established that she should alert us to anyone out and about at night. We don't mind that, as she is a great watchdog.

However, I think it's probably just her temperament to be nervous in new situations. 

Today we tried out a new short tunnel, in the expectation that she would go through it, seeing she has been through longer and darker tunnels at dog play sessions.

But no. That red thing looked quite strange and threatening...

Eventually a piece of cheese tempted her to put her head into the tunnel. But no way was she going to step in.

So that's where we've left it so far. It's always 'baby steps' when introducing her to anything new.

Re-reading my own old blog posts

 Peppa raced out the door this afternoon when our neighbour called, and we did our usual heart-searching about our awful standard of dog training. 

And then I began to wonder whether we had the same issues, so many years ago, when we had Penny living with us. Our vet agrees with us in referring to her as 'Saint Penny', haha. In comparison to Peppa she was indeed a saint.

I thought I'd look back at my own old posts from 2007, when Penny was around the age Peppa is now. And I'm finding it not only entertaining, but also actually helpful. 

One thing I'm noticing is that Peppa is more of a digger than Saint Penny was. I might have made an error of judgment in letting her 'help' me when I was weeding around the strawberries. She sure did love digging that big hole! It was a bit of a pity that a few of the strawberry plants ended up strewn around the area. But hey, she had fun, and it wasn't all that hard to replant the ones she removed.

I guess we'll find out soon if I've created a 'digging monster'.

I'm going to do a search on my old blog for references to digging and see what comes up. In the meantime, I'm intending to scroll through fifteen years of Penny's blogs to see which links still work and make a note on each post as to which links are no longer viable.

training a lhasa apso

 When we brought Peppa into our lives, we knew it would be necessary to get her used to grooming. So we did our best, and she's used to being up on the table getting special attention (and extra special treats) every evening. Fortunately, she loves it. We did come up with the theory that she had seen her mum and dad being groomed and thinks it's part of being a grown-up dog. Who knows what goes on in the clever little head?

She's more clever than we thought she would be, and has trained her people pretty well. Here are some of the favorites:

1. Jump appealingly up onto the human's legs and allow said human to stroke your head and tickle you behind the ears, at the same time slo-w-ly, quie-t-ly stealing a handkerchief or  tissue from their pocket. If tissue, tear it to shreds and enable them to get some isometric exercise bending to collect the shreds. If a handkerchief, mouth it dramatically as if you're going to swallow it and might subsequently need to go to the amazingly expensive Animal Emergency clinic. Wait until the human races to get you a super-nice treat and willingly 'give' the hanky to them in exchange for the treat, and get praised for being so co-operative.

2. Whenever you see a baby gate left ajar, race into the forbidden room and ostentiously wait in the doorway for the command to come 'this way' and receive a treat for your obedience.

 

 

3. Go out into the backyard and bellow at the top of your voice at any movement in the adjoining apartments and wait for the command to 'come'. Race in and get a treat. 

I suspect she's working on a few more commands for the humans to obey. I'll report when she has us even more under her control. 

Oh, and now that I have a close look at that photo I posted, I think I'd  better get off this computer and do that grooming. Obviously today was a rather exciting and messy playday.

 

a cat and a lhasa apso

 Our neighbour has a cat. He wants to be near Peppa, and in fact wandered right into our house the day after Peppa came to live with us.

Peppa loves him. But the problem is that he won't let her come very close. One day, when Peppa was tiny, we went for an on-lead walk along the street and he accompanied us by walking alongside us up on the tops of the fences. 

Peppa had conniptions and it was pretty nightmarish trying to stop her strangling herself on the leash. 

Things have settled into a sort of truce, where he strolls around the perimeter of the house and she races around inside, looking out the windows or trying to bash her way through the screen door, if the wooden door is open. It's fun for her and entertaining for us. Sometimes I wonder what will happen when he eventually decides to let her approach him.

Well, today I discovered that she  can play happily with a friendly cat. We came across  a cat lying on the edge of a footpath when we were out for a walk, and these photos show what a lovely time the two of them had together:

So perhaps Mr Next-door and Peppa will get to play together sometime in the future.

A lhasa apso puppy having fun in water

 

 Peppa had her first experience of water play two days ago and again today. I had read that lhasa apso dogs don't like water, but we thought it was worth a try.

It has continued to be hot this week, so we  wanted to get out the old pool Penny had loved. We put a sprinkler into it, so that the water was moving but not deep. 

I found an old footstool that had flat legs that we thought  would not damage the pool floor.

                                                                                                                      

 

An additional box outside the pool acted as a step for getting in.

It was fun!

 

tale of a dog, a djembe and a kangaroo tail

One of the humans has a new goatskin stretched across his dejmbe, so of course he had to try it out as soon as he got it back after the repair.

And of course Penny had to have a look at it as he placed it on the floor. Unfortunately for any future joy she'll have in listening to djembe rhythms, he gave a nice loud thump just as she looked up into the bottom of it. It sure must have been loud to a dog's hearing, as her head was inside the cavity of the drum.

So now Penny hates it. Here she is peeping around the corner of the next room to check what the scary noise is.

To cheer her up, I presented her with the enormous kangaroo tail that we recently bought for her. We got such a huge one because I worry about her choking on a small bone. (Yes, I know it was a bit of overkill.)

As usual, she headed out the doggy door to bury her bone. But what a problem... The bone wouldn't fit through the small space. So round and round and round and round she went, trying to figure out how to get to the backyard.

Until I took pity on her dilemma and opened a door.

So the search began for a place to bury a long, long bone.

This way?  No, perhaps this spot?

And finally, a good hiding place.

By the time she was finished, you couldn't even see there was a bone. I'm constantly amazed at how much dirt she can move with her nose.

And back inside.

But then she changed her mind. She decided to fetch it. At this stage it wasn't a red juicy-looking bone. It was dark with soil.

And so the day continued. Chew, chew, chew, chew... Until she was so exhausted with the effort that I began to worry about her.

Eventually I decided she was panting so much I'd try to take it, as planned. I swapped it for a frozen cube of mashed vegetables in warm water.

Hours of fun for all.

a dog as music connoisseur

Penny's recovering well from her strange limping problem, we hope. It's good to get her up and about as much as possible, with gentle exercise.

But...

Am I hurt about what she does when I play the piano? Get up from her mat and take herself out of the house?

No, not at all...

Worst of all, she comes back in when I stop playing.

the new dog bed

You can lead a dog to a new bed, but you can't make her lie on it.

This will have to be my new saying, because I spent more money than I like on a fancy new bed for Penny today and she's NOT interested.

Here's the old one, which is looking pretty worn out.

And here's the new one, with Penny looking rather worried about it.

We have the new one sitting on the old one, in the hope that the 'nice' smell might rub off on the new one.

It's probably not going to happen, because the new one is really too small. And we can't return it because we let Penny play with it and toss it around the kitchen to help her see it as a fun place to be.

Oh, well. Better put it down to experience and scan the internet  for a bed that looks like the old one.

Penny's invisibility trick

Penny has a lovely new collar. She received it because her old one mysteriously fell off when we were walking. A kind neighbour read our phone number on it and called us to say he'd found it in the street, so we hurried around - well, in the recent heat it couldn't actually be called 'hurrying' - to collect it. But the clasp was broken off.

So we bought a lovely new one. And Penny christened it this morning in a mud puddle. (We won't be complaining about the puddle, because it's so thrilling to have had some rain at last.)

 And then she rolled in the grass, which is very yellow after the long dry weeks, and did a disappearing act. It's hard to see where Penny finishes and the landscape begins.

dogs are so patient

I loved this  clip of a - presumably domesticated - squirrel hiding a nut in the fur of a Bernese Mountain Dog.

a free crostic puzzle

I'm not sure if any of you (humans, that is) have ever done a crostic puzzle, but here's one, courtesy of one of Penny's humans.

The diagram is not a crossword, even though it might look like one. The whole thing is an excerpt from a piece of writing, in this case a novel. No hints as to which novel, of course, but if you have read any of Hsin-Yi's doggy mysteries, you might...oops, I wasn't supposed to give any hints.

Each word in the text ends at a shaded square, which is not necessarily at the end of a line. There's no punctuation.

You answer the clues as best you can, and transfer the letters to the diagram. The tiny letter in the top right of each square tells you which clue to transfer from.

Often you can guess incomplete words on the diagram, especially if you've read about Honey and her adventures - oops, forgot I'm not going to give away which author features in the puzzle.

As an extra help, the first letters of each answer, on the clue page, reading down, spell the name of the author and the title of the book.

In case I haven't explained clearly, here are some links to sites that describe the way to solve a crostic:
how stuff works
netcrostics

I'm including it as a jpg, so you would have to print out these two following sections, if you want to do it. I don't know how to make it bigger on the blog page, but if you click on each page of the puzzle, it opens in a new window where it's easier to read.

In a couple of weeks I'll post the answer, just in case someone wants to see it.

Have fun!

BTW, I've just had a thought. Seeing I'm a primary school teacher (elementary school), I'll mention that this puzzle is copyright free. Any teachers using H A Hanna's award-winning books in class are welcome to print off these puzzles.

the lorikeets are eating the apples again

Penny was on duty today, guarding the house.

She was at the front door, ensuring no one passed by in the street unchallenged, no cats invaded our front yard, no strange people got in or out of cars, no dogs walked by.

But, out in the back yard, they were back. The apple thieves.

Where was Penny when she was needed for bird-barking duty?

I caught the thieves red-beaked, in the act of thievery.

rainbow lorikeets, mulch, apples and a dog

Penny and I strolled around the garden the other day to admire the apples. They were nearly ripe.

Penny takes her duty seriously to pop outside each evening to deter the inhabitants of this nest...

...who emerge at dusk to steal our fruit. We sort of scared off FOUR in the apple tree last night. I say 'sort of', because they came right back each time Penny dutifully barked them into retreat, and eventually even a dog has to get some sleep.

But these don't look entirely like possum tooth marks. Who else is stealing our apples?

Aha! A culprit is waiting for us to go inside.

We see you, and Penny is barking at you! Do you care? No.

Okay, so I'll pick up some of these bits of bark on the little path and throw them at you!

Penny thinks this is a great game, and now she knows that bits of mulch are really important, because her human has been playing with them, so she should take some inside the house and taste it and keep it and enjoy it in every way.

So everyone's happy now, with something to eat. Dog, possums, ringtail possums. A happy ending.

enjoying a little park with the dog

As I've said before, living with a dog makes me more aware of local places to enjoy nature. I was driving through Heidelberg recently and noticed a teensy little park and stored the information away in my 'can't-be-bothered-going-for-a-proper-walk' mental filing cabinet.

Today was one of those days, so we drove to the minuscule park and Penny showed me that you don't have to cover a lot of ground to have fun.

You can chase tennis balls and then lie on them.

You can mooch around smelling the smells.

There's always the pleasure of surveying the local scenery.

And, of course, you can just enjoy the ownership of a really, really grotty old tennis ball.

mooching around the local lanes with my dog

Penny did her 'puppy eyes' trick today, glancing at her lead as if to say, 'When are we going out?'

Of course, I couldn't resist. I love it when she communicates with me so clearly. But I wasn't in the mood for a full-on exercise-type walk, so we strolled around for half an hour just smelling the flowers.

I feel sure Penny was smelling things, because she had the tell-tale froth around her nostrils that says she's in full scenting mode.

But, strangely, all the flowers she examined were low to the ground. Could it be that she wasn't actually enjoying perfumed flowers, but was sniffing around for pee-mails?

I, on the other hand, WAS looking at plants for aesthetic reasons. Oh, wait, I guess canine aesthetics involves urine, so I shouldn't feel so superior.

I recently attended a workshop on edible weeds at Ceres, so I was looking out for them. Here are a couple I noticed:

dandelion

plantain (I think)

I saw a lovely dandelion seedhead, and crouched down to get a photo of the ball of fluff. 

But Penny came to see what I was doing and wandered away with half the seeds stuck to her coat!

enjoying the ordinary with a dog

Walking Penny is a duty, in one way. We aim to go out for at least forty minutes every day. (We don't achieve that goal all the time, of course.)

But in another way it's an absolute pleasure, because even an ordinary place is made interesting by Penny's company. Who'd have thought, for instance, that a concrete yard could hold so many smells to investigate?

And you certainly never know what you'll find in a grassy back lane...

I found lovely sunny vistas.

Penny found bread rolls! (Oh, how I wish our neighbors wouldn't throw bread into the back lane.)

Every walk is an adventure, if Penny is with me.

fun game for learning about animal health

Human Number Two is out walking with Penny and I'm lazing around at home playing a game on the computer, a game I saw on PetMD.

It's fun. The game is released by the American Veterinary Medical Association. You are training to be a vet and working in a vet hospital. I'm just at the beginner level, and already I'm not keeping up with the influx of clients. I'll have to stop blogging and get right back to it...

an alien visitor in the local park

We've just come home from a visit to Willsmere Park, and when I sat down to look at my photos, I clicked on a close-up of strange bumps on a tree.

But what was this? The computer's face recognition program thought there was a face peeping out of one of the bumps!

Da Dum (creepy music rising to a crescendo)... when I zoomed in on the little bump, it looked like...

an alien dog.

Do you see the ear hanging down at the right? The long line of the muzzle? 

I think it might be a visitor from Penny's planet of origin, perhaps the Canine Leader who sent her to explore Earth and see if it was fit for Doggy Colonisation.