Pets – Page 83

Alert! Alert!

This is the look of a dog who heard the refrigerator door open and is using her ears and nose to determine if the cheese drawer is being opened (cheese, yummy cheese!) or her hot dog container is being taken out (she gets her medicine stuffed in hot dog slices). In her younger years when I’d close the fridge door she’d just magically be there, making me wonder if she was using wormholes to silently move from wherever she was sleeping to the fridge.

When I walk her and see how much she smells and hears that I can’t, I can’t help but ponder how much of the wonder of the world I’m missing even though it is literally under my nose.

Sam at the Window

Sam in the cat tree, looking out of the window in my office, taken on the day after we adopted Boo in 2013. My mirrorless camera had just arrived so I was able to set it on the window sill and take the picture, I really like the freedom of camera placement that mirrorless cameras offer.

IT’S ELLIE!

Watching my favorite show, Adventure Time, with my sweet pup.

On our walk this evening a little boy up the block asked if he could pet Ellie and I said yes, she’s a pretty gentle soul. He was squealing in delight and couldn’t stop hugging her until his mom eventually pulled him away so we could continue on our walk.

Across the street we could see Yum Yum, a sweet puppy who may be Ellie’s biggest fan, she just desperately wants to come say hi to Ellie whenever she sees us. She used to pretend she had to go the bathroom so her owners would let her outside, and then she’d run over and mob Ellie with licks to the face, but they eventually got wise to her little deception. I can’t blame you Yum Yum, Ellie is pretty great.

A couple of years ago at the dog park we met a woman for the first time and as Ellie went up to her (surreptitiously sniffing her pockets to see if she was carrying treats) the woman started petting Ellie and crying, she said Ellie reminded her of her dog who had died earlier in the year. I understood all too well, the death of our cat Scout was still fresh in my mind, and I started to offer to take Ellie to a different part of the park when I noticed she was smiling through her tears and wanted to pet Ellie for a while longer.

On two occasions I’ve had teenagers, after watching Ellie and I play in the park, separate from their friends to come over to tell me what a wonderful dog Ellie is. I don’t have kids of my own so I don’t normally get to see teens in such unguarded moments, but it’s very sweet.

It’s a little funny how someone as painfully shy as I am ended up with a gregarious dog that spreads happiness wherever she goes. I sometimes wonder if she gets a gray hair for every moment of joy she brings into the world, the price she pays for being such a great dog, it would certainly explain the many gray hairs. If so, I hope she gets many more.

The Trixie Maneuver

Back in March I was photographing Boo resting on the heating vent when we experienced the Trixie Maneuver, where she approached and backed up and sat down right in front of him, anxiously waiting to see if he would attack her. She had been trying these submissive approaches with Boo, mostly unsuccessfully, but while his eyes went wide for a moment, he did allow her to stay, and she leaned over on her side with her feet and tail overlapping his hands.

While it took a couple of months for Boo to accept Trixie, peace does not yet reign among the cats in our household. Boo and Sam have been at odds since Emma died and Trixie arrived, and Sam has had enough of both the young cats. He’s fine if they are on their own but swats them if they try to snuggle with him.

These things take time, and to help normalize relations I’ve been lining the three of them up each day to give them some cat treats, and they all get along fine then. Sam will be a lot happier when he relents, as he’ll love having extra snuggling partners, but for the moment he’s curled up in my lap and happy to be on his own.

Rear Window

Templeton does a little bird watching from one of the rear windows in our old house. That house was much more modern than our current house, one of the things I miss is the many windows and the great views into the backyard. And the air conditioning. And the two-car garage. While we had nice neighbors on either side, in general I much prefer our current neighborhood, and I certainly don’t miss the commute.

Gray Tuxedo

A picture from 2001 of our cat Templeton, this picture has been offline since I took my old site down a while back. He was a handsome little fellow in a gray tuxedo coat and would transform my thinking about cats. What a blessing it was to have known him.

Have Boo, Will Travel

After the arrival of Trixie, Boo decided it was time he was moving on and packaged himself for transport.

I took this with my little Canon mirrorless camera but the light levels were so low that the image quality suffered. I really enjoy the concept of mirrorless cameras and would like to use them for most of my non-wildlife photography, but it will mean moving away from Canon for the first time ever as they are deliberately (and perhaps understandably) holding back on designing good ones until the market matures. Sony has some full-frame models that would have better handled this scene, if I had to choose today I’d probably go that route, but the expense of buying new lenses is holding me back at the moment.

A Snapshot of Scout

I’ve never put this picture of Scout online before as it’s just a simple snapshot from when she was around one year old, but I was editing it today and my eyes filled with tears and I had to put it aside for a while. It caught me off guard, as while I will go to my grave missing her, she died two years ago and usually by now the sense of loss isn’t quite so pointed. Besides I’ve edited other pictures of her recently with only the expected dull ache of distant loss.

I suppose it has as much to do with Emma as Scout as I’ve been thinking a lot about her recently. Grieving for her got interrupted with the health problems the other pets had and as needs must, we focused on the sick more than the dead. They were both far too young when they died, especially Em, and while we tried everything to save them, ultimately their fates were out of our hands.

The silver lining, of course, in outliving our pets is that as sorry as I am to have lost Scout and Emma, I’m happy to have welcomed Boo and Trixie into our home. Only I hope I won’t grieve for their loss for many years to come.

Sleepmate

I don’t think I’ve put this picture of Scout from 2001 online before, she’s sleeping on my side of the bed in the master bedroom of our old house and had been with us for about 5 months. Right from the get-go she climbed on to my chest every night when I went to bed.

Sam in a Sunbeam

Sam enjoys the warmth of the sun as he naps in our living room.

Our snuggly Sam has mostly returned to form after a difficult couple of years when he lost both of his older sisters, he has been glommed all over me this weekend and when I get up steals my spot, then when I return lets me pick him up and he goes right back to snuggling. The one thing we’re working on is that he’s not ready to let his new sister Trixie snuggle up with him. Bless her heart, she keeps trying and will approach submissively so he can lick her head, but he’s still rather agitated and will end up nipping her and moving away. There has been some progress and I think he’ll come around, we’ve had some snuggly cats before but Sam is in a class of his own. I think he’ll appreciate the extra snuggling partner that he hasn’t had since Scout died.