Hovawart TV: She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not

Bard - the Herd-Wart - is brave enough to explore the mysteries of cat body language.



She does love you, Bard. It is a cat thing.

That Day To Day Stuff

"It's benign", the vet said over the phone, and the longest exhale in my life could start making its way to freedom. In fact, I had to call her back the next day to recite the whole report she gave me, as I couldn't remember a lot more of what she said, other than those three words.

Nine days of waiting, pondering, worrying, pacing, and some more worrying, it all came to an end in one exhale. Live from day to day, they teach us. Dogs that is. And didn't Kenzo gave me yet another lesson in that department when we returned from his surgery, when he tried to make a high-five. I am a lousy student of dog life-lessons.

Sheepshit

"Tilde? ... Tilde!!", I shouted, to no avail.

Ah yes, you might have noticed, a lot of my recent posts seem to start with exactly that shout, although eye-witnesses claim I use the F word.

Before you read on, I want to reassure you, no person or animal got hurt, other than yours truly's confidence in having any control whatsoever over Tilde, was dented once more.

Looking After Me

We lay down in the grass and cuddle. I am glad you are back. I take a deep breath and pick up the phone, to break the news with people abroad, who expect us to come and visit.

God damnit Kenzo.

It should have been a thorn they found, maybe even a copper wire, whatever, embedded in your foot. Like they found with Viva before you.

The "Shitbag" Checklist

If you have been reading Jan's Chickenshit post, well, Tilde wasn't finished with us yet. And this time, she was caught on camera.

I was looking forward to the weekend, and also to meet Emil in person - as Jan mentioned in her post, we were spending a weekend with friends we know for quite a while from FB - I always followed Emil's story on Dina's FB page, and watched him grow from a shy and insecure puppy mill dog, into a happy and thriving Hovawart.

Chickenshit

Today I turn the blog over to Jan Wolfe about what should have been a textbook display of Tilde managing the "Leave It" command.

Note to self, never go on a weekend with a blogging friend.

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It started out as a quiet Saturday afternoon walk in the woodland surrounding our rented cottage at Henne Strand – six humans and three dogs enjoying the warm September weather and each other’s company.  The dogs were sniffing in the undergrowth and reading the various scents as we would read a newspaper.  We humans were chatting about this that and the next thing and enjoying the meeting that we had looked forward to for months.  As we walked, we passed numerous cottages, each of which we admired and passed comment about, and wished that we owned or at least could live in.

Hamletgate

I have a simple rule for this blog. It should be about dogs. But rules are there to be broken. And when yesterday a group of 33 pilot whales were butchered in the Faroe Islands, for the first time in this annual event the Danish Navy and Special Forces were present, and kept the Sea Shepherd activists away from the locals that were driving and killing the whales.

People Skills

We just hit the trail and I could see in the distance, one of our pals was on it as well.

I stepped up our pace to see if we could catch up with them and then play a little, maybe.

I noticed our friend had seen us. She waived, waiting for us to catch up.

Tired Dog, Good Dog

You have heard the cliche before, "a tired dog is a good dog", or, "... a happy dog". Although it takes a lot more than that, I like it enough to say, it is one of my favorite motto's.

Tilde clearly never got the memo though, and she challenged us in this department in a way we could never have imagined. From almost day one she was like an energy bomb bouncing around.

The Beauty and The Beast

I can see most dogs think twice before they approach.

On one leash I have the Beauty, wriggling like a worm, bouncing as much as the leash allows, while the smiles on her face work like a magnet, "I want to lick you up!".

And on the other leash I have the Beast, sizing you up, to determine if you are worthy of approaching his awesomeness. And not in the last place, approaching his Beauty too.