Happy as a sunflower... Oh so sweet.
I'm such a good girl - promise ;)
It has been a rather eventful week, mainly due to Genevieve, who has been Miss Jackyl and Hyde... ;) It started off with her being an enormous brat, jumping up, biting at me and growling for attention and the next day she was the sweetest angel for just about a day and a half. :P I told Hunny that whatever remedy he had given her should please be continued, but alas! it seems like it was all her own idea. On the perfect day she only slept in her very tiny dog bed (we're still waiting for a crate *sigh*), she played with her own toys, she ate ALL her food (all of a sudden) and snoozed quietly at my feet while I was watching TV (bliss). I felt so amazed and accomplished, believing that all my effort to try and discipline the wild little beast had paid off, but unfortunately all returned to "normal" the day after, when we had, once again, a little hooligan on our hands that bit, growled, eaten my raspberry bush :( and even peed on the blanket she'd slept on in front of the TV!? Eish!!
How can u be mad at me when I'm so cute!
In my desperation to try and relive her moments of best behaviour I tried some dominating tactics, holding her on my lap, rolling her onto her back and getting her to lie still. We eventually had her pacified for 2 minutes, tickling her tummy. I could even (quickly) trim her toenails. In my state of elation at being able to groom her properly I ventured out to get the proper Irish red setter trimming equipment and started trimming her feet, ears and legs. I was a little less successful to say the least. I know I was supposed to introduce the whole trimming and grooming experience more sensitively, but who really has time for all that! I'd been on leave for an entire month and still hadn't managed to get to half the things I'd planned to do and this was my last week of leave, so patience and dominance would have to do the trick. Obviously I was mistaken :P
Jenni wasn't all that bad I suppose, but after a long walk, lunch and a "hurry-up" outside I was hoping to have a passive pooch to trim and brush, however, Madam had other ideas. She had much more fun biting at the scissors, nipping my hands/clothes/shoes or whatever she could reach. Presenting her favourite toys had zero effect and she squiggled and squirmed most of the time. I had to be more than just stern and really lost my temper at times and would just pin her down to the floor, which would work for all of 10 seconds. *another Deep Sigh* At least in the end she was sort of trimmed and I could brush her undercoat with the pin brush. It is recommended that for showing one not brush a completely dry coat and so I brewed a fragrant tea of rose geranium to spray on her body. The showing gurus recommend some conditioning mist, but I don't know where to get hold of that so I decided to be creative ;) At least it made her smell lovely.
At last!
Disappearing whiskers...?
Following the success of the tummy rub training I tried to hold her on my lap and inspect her teeth, rub her ears etc etc as often as possible (preferably once a day). It didn't particularly help much I guess, because two days ago Jenni decided to chomp up my mobile! I was working (playing games) on the computer, when I heard a loud crunch. I realised it wasn't one of her own toys and stepped over to get the crunchy object from her in case it could hurt her and then I realised that it was my mobile!! NO!!! I was so shocked I couldn't even be mad at her. I was also just so relieved that it was my old phone and not Hunny's Blackberry Torch.
After that incident and wetting the blanket in front of the TV I was once again very sceptical about the future prospects of living with a dog and doubted my decision to get a puppy in the 1st place :( But life goes on and all I can really do is try my best to tame the little beastie, so our training continued. While practicing the tummy tickle again last night I noticed that her whiskers are disappearing!? I've noticed for some time that some of Jenni's whiskers are shorter than the others, but now I see that all of them are getting shorter and shorter - and I have absolutely NO idea why that could be. One thing I did manage to do this holiday was to read through four Red Setter books and also a few dog behaviour and puppy training websites, but I've never heard of whiskers disappearing! It's so odd!
Anyway...
When I got up this morning I realised that the vet is coming out to give Shala (my mare) her 1st African Horse Sickness injection, so I had to get up and go over to the farm to present her passport and give my horse some carrots and attention for a change! I rushed out without breakfast or a shower (which reminds me... I'd better take one before dinner :P) and went to the farm to catch her, pick out her feet and give her some love. She is such a sweet animal, I feel really bad that I didn't get to her more often this holiday, but it's been Hectic.
On the way back home I ran through ALL the 101 things I had planned to do and never got to... I didn't have a cup of chai tea every morning, I didn't listen to the radio every day and I never did get around to sorting my room with all my heaps of stuff still lying in it... I now know and clearly see my weaknesses (currently there seem to be plenty). For starters I tend to be VERY lazy :( Once I've compiled a list of tasks and how to do them my subconscious seems to consider the task completed and I never finish all the To Do's for any given day in my diary. So my time-management is more than ineffective. Thankfully I also realised what I need to keep myself productive and less lazy = a little bit of healthy pressure. It inspires me and gets me going 100 miles an hour ;) Now the challenge is to figure out how to force myself to do enough without over-committing.
Other than all that, today is my last day of extended holiday, since my capacity for taking unpaid leave is unfortunately limited and I have to get back to deadlines again tomorrow. I was trying to explore how I feel about it, but decided it's perhaps not that wise if my desire is to remain positive and enthusiastic about the week ahead ;) So, after I paid my visit to Shala I raced back home to get digging and down to planting all those seeds I'd been meaning to the whole month. Gooseberries, peas, beetroot, radish, swiss chard and more buckwheat. I had planned to stagger my plantings, but that will have to wait for when I'm all grown up and have my disciplined, efficient time-management sorted out :P
Following the groundwork it was time for making lunch. However, before I could start I had to rearrange the fridge, because I couldn't find the green peppercorns I knew I bought 2 days ago - then after unpacking the ENTIRE fridge I found the peppercorns in the grocery cupboard :P ( go figure!) While cooking the pasta I suddenly remembered that we have a hooligan dog and jumped up to see where she was digging this time, only to discover her sound asleep on the high-back chair. ;) heheee. I just had to take a quick picture before shooing her off.
Her Royal Highness, Queen Genevieve.
As we finished lunch some friends came over to meet our new hooligan Puppy-child. Jenn nearly knocked the coffee out of their hands and almost gave the lady a bruised nose, but she LOVED all the fuss and hugs that they gave her. :) Luckily they are huge dog fans and just LOVED all the kisses, wagging tail and jumping up against them. It's such a heart-warming experience to see other people enjoying the enthusiasm and attention of your favourite child. The only real embarrassment was when she peed on the floor in excitement (luckily outside) when they greeted her too enthusiastically. She also started jumping up against me again following the lapse in discipline for a mere hour.
But the fun didn't stop there... after lunch and waving our visitors goodbye we had the obligatory afternoon nap and when we woke up it was around 5:30pm, I peeked out the window to a dreary, dull sky and was VERY tempted to crawl right back into bed, but then I decided to seize the moment and take our little brat for her walk before it's too dark, since you never know when there will be an opportunity to go walking once the winter rains have started in the Cape. So Hunny and I dragged ourselves out of bed and took Poopy for a walk.
Luckily we were armed with big rain jackets because halfway around the block it started pouring down with rain. It was a cloud-burst and the thunder was sending Jenn running frantically with her tail between her legs. Thankfully she was on the retractor lead and couldn't run off anywhere. We had no other option but to jog home and duck under tree branches to dodge the multitude of fat raindrops. Jenni was rather scared and to take her mind off the loud thunder I had a go at whistling the tune from Ed, Edd& Eddy ;) There wasn't really much else I could do. We were all soaked to the bone. Once home (at last) we dried Jenn off, changed into our dry PJs and every time I saw another flash of thunder I rushed over to Jenni to feed her some biltong treats. You have to use every opportunity available and I would not like to have a dog that's terrified of the thunder - so I sprinted over every time I saw the flashing sky and bribed her to love the sound of the storm. All the while little wet Jenn sported the sweet fragrance of Rose geranium. At least the drench watered all my freshly sown seeds, saving me some time. Like I said - a crazy week indeed.
No comments:
Post a Comment