The Mutt and his Dad – the language of love

Tags

dog, family

Genis and his dad

Today is National Mutt Day according to Dr Google. We are not quite sure what standard of mutty breed Genis is: there are definite signs of a fox terrier forebear in the appearance, but the long curly hair and the cutesy facial expressions indicate that there was a Maltese poodle involved in the parental relationship. There may be more branches in his family tree that we are not aware of, but this is what makes him special. His dad calls him a “pavement special” and he doesn’t seem to mind.

I hijacked Genis’s blog to tell you about the Mutt’s relationship with his Most Favourite Person in the world – his dad. Genis is not a Happy Dog when his dad is not around. When Dad goes out and leaves him behind, he will sit around and mope until he hears the click of the door lock – the sign that Dad is back home. When my daughter and I leave the house for hours or days at a time, he hardly notices.

Dad and Genis have developed their own language through the years and they understand each other perfectly. They talk all the time, or rather, Dad does the talking and Genis takes his orders from whence they come. I sometimes eavesdrop on these conversations and try to interpret them. I think I got the gist of it. It goes something like this:

“Genis, please get out of my shoes!” – meaning that the mutt is underfoot.

“Genis, I can wash my own face” – translates into “stop licking me!”.

“Genis, you had quite enough to eat and cheese is not good for dogs” – to which Genis responds by sitting back on his haunches, prettily begging until he gets a piece of cheese.

“Scold her!” – causes an immediate volley of barks directed at the human (usually me) who refuses to dish up treats or to vacate the couch so Genis can watch the telly with Dad.

“Look, they are going to the beach without you!” – going to the beach is the only activity which can convince Genis to leave his dad’s side. Unfortunately for him, once he is in the car, he may realise that he is on his way, not to the beach, but to the vet or the pet parlour. Apparently lying to a dog does nothing to swing his loyalties.

“It’s time for Genis to go down”, shouted from behind Dad’s desk sends Genis to the front door to wait for his entourage to go “potty”. He will only consent to do his business with Dad watching from the balcony and his personal pooper scoopers (my daughter and me) marching him to the edge of the lawn.

Somehow this special relationship makes all of the above appear quite natural.

From the groupies revolving around the edge of their lives: Happy Mutt’s Day Genis and his Dad, and the same to all his Mutt friends!

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The humiliation of wearing a little tartan number

Tags

beach, dog, family, ocean, weather

Lately we haven’t been visiting our beach as often as we used to. The whole family came down with the turn-of-the-season-flu and we had to stay indoors. This was accompanied by a spell of bad weather, howling winds, thunderstorms and a drop in temperature.

I’ve told you about our beach before – warm sunshine, tranquil ocean and lake with a stretch of golden sand in between, a soft little breeze, the lulling sound of water lapping on the beach … it’s all there. Can you feel it?

This is the normal view from our balcony:

This is what it looked like this week:

The roar and the crash of the waves on the beach frightens me a bit, especially when the waves crack like a whip against the rocks.

This is the tidal pool where I usually go swimming:

Scary stuff, hey?

This morning the sea is a little bit calmer and it is not so cold, so we decided to go for a walk. I was besides myself with joy, but … there’s always a BUT isn’t there? … then Mom decided that I should wear a jacket. To the beach!

I loathe wearing clothes and only submit to this kind of indignity when the nights turn really cold or rainy and I have to go outside to do my business. Now I have to wear this ensemble to the beach? Cos it’s winter says Mom. Really?! It is 17°C out there Woman! I tried to appeal to Dad, but he just smiled and said “Put on your little tartan suit, Genis”.

Then, of course, I had to “sit” for a photo shoot:

There will be no forgiving this. Not for a very long time.

Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge (Day 4): Quiet times

Tags

Africa, beach, dog, family, holidays, ocean

Far Out In Africa invited me to take part in the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge. Please visit visit this blog, you will love the stunning pictures and the stories attached to them.

The rules of the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge and my reasons for honouring bloggers living in and writing about Africa is explained in my Day 1 entry No legs needed to fish.

Visiting Perdebytjie se nes is a blog experience that you should not miss out on. Go check out those awesome images.

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We love those quiet times in Paradise when the holiday season is over and we have whole stretches of beach to ourselves.

When even the lifeguards can take a rest

early in the morning when ours are the first footprints at the water’s edge

or late afternoon when we can play undisturbed

or in the early evening when we sit down in our camping chairs and watch the waves

or when darkness falls and we can watch our lanterns fly into the night skies.

Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge (Day 3): The joke is on me

Tags

Africa, crocodile, dog, family

Far Out In Africa invited me to take part in the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge. Please visit visit this blog, you will love the stunning pictures and the stories attached to them.

The rules of the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge and my reasons for honouring bloggers living in and writing about Africa is explained in my Day 1 entry No legs needed to fish.

Today, I would like to let Spokie Sny Spoor know just how much I enjoy her stunning pictures of animals in the wild. It will be worth your while to visit her blog and see for yourself.

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I must admit that I prefer to see wild animals, reptiles, insects (especially mosquitoes) and in fact, everything that bites, stings, and swallow their prey whole, on photos rather than meet them in person. My weird human family, however, sometimes insist on testing the limits of my bravery.

We have two crocodile farms in the vicinity and whenever we have visitors from other parts of the country, they are treated with a visit to one of these breeding grounds. Thankfully, dogs are not allowed and during a recent outing to show off the crocs, I was left in the care of a friend. However, Sissy promised to give my regards to the crocodiles. Not that I actually sent my regards, but there you are …

Crocodiles are aquatic reptiles, meaning that they actually live in water, however, they love sunning themselves on the river bank. The peeps have to stay behind the safety barrier and they are not permitted to touch or feed the crocs (with good reason, methinks). Sissy had a good look at the crocs and then decided that this one with the friendly smile would receive my regards with thanks.

Yeah.

Having gracefully received my remote greetings, the croc’s smile now stretched from ear to ear. It was indeed a very friendly specimen, she thought.

Yeah.

Emboldened by this apparent sign of success, Sissy showed the friendly croc a full page photo of her favourite doggie.

The response shocked her.

When I saw this video later, I was so embarrassed that I went off my food for at least an hour. I will NEVER be able to live this down.

Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge (Day 2): A likely tale

Tags

beach, dog, family, ocean

Thanks once again to Far Out In Africa who invited me to take part in the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge. You should really check out this blog – if you haven’t done so yet, you are missing out big time!

The rules of the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge and my reasons for honouring bloggers living in and writing about Africa is explained in my Day 1 entry No legs needed to fish.

Today I would like to nominate a lady who currently lives in Ghana, but also has her heart firmly enmeshed in the beautiful country of Namibia. I especially enjoy her tales and pictures of the daily lives of women in Africa. Please visit her site Thulana and enjoy.

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My Day Two entry for this challenge:

Yesterday, as is our usual routine, Dad and I had a little nap after lunch. The best time of the day to go to the beach in order to collect shells, is when the water is low and yesterday low tide was around lunch time. No surprise then that while we were stretched out on the couch, the two women did a disappearing act.

Even in Paradise there are dangers lurking everywhere and Dad has put some very strict rules into place, to be observed at all times when we go out on our daily walk. Of course, having given me the slip, the women had no one handy to remind them of the rules … and they broke every single one. Dad noticed that the moment he woke up.

Rule 1: The Dog must be on watch. Rule 1 broken.

Rule 2: Always stay within sight on the beach. We live high on a hill and from our balcony, we can can see a very long stretch of beach, but as you can see below, the beach was deserted. No tick next to Rule 2.

Rule 3: Always carry a fully charged cell phone when leaving the house. Yes, well … the two fully charged cell phones lying on the coffee table were witness to the fact that Rule 3 was not observed.

Rule 4: Never, under any circumstances, stay away for longer than two hours at a time. So when the two culprits walked in more than three hours after the event of low tide, an explanation was asked for.

Sissy, obviously appointed as spokesperson, hastened to explain that they walked a little further than planned, because the shell harvest proved to be very successful. They .. sort of … well, wandered off around the bend to inspect the boulders where the seagulls drop the mussels on the boulders to break open their shells. This was well worth watching for a few minutes.

“A few minutes”, says Dad. Yes, and then they felt a bit tired and sat down on a tree trunk to have a drink of water (well, well, they actually managed to adhere to Rule 5: Always carry a bottle of water.)

“Oh”, says Dad. Just that. Oh.

Yes, explains Mom, now taking over where Sissy left off. Then they saw something move under a bush and upon closer inspection, they found a common garden snake in obvious distress. The poor thing was in labour and the women tried to help out by delivering the little snake. Mom produced the evidence in the form of a very small baby snake. Stillborn. Such a shame.

So, Mom loftily declared, we’d better go and have a shower to wash off the trials and tribulations of the afternoon.

“You know Genis,” Dad says, “That must have been a very difficult labour.” I knew exactly what Dad meant; that little snake has very obviously been dead for more than a day. Or maybe two days. I just looked at Dad, waiting for the explosion.

But Dad just winked at me: “Genis, a very wise man once said ‘Never let the truth get in the way of a good story’.” I nodded in agreement; Mark Twain was indeed no fool.

Knowing my dad, though, I knew that we would get to the bottom of the snake-in-labour story eventually, and This Dog is never wrong.

Later that evening we heard the women giggling from their study hide-out and what did we see (or rather, WHO did we see) on the computer screen when we sneaked in? None other than The Next Karate Kid herself. There was the explanation for the time spent Lost in Paradise – two grown women playing silly games in the sun and losing track of time.

Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge (Day One): No legs needed to fish

Tags

beach, dog, family, fishing, ocean

My sincere thanks to Far Out In Africa who invited me to take part in the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge. I have been following this blog for quite some time, not only because I also reside in Africa, but because I really appreciate the beautiful photography, the stories behind them and the love for the countryside which is so aptly demonstrated through the pictures. I must urge you to visit this blog if you have not already done so.

The rules of the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge require you to post a photo each day for five consecutive days and attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction or non-fiction, a poem or simply a short paragraph and then you nominate another blogger to carry on this challenge. Accepting the challenge is entirely up to the person nominated, it is not a command.

Being new to the blogging community, I very rashly accepted this invitation to join in the fun without fully having grasped the consequences:  it is only now I realise that I am neither a photographer (aim and push the button is the best I can do), nor am I a writer and I haven’t befriended that many bloggers yet. However, I have been following some bloggers publishing stunning photographs of our beautiful continent and weaving stories around these pictures. I am sure you have also met most of them already. These are predominantly Afrikaans blogs, although some writers also blog in English, but I find that the pictures tell a story of their own. I would like to honour these bloggers and (who knows?) just maybe they will agree to play along with the challenge. 😀

Today I salute a motor cycle enthusiast by the name of Sparkle. Her travels on two wheels “following her nose”, have led to interesting small towns and villages in South Africa’s breathtakingly beautiful countryside. Her pictures tell interesting stories of these places and the people who live there. Be sure to visit her site Doutrapper and enjoy.

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My Day One entry for this challenge:

My mom suffers from cardiac arrhythmia and This Dog suffers from a condition called “I-ate-way-too-much-in-the-past-and-now-I-have-to-pay-for-my-sins”. In order to keep the weight down and to prevent my mom’s heart from attacking her, we not only live on a very strict diet, we also walk distances of at least five kilometres every day, come rain, hail or sunshine.

Walking on paved city sidewalks really held no attraction for any of us, so we recently moved to the Southcoast of KwaZulu-Natal, which we promptly renamed to “Paradise”. We love exploring the coastline on foot, walking on the beach through thick sand, collecting shells and driftwood and stopping every now and then for a swim.

Sissy, who is much younger than Mom and much prettier than me, accompanies us on these walks. Sissy suffers from an overactive imagination and she sees a story in every pebble or drop of water, but she is way too lazy to write, so she just takes pictures and Mom does the writing. Very early one morning we were walking along the beach front of a town called Margate, and this is what we saw:

“Oh My Dog”, says Sissy, “Look at that empty wheelchair. What have here? A suicide attempt? Should we call the police?”. Mom tried to calm her down, but she kept on spinning tales of gruesome drownings.

Very perturbed we walked on at a fast pace, until we came to an old pier jutting out into the sea, and there were loads of fishermen throwing in a line in the hope of an early morning catch. Sissy barely stopped to catch her breath, but ran down to the pier to tell the fishermen about the abandoned wheelchair.

To Sissy’s great surprise they took this dreadful news in their stride and then they explained to her that the wheelchair belongs to the person sitting at the very tip of the pier, calmly fishing for his breakfast.

Mom never said anything as we slowly went on our way, but like always, she got in the last word by presenting Sissy with the picture below:

Caught Red Handed

Tags

beach, dog, family, pet diet, pet obesity, pizza

The much-verbalised, long-drawn-out War of the Dog’s Diet, may just have been brought to an unexpected and rather abrupt end. Or not 😀

It all started out very merrily (the event that may end the war, not the war itself) when we all visited our favourite beach restaurant. The weather was hot, the beer was cold, the pizza was delicious – trust me, I know.

On such occasions I’m allowed to sit on my Dad’s lap and join in the conversation, but once the food is served, Dad puts me down on the floor between his feet and that is where I stay until the meal is over. I never object to any of this; I’m a well-behaved dog as you all know.

Once the food was on the table and the dog on the floor, the usual admonishments and counter arguments followed in rapid succession:

“Do not, do NOT I say, feed the dog under the table!”

“I never feed the dog, not under the table or anywhere else, for that matter.”

“Then please do explain how it is possible that he is not losing any weight?”

“How must I know? YOU are in charge of the dog feeding department.”

Blah-blah. On and on it went until Sissy put a firm stop to it: “Stop it now! Everyone is watching us and listening to you squabbling. Nobody will feed this dog!” Sissy has spoken and (relative) peace and quiet descended. The family started eating while watching an impromptu show by street artists.

I just sat there … very quietly … and waited … very patiently; I know the drill. While all eyes were on the dance show, a hand with a nice cheesy piece of pizza crust crept under the table and the tasty morsel was dropped into my mouth. Just like I expected.

What I did NOT expect, was the camera that flashed in my face at that very moment.

This image will hit the internet shortly; I know this family – secrets do not remain secret very long. I also know that the picture will be studied v.e.r.y. carefully to see whose hand that is. And then … well, we will have to wait and see, won’t we? 😀

Not a good day for fishing

Tags

beach, dog, family, fishing

This afternoon just before sunset Dad and Sissy grabbed their fishing rods and set out for a happy hour of fishing fishing. Mom and I decided to tag along. Dad thought that today the weather conditions were perfect: the lagune presented a full body of water, the wind stirred up a little waves and the fish were ready to take the bait.

Off the leash

Tags

beach, dog, family, fishing, leash, ocean, pet obesity

The past few weeks have been a bit hectic around here what with This Dog being a little bit under the weather and needing a lot of sympathy treats, which proved to be a weighty problem. Added to that, we had a spot of rain and wind, which meant I had to stay indoors; no exercise also added to that little weighty problem. I did not exactly GAIN weight, but I did not LOSE much either.

So yesterday we returned to the strict diet and exercise routine and I was let out for a walk. But guess what? Here’s the good news: I was allowed to run around without that dreaded dog collar and lead for the first time since we moved here. Hurray! You have no idea how much I enjoyed that.

Paradise lost

Tags

beach, cat, dog, family, fear, pet, potholes, roadworks, swim, veterinarian

My friend Noodle has been feeling a bit under the weather lately (you can read all about this on his blog noodle4president), and he had to visit the veterinarian to get his blood works done. Luckily it turned out that he is just fine.

I was so distressed by this that I developed a sympathy illness (this happens when you have such a close emotional link to a friend with whom you empathize so strongly that you start to feel ill yourself). So, after my daily swim today, I suddenly started coughing and soon I was in the grip of a severe asthma attack. Not to be outdone, Sissy went into a full scale panic attack and Mom decided to drive us to the veterinarian 20 kilometers away.

We were racing downhill on a very narrow lane, when all of a sudden … the road disappeared. We thought that the bridge had collapsed, because everything was under water. Mom, of course, drives like a bat from hell (says Dad, so I’m sure I’m allowed to repeat that) and she just put her foot down on the pedal. The next moment we were slipping and sliding through the murky water.

Paradise is less than perfect

Tags

anxiety, dog, family, fear, monkey, pet, pet obesity

It is high summer here in KwaZulu Natal, which means that we can go to the beach most every day. However, today was overcast and drizzly, which made my Humans decide to explore the hills and and valleys at the back of our complex.

There is a deep valley at the back between our house and the South Coast highway and we can see the bridge across the Mtalwume river from our back lawn. The grounds have been cleared almost down to the river and Mom suggested that we walk in that direction. I immediately vetoed that decision; it may be beautiful down there, but –

Elysium view of bridge over the Mtalwume river

can you see who was sitting at the edge of the lawn, watching our every move? If you look closely, you will see those naughty Vervet monkeys under the trees. They may be cute, but I am still a bit … well, not scared exactly, just careful.

It’s all about trust in the human race

Tags

anxiety, beach, cat, dog, family, fear, pet, swim, trust

Ponsie (otherwise known as Our Cat), is having a hard time adjusting to our new home and lifestyle. Ponsie and I were both adopted. She is a year older than me, but she is a lot smaller.  She was separated from her cat mommy when she was just a week old. They used to live in a storm water drain where her cat mommy had to scrounge for food.

Saying goodbye is never easy

Tags

beach, dog, family, moving house, pet, pet diet, pet exercise, pet obesity, swim

The past few days have been taken up with so many new impressions, sights and activities that I hardly paid any thought to those friends, family and familiar places, previously very important in my life, which I left behind.

I just want to let everyone know that “goodbye” does not mean “forgotten”. I will be thinking of you often and I will remember the good times. So shake my paw and wish me well, as I do all of you.

We went fishing!

Tags

beach, dog, family, fishing, ocean, pet, pet exercise, swim

Today Ouboet bought a new fishing rod and he took us along to the beach to try his hand at shad fishing in the surf. To reach the beach we have to walk downhill on a sandy road along the river bank before we reach the train tracks.

I’m a beach bum!

Tags

beach, dog, family, moving house, ocean, pet, pet exercise, pet obesity, swim

Can you believe this? I cannot! I must be dreaming, but look! Just look at the photo of This Dog on the beach!

Remember I told you that we were about to move house? Well, that is exactly what we did. We packed up all our furniture and other stuffies in our house, it was loaded into a very big truck and then Mom, Sissy, Our Cat and I got in our car. My heart was sore, because we were leaving Dad behind. We traveled a whole day and by nightfall we arrived at a place I’ve never been before. Mom and Sissy were very tired of driving all day, so we all went straight to bed, in our sleeping bags on the floor.

Am I an Uncle or an Aunt?

Tags

aunt, baby, beach, dog, family, moving house, pet, swim, uncle

My Bro that lives in Cape Town and his wife have a little baby girl who is four months old today. Mom calls her ‘Cutesicle’, cos she’s so cute, see?, but her real name is Lexi. I think she is the most beautifullest of all the beautiful babies in the whole world. Come on then, admit it!

There is something that confuses me a bit and I hope my friends can explain this to me: Sissy tells me that she is Lexi’s Aunt and that I am Lexi’s Uncle, because she belongs to my Bro, see? But I don’t understand, if Lexi is a girl, how can I be an Uncle; should I not also be an Aunt? When I asked Mom about this, she just remarked to Dad that “…the wheel is still spinning but the hamster is dead.” Dad almost choked laughing, but I don’t get it: what is so funny about a dead hamster? We don’t even have a hamster. Maybe we should get one, I would so love to play with a cuddly little furball like that.

However, I’m digressing and just now Mom will tell me again that I’m suffering from verbal diarrhea. Why does she always say that? The last time I had diarrhea, I was really sick and had to go to the vet.  Mom can be so sarky sometimes *sighs*. The good news is, I peeked on Mom’s Facebook today and saw that she posted photos of our new home and, Oh Happiness!, she says that Lexi and her whole family will be coming to visit us there when the weather turns a bit cooler. Lexi and I will get to swim in the tidal pool and play on the beach.

In her pic you can see how small Lexi is and she cannot walk yet, but Dad says she is going to start crawling one of these days. I am SO pleased that I learned to swim, because I am bigger and stronger than Lexi, so I can watch over her and make sure that she is okay in the water. I still weigh in at 11,9kg and Lexi only weighs 7kg. Mom says she is growing so fast that soon she will bigger than me. I cannot quite believe that, but just in case … maybe I should lay off my diet for a while?

Mom says that is wishful thinking.