Big scare

As I mentioned in a previous post, Rufus likes to grab Amelia by the collar and drag her around. Well, tonight he got ahold of it and somehow twisted it around his lower jaw so that he was stuck and she was choking. Tim and I had to hold them both still against their panicked thrashing and cut her collar loose enough that we could roll Rufus over and get them both free. Very scary for all of us as Amelia was running out of air and Rufus' teeth were wedged in there tight. Immediately after they were rescued, both sniffed and licked each others' face as if to say "Hey, no hard feelings."

Unexpected Guests

Although you might have a difficult time judging by the temperature, the local Texas flora have come to realize that it's late fall. All three of our elderly mulberry trees have cast off their summer foliage with a vengeance, pretty much burying our yard in a thick carpet of leaves. So off to the store I went in search of extra-extra large trash bags with intent to do some frenzied yardwork.

On my way home earlier, I had noticed two unfamiliar dogs wandering in our neighborhood. I stuck a few treats in my back pocket before heading to the store, just in case they were still roaming around lost. And sure enough, they were: a young shepherd/lab mix who could have easily been a black version of Rufus, and an elderly beagle. The beagle had a collar on with a tag bearing his name ("Short Stop") and his owner's number. Leaving a message on the owner's voicemail, I thought to myself, Well, now you've gone and done it. Got to look after him until the owner calls back. Another fine mess... Although the black dog had no collar, I was very hesitant to let him keep wandering back and forth in traffic on his own, so the three of us headed back to the ol' Chateau Rufus.

At first, I figured I'd just keep the two visitors out front. Sophie was out in the backyard, however, and I walked around to ask her to keep an eye on the newcomers while I brought out a crate for Short Stop. Amelia and Rufus ran to the gate to greet me, right up to the point where Shadow (the black anti-Rufus) rounded the corner behind me.

Ohboy.

Amelia didn't take too well to a strange dog following me, with a fence between us. The argument that ensued was loud, scary, and particularly hard on our gate (which survived, but I think it might need a little work this weekend). Apparently, her guard dog instincts run deep. So while Sophie came around to keep Shadow in check, I went and brought Amelia out front for a slightly more controlled meeting of the canines.

There was a little tension at first, while the two sniffed and sized each other up. Then, instead of growling or lunging at the visiting dog, Amelia flopped down into the biggest play-bow I've ever seen, and she and Shadow rolled around like a couple of puppies. Rufus came out next, with predictably similar results. Everyone showed a casual interest in Short Stop, who preferred to let the younger dogs act silly while he relaxed in his crate. Reasonably assured that the dogs were going to get along fine together, we set about doing some all-but-forgotten yardwork while the puppies rolled around in the piles of leaves.

Short Stop's owner finally called back (Shadow, it turns out, was theirs as well - he'd apparently ditched his collar at some point), and we agreed to look after the two dogs until they got off work, and could come take them home. Short Stop had begun baying, however, apparently upset over being left out of the fun. Rather than subject the neighbors to a beagle serenade, we let him come into the backyard and hang out with the other dogs. He walked around the yard with Amelia for a minute, paused as they passed Shadow, then promptly laid into the black youngster with a distinctly un-playful wrath.

Ohboy, take two.

What followed was a flurry of activity. I snatched Short Stop up, scruffing him until he regained his composure. While my attention was on the beagle, Rufus rushed over to the (justifiably) panicked Shadow - who promptly lunged at him. I heard Amelia's rolling bark from beside me, saw her leap forward, and thought: this is going to get very ugly, very fast.

But it didn't. Amelia tackled Shadow in mid-lunge, knocked him onto the ground, and just pinned him there like a wrestler until everyone had calmed down. Short Stop went back to his crate to cool his heels, and the other three dogs kept cavorting around, demolishing our piles of leaves as if nothing had happened. By the time their owner arrived to pick them up, Short Stop had calmed down again, Shadow had played himself breathless, and both were thrilled to be heading home. Rufus and Amelia got some wet food with their dinner, helped me bag up a few more leaves, then curled up to sleep off a hard day's romp.

Incidentally, our next-door neighbor pointed out today that Amelia was tearing up our bags of leaves. In fact, she was dragging them back out across the yard, then ripping them open - apparently, she had so much fun playing that she wanted to reset all the leaf-piles for another game today.
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Rufus and Amelia

Things have worked themselves out between our Rufus and his sister, Amelia. They are inseparable and take turns being obnoxious to one another. Rufus loves to grab ahold of one of Emmy's ears or legs or her collar and try to drag her outside to play. Amelia still takes Rufus' toys and treats and always eats first. They are barkin' buddies who alert each other to the presence of cats, people and sirens. They are jointly responsible for destroying any stray sock, sweater or magazine that happens to fall within reach and together have successfully ousted one or the other of us from bed (whereupon one dog sleeps with Mom and one with Dad. Usually.) Walks are twice as tricky with two adolescent adventure dogs, but we're getting there, slowly.

It's so worth it when they settle down and lay their noses together during a nap or when they lick each others' faces affectionately. I love my dogs. I'm lucky to have them.

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Things Rufus has eaten

Numerous shoes
DVD remote control
Plush toys
"Indestructable" compressed rawhide chews (took less than an hour)
Wooden chair made by Tim's father
Wooden TV stand
Three bras
One pillowcase
Innumerable cardboard soda can boxes
The mail
Nearly new green shirt
(10/01) Plushie
Misc. cords (Amelia probably helped a lot with these)
kitchen sponge
Copy of Games magazine (found in shreds all over the backyard)
(10/6) Grey flannel pillowcase (which Tim turned into a braided tug toy)
Few dozen socks
(10/13) A silk/sequined bag and the vintage costume jewelry inside it (his turds must look FABULOUS!)
(10/15- busy day!) 5 of Sophie's tops, a mystery cord, two socks
(10/27) Sophie's pillow. Photo below:

(11/02) Sophie's pink woolen hoodie
(11/03) Sophie's grey hoodie shirt
Playstation controllers, as well as some games and CD cases
More books and an art print
Comforter
HUGE dog bed, brand new (He managed to unzip it, so at least the shell of it is intact.)
Another Games magazine

And that's just the stuff we know about. I'll add more as it is remembered or destroyed.

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Sibling Rivalry

Well, its about a week into this new pack formation and it's not going as smoothly as it did with Buster. Emmy's very protective of the resources: food, toys and affection, so she's been doing a fare share of menacing Rufus. He's a pretty good-natured fellow but he's having a hard time dealing with not getting his toys when he wants them and having to wait to eat until she's done. The weird thing is, we've tried separating them at mealtime and Rufus doesn't like that. He seems quite upset if we close a door between them, whether he's on the inside or she is. So, for now we'll just put out plenty of food and hope that once she's had her fill, she'll leave him alone to eat and that he'll stop moping and start eating.

As for the attention-whoring, she actually bolted over Tim who was laying on the futon between the dogs, petting them both. While we know we can't influence their pack order, we CAN demand good behavior. It's just trying to enforce manners and civility while allowing them to work things out on their own that's so stressful. It's also hard on us seeing Rufus bullied. He's smart, though, and it seems that about half the time he's baiting her to get her to chase him.

It's only been a week. Too early to be too concerned I think. She's just going to need a lot of training to learn how to live indoors with a pack that pays attention to her. It appears she may have been an outside dog, because she's peeing in the house, even next to the food bin (which is fortunately a plastic tub, so no contamination.) She's also peed in the hallway outside the bathroom. For now we've set up baby gates to keep her confined to the livingroom.

Rufus seems mopey sometimes. But he seemed mopey before we brought her home. I think we'll just have to wait and keep loving them both and trying to be good role models. I just don't want to lose the happy, confident boy that our Rufus has become.

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Lonely Dog

Over the past few weeks, Rufus has slowly become more and more destructive: a sure sign of boredom and frustration. I've personally lost my only black bra, two pairs of shoes (almost a third pair but I rescued them after losing only part of the heel,) a halter top, many empty soda boxes, pillowcases, a cat bed, a wooden chair, a tv tray, stuffed animals, and who knows what else we simply haven't found the remains of yet. He has also become very recalcitrant on his walks and we've had to cut short our last couple of forays and head back home after Rufus got too unruly and wild. At home, he'd get into everything, bully the cats, nip at us and run out back and bark in order to get us to go outside and see what was up, whereupon he'd try and start a game of chase-me chase-you. We were losing patience and sanity. Obviously there was only one solution.

We got another dog.

Her name is Amelia, but "Emmy" for short, and she's probably got some pit bull or mastiff or both in her. You may notice she looks a bit like Buster, but that's not the reason we chose her. She simply charmed us and had such a good, sweet, playful temperament that we were pretty sure she could keep up with Rufus without being bullied or being a bully to him. If you follow our "Shelter Diaries," you'll have already read about her and her pal Royce. Unfortunately, Royce is still at the shelter and on the urgent list. We'd have taken them both if not for the fact that we've got too many animals as it is.

Rufus is very happy with his new sister and hopefully, she'll be a good influence on him. We'll post photos and video later. In the meantime, here are a couple from her time at the shelter.

It's our first night together and I'm looking forward to seeing her become used to her new home and her new pack. Welcome, Amelia! We love you!

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Shower time

When Rufus was small enough to fit in the kitchen sink, that was where he got his baths. As he grew too big for that, I began simply taking him into the shower with me. It was never his favorite thing, and although he is always very good and patient, he is very happy to get out of there, shake water everywhere, and roll around on the carpet like a maniac.

He's caught on to the fact that, when it's shower time, I wait for him to follow me into the bathroom (which he always does, no matter what I'm up to) and then I close the door so he can't escape. Nowadays, he stops halfway into the bathroom until he knows it's safe to proceed. Thus, after a long muddy romp in the backyard, I had to trick him into coming all the way into the bathroom while still being able to close the door behind him. Not hard, just had to put something interesting on the lid of the toilet so he came over to investigate. Ha! He was trapped. As I started forward to take his collar off, he backed up, but then stopped and with a look of resignation, waited for me to remove it.

Now, at this point, what I have always had to do was lift him into the tub. He's about 50 lbs. of muscle and long, long legs, so it's not easy to do. After turning on the shower and setting it to a dog-friendly temperature, I decided to see if he'd get in on his own. I didn't think for a minute that he would, but it was a good stalling tactic while I braced myself to hoist him over the edge of the tub.

I looked at Rufus, then at the tub and said, "Get in."

And he DID!

He still doesn't enjoy taking a shower and he still can't wait to get out and roll around on the floors, attack the towels, etc, but it was so very heartening to see him willing to do something he didn't want to when there was no treat involved other than pleasing his "mom." He stood there so good under the water while I washed him, and waited for me to get clean too (he jumped on me with his muddy feet.)

I am very proud of my funny little dog. He still has a long way to go before he's no longer a bratty teenager, but this was a really awesome step in that direction.

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