Saturday, June 17, 2006

Kat's Dog Tale--

Kat said...
I'll tell you a funny.Yesterday morning I awoke to what passes for normal in my brother's house (I am staying with them while he recovers from two major surgeries). He has two pre-pubescent boys and a four year old girl. I have a dog that's been on a chain in the back yard for a week or two (he is much more used to running free in a fenced yard).There was banging on the door and the kids were running around the house yelling "someone's knocking on the door". They know they aren't supposed to answer it without direct instructions from an adult. I stumbled out of the bedroom towards the door figuring it was the neighbor kids who are always up at the crack of dawn wanting the kids to come out and play.Went to see who was there. It was the land lord. Apparently, the dog got off the chain and was running around the neighborhood "terrorizing" the other pets (he was barking outside the next door neighbor's fence where they had four dogs who were barking back). Instead of calling my brother or knocking on his door, they called his landlord.The dog was outside the door with the landlord and the youngest child went out to pet him. Everything was fine except the landlord was upset he was called. I let the dog in the house so I could put a leash on him and walk him back outside.I had no idea that the cat was still in the house. As we walked to the back room, the cat came trotting through. Off went the dog, the cat running through the house like a bad Steve Martin movie. Furniture flying, the dog barking like cujo, the cat screaming, spitting and scratching. Everybody was yelling including me who kept yelling at the dog to sit or heel or anything that would stop the chaos.The dog finally cornered the cat in the back room. I ran in and caught him by the scruff of the neck and had him on the ground. The cat was standing near the pantry with it's back arched still hissing and spitting. I was reaching over to the nail to find the leash when the youngest came trotting in the room.I said, "Don't pick up the..." and before I could get it out, she picked up the cat that proceeded to hiss, scratch and claw it's way up her head and out the door which set the dog off who tried to leap for it, barking and snarling like a possessed dog, while I still had it by the scruff of the neck (it got off the chain by some how squeezing it's big head out of the collar so there was nothing else to hold on to). He pulled me into the dryer and nearly dislocated my left arm all the while the landlord was standing outside the door and the kids started screaming again.I finally got the leash down and made a slip noose. The dog then sat down, wagging his tail and lolling his tongue as if he had just saved the world from total destruction and was waiting for his doggie treat.Needless to say, the landlord was not impressed. I now have to find someone to take care of the dog while I take care of my brother and his family.Anybody need a good, temporary watch dog who doesn't have cats?

5 comments:

Scott from Oregon said...

When I was still living at home, my younger fourteen year old step-sister came into my converted garage (with attached bathroom) bedroom and our dog followed her in. We had a gigantic male cat named Bogart who was dead asleep at the time. The dog awoke the cat, and the cat went nuts. It was going to rip our dog new holes for eyeballs. My sister picked up the dog ( a medium sized female Siberian Husky with pretty blue eyes she did not need replacing) and Bogart kept leaping into the air and scratching at the cat. Remember the white rabbit in Monty Python's MP and the Holy Grail? Like that...

I jumped in between and the cat kept making leaping assaults and tore through my shirt and clawed the heck out of my chest. My sister could do nothig but say "Oh My God" a whole bunch and turn her back to the cat. The cat shredded her shorts in the back until her bleeding behind was hanging out and this sent her scurrying into the bathroom while I tried to contol the cat with a blanket, like trying to put out a fire...

Finally, with the dog in the bathroom with my sister and me whipping at the cat with a blanket, Bogart ran off and jumped up beneath a curtain and into a window sill, where it proceeded to "uurrrurrrrrrr"like a demonically posessed entity, which gave me the opportunity to go into the bathroom and check on my sister's backside...

She had locked the door. I knocked. D
"D, open the door."

"Is the cat out there?"

"Yes, but he's in the window."

"What's he doing?"

"He's scared. D. You don't need to lock the door. It's a cat. He can't open it."

"Are you sure?"

"Ever see him open a door before?"

"No."

"Alright, then. Let me in..."


I have faint scars across my chest to this day, and my sister has told me about the great explanations she has had to go through with her now husband to explain the scratches on her backside....

Kat said...

LOL...Now see, I tried to tell my brother it was natural reaction of dog and cat, but he is just not an animal person. He swears the dog is cujo and needs better "obedience training" because, according to him, the dog should have stopped while we were yelling. The cat, he says, is possessed and was banished from the house (actually, thrown out the door).

I just wanted to tell him so bad about the time the dog chased a rabbit around the yard until it squeezed through a hole in the fence. A hole that I could have swore the dog would not fit through, but he did.

I had to jump the fence and run after the dog who was running through the neighborhood and near the busy street I lived on, all the while I kept picturing watching the dog get hit by a car right in front of me.

I finally got him cornered at a neighbors and, having no leash and the dog kept insisting on lying down instead of walking back to the house, I had to carry my 45 pound squirming dog three blocks back to the house, get him in the fence and then try to figure out how to block this little gap between the gate and the main fence.

All in a days work of owning a dog. (or any animal for that matter). Some people are just not cut out for it.

Scott from Oregon said...

We have a back corner pasture (for sheep, I think, that we don't use. My dogs discovered that the fence there was eroding into the creek and they could scoot under it and be gone for the afternoon and evening if they wished. Last August, I shut the corner down with an additional fence. Well, yesterday, I took down the fence to get a mower in there and today I found myself in 4wd, traversing creeks and bouncing through creek beds (I keep about a thousand pounds of tools in the back of my truck, so when things bounce, they really bounce...)

After an an hour of trying to outwit the two miscreants, I surprised the Collie (they listen when they have to, which is most of the time) and my Akita/Shepard ran home knowing that when I get mad, I pick them each up one handed by the scruff of the neck and carry them that way until I can toss them into the truck (pops used to do that to me when I was a kid and into food I was supposed to share with others)... At sixty pounds apiece, I think they don't appreciate it very much.

I put the fence back up a few hours ago, and I am starting to soften up a bit, and will probably start talking to them again in the morning...

Sabra said...

Good boy. Yeah, what a Good boy! You got the neighbors riled up - their dogs riled up - the landlord out and about - and almost got the kitty... Good boy...

Wouldn't it just be easier to tie the cat out than find a "dog" sitter? Just a thought...

And, doesn't every dog owner know that dogs truly believe cats were meant to be chased?

Anonymous said...

Keep up the good work » » »