Days of Whines and Cold Noses: New Blog Home

This blog has been moved to http://cranmerleedaysofwhinesandcoldnoses.blogspot.com/.  It is now a fictionalized, humorous tale of a freelance graphic designer and her two Basenjis--Harper and Pop Tart. I hope you will take a look. LeeBeth

New content and format coming!

Hello!
This blog will be changing content and format in the next week.  Please be patient while the new blog about a fictional basenji household is under construction.
Hope you check back in a week!  Meanwhile you are welcome to check out old posts.

Dog Names

Dog names are odd things.  Usually I'm very good at remembering the names of all my neighbors and friends' dogs.  Not the neighbors' dog who lives behind me though. This evening I walked by an open window and heard my dogs outside charging up and down the fence line.  The neighbors' Rottweiler had gotten loose AGAIN and was running around in the backyard outside the fence. 
My Tallie has a cervical disc tear and is supposed to be "staying quiet," as if "staying quiet" and "basenji" are somehow compatible!  He should not be romping around trying to intimidate a Rottie, so I yelled out the window for the dog to go home. Of course, I couldn't remember his name, so my yelling was like spitting in the wind.
He knew I was talking to him, but was content to pretend I could be yelling at any creature wandering around my backyard--the bird skipping in and out of the bushes perhaps?  The stink bugs crawling up the siding? Certainly not him. Tomorrow's goal is to find a mnemonic to remember his name!
My mother always contended that before you name a dog, you should shout that name out the window 3 times to hear how it sounds. Usually she followed her own advice--"Here, Spunky!" "Here, Cleo!" seemed to have worked well for the first hounds our family had when I was a child. 
I've had a much more difficult time following her advice.  "Here, Talon!" makes me sound suspiciously like a hanger-on in a biker gang, and "Here, Grinner!" just sounds silly or gives the appearance I've taken one too many Prozac.
Some days I wonder how I could have strayed so far from such good advice.  Then again, I remember we had a dog named "Bandit" when I was in high school, so even my own mother was known to ignore her own advice occasionally.

Basenji Thievery

They look so innocent, don't they?  However, one of these dogs is a thief!  I had so many things to do today, and my memory is not what it used to be. Last evening I carefully made a list to remind me.  This morning as I'm groggily drinking my coffee, I looked all over the table and couldn't find my list.

"No problem," I thought. "I'll find it eventually, so let's start with what I do remember." The dogs seemed to be just lying around, approaching the day slowly like me.  I got caught up on all the emails I needed to answer and looked again for the list.

It was still nowhere to be found,  and I had a feeling that there was something important I was forgetting to do.  The basenjis reminded me that I had forgotten to walk them, so Grin, Pilot and I headed out the door. (Pilot is the dog on the left, Grin is in the middle and Tallie is on the right in the photo.)  Poor Tallie is not allowed to go for walks now until his cervical disc is better.

The walk seemed to clear my mind because when the basenjis and I got home, I remembered a task I had promised to do for a friend.  One more item down, but what were the rest? 

I'll never know because as I was finishing writing up the information for my friend, I felt something damp and in pieces under my foot.  When I bent down to pick up the mess, I could make out a word here or there on the torn scraps of what had been my To Do list.  Suspiciously, no dogs were under my feet. They wore all lying innocently in sun spots. It was obvious one of the basenjis was able to steal the list off the table, chew it up and spit it out in disdain without my ever noticing the little thief in action.  But which one was it? Look at those basenji faces and tell me which one you think looks like he's capable of such a crime--Pilot, Grin or Tallie.  I await your verdict.



Signs--Good, Bad, Bald?

When life gets trying--and boy has it been trying the past few years--I find myself looking for signs that things are going to get better.  You would think I would have learned my lesson a year ago. The morning started out like any other morning.  I got up and grabbed the dogs' leashes for our morning work.   The sun was just beginning to rise in a grayish sky.  I remember hoping it wouldn't rain as I struggled to put the coats on the two squirming dogs. It was chilly and I knew they'd be shivering without them.
Grin, Tallie and I stepped out the door and immediately I got more than a shiver up my spine.  I could feel eyes watching me.  Creepy eyes.  I glanced up from the dogs and saw 12 turkey vultures perched on the roof of the house directly across from mine.  In the sky another dozen were flying lazy circles over the houses.  As if this weren't disconcerting enough, when I turned around (yes, I considered fleeing back into the house), I saw 5 more turkey vultures sitting on my roof looking down at me!
For those of you who have never seen a turkey vulture, let me give you a brief description.  They are huge, ugly birds with a wingspan of about 5' with grayish feathers on the bottom and a red, almost bald head. 
They are scavengers.  I saw no dead animals and the dogs certainly didn't act like they smelled anything dead.  This did NOT seem like a good sign.  What were they trying to tell me, "We've got our eyes on you?" "You're dead meat?"
I looked to the basenjis.  They were ignoring the vultures completely and were pulling against their leashes wanting to start their walk.  In that moment it came to me that I could go back inside and curl up in bed or I could follow my dogs' example and get on with living the day.   What the heck, we were already outside --all with our coats on--so I just laughed at the birds and carried on.  I like to think the dogs were proud.

Sun Dog, Table Dog

Today is a fiercely windy Monday, and the dogs have been moving from room to room in search of sunny spots.  Basenjis are superior at making the most of a tiny beam of sunshine in an otherwise dreary day. 
My first Basenji Phoenix made an art form out of sunbathing.  Unfortunately, the sunniest spot in my first house was in the dining room--in the center of the table!  That dog loved to jump up on the table, stretch out on her back and "catch some rays."  I always thought if she'd been a Weimaraner, she's have made a perfect model for William Wegman.
Nonetheless, I tried everything to break her of the habit:

• Putting tin foil down on the table top because I was told dogs hated having their nails touch tin foil.  Phoenix thought it was great fun making scratching sounds on it.
• Taping balloons along the edge and top of the table because I was told the popping sound would scare her enough to stop her from jumping up.  Phoenix made an agility game out of that by seeing how gingerly she could weave between them.  Then she'd grab one and bite it to enjoy the noise she had created.
• Shooting her with a water pistol when I found her lying on the tin foil among the balloons.  She would continue to sit there but now added batting water away with her paw to the game!
• Etc., etc., etc.

After months of exhausting myself coming up with ideas to get her down, I finally declared her the victor in "The Battle of the Broyhill."  The terms of the surrender were simple. The conquered would cede the territory hereafter known as "The Dining Room Table" to the victor in exchange for the victor's assurance she would no longer eat the flowers out of the flower pots or nip at the conquered when she told her to come out of her crate.  The terms were so reasonable that until the day we moved, the truce was adhered to and Phoenix never missed a day in the sun.

Dogs on a Swing Video Share for Easter

Happy Easter to all my friends who celebrate Easter!  Hope this video from Huffington Post makes you smile as much as it did me.  I cannot imagine any of my basenjis who would enjoy the swing as much as the basenji in the video does.  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/28/dogs-on-a-swing-video_n_1386220.html