I have lived in the rainy NW my whole life, and I have had cats my whole life, and I have NEVER seen a cat come inside as wet as Mouse last night! She looked like someone had dropped her in a pool!
Category: pets
Diggin’ a hole…
Out in the field, diggin’ a hole
Diggin’ a big ol’ hole!
dig, dig, dig
Hey! Can’t you see I’m busy here?!
dig, dig, dig
Ok, I’m ready to come inside now!
What is this ‘bath’ thing you speak of?
FWIW, He didn’t get a bath, just a quick hop in the trough and he was clean enough to come inside for breakfast 🙂 Thank goodness for that eskimo easy-clean fur – the dirt just drops off, you’d think he was scotchguarded. I actually encourage the digging, I think it’s good exercise for the body and mind, and he loves it, so why not? A tired dog is a good dog!
Barclay and Jack
Barclay and Jack had a rip-roarin’ time playing out in the yard today. It’s funny to watch them start it up, because there will be a bit of growling and posturing, but tails are wagging, and next thing you know…
Someone’s on the ground getting chewed on!
And they take turns…
Or they’ll grab some nasty old tug toy they dug up – ew!
Barclay says ‘I love playing with Jack!’
All the critters
Big Red and her chicks are mixing in just fine with the rest of the flock (that’s her and her chicks in the back center). I even saw her biggest rooster chick picking a fight with Copper, the baby cochin roo who’s easily three times his size. They fluffed up and jumped in the air and everything!
The cats are never far away when I’m doing chores. Mighty hopped up on the post to see what was going on.
Barclay and Jack had a crazy wrestling match on the sofa.
Hey stop, that tickles!
Poor Alki is quite old, has cancer, potty issues, is mostly blind and deaf. She mostly naps, and eats cookies…
Did someone say cookies?
(Bounds towards the kitchen) I’m getting a cookie, right?
Cute and fuzzy
 My camera does a terrible job in low light situations. It’s happy to flash and give it a shot, but the results are usually blurry. These pictures are cute anyway…
Barclay often plays hard until he is what we call ‘stupid-tired’, where he’s tired, but he just won’t lay down and take a nap so he keeps running around doing destructive stuff, barking, and being annoying until I lift him up on my lap, and he’ll just flop over against my chest like this. That seems to throw a switch, because after a few minutes I can set him down and he’ll flop over for a nap. I swear he’s ADD.
Then later he was napping in the living room when Mouse came up to him…
And gave him a little face-bath. Aww, how cute! Considering he likes to pounce on her and drag her around by the scruff, they seem to have a special relationship. They just like to play rough!
I’d stay on that hand!
21?! Tell the dealer you’ll stay!
And the other guy at the table only has a bone! He doesn’t even know what game we’re playing! Hang in there Barclay, you’ll take the pot!
More Dioji
Dioji is doing well with these strange creatures we call ‘cats’. Obviously they aren’t afraid of him.
Lots of roughhousing. Barclay loves it!
Houseguest – Dioji
Our friends Brian and Merilee had a family thing to go to this week, and Dioji the Golden Retriever needed a place to crash, so we said ‘bring him on over!’ He’s a sweetie, and since all the dogs are friendly (except Alki, who sends out bug-off vibes just fine) we figured they could have fun playing together. Seems to be working out fine so far 🙂
Barclay likes to chase and be chased, and wrestling. Dioji wasn’t sure how to play with him, and he even scared Barclay a couple times by barking at him (sending him running back to me until he felt brave enough to go play again). But Jack and Barclay gave him a demonstration of their favorite play style. You can see him studying them intently! And they had a couple scuffles over toys. They’re like teenage boys – one minute they are partners in crime, next thing you know someone is howling because they got punched. But overall it’s been great and everyone seems to be having a good time.
Walk around Battle Ground Lake
I took Barclay for a walk around the lake on Tuesday. I wanted to go somewhere cool and shady where he could jump in the water if he wanted to. That was the perfect place to go! But there were a lot of people there, even for a Tuesday. Luckily most of them were in the wading area, and so we only ran into a couple groups on the lake trail. One couple looked like they were on an expedition, and they were from out of town so we chatted for a bit, talked about what other stuff there was to see in the area. It’s funny to see people outfitted for a long hike on the lake trail, because it’s really just a stroll, and it’s less than a mile total. Though sometimes I have gone with a full backpack just to get in shape for carrying my pack. So I suppose then I look silly too 🙂
It’s hard to get Barclay to sit still for a picture – he wants to go go go! There’s so much to see!
Like baby ducks!
We stopped and waded around in the water a bit here and there. I just wanted to make sure he stayed cool. He doesn’t know if he can swim yet, so I want to encourage him to play in the water whenever we get a chance. One of these days we’ll have to get him out into water where he can paddle a bit. I think he would enjoy it.
Steff Does Stuff! 