Higgins Hörna

October 31 2005
Weekend fun

This weekend was a bit unusual since mum was working Saturday so I got to spend the day with her parents. One good thing was we didn't have to get up as early as we do during the week. When mum left me with her parents I saw that little Martin was there as well, he'd slept over at his grandparents who are actually mum's parents. Since Martin was there my day was a bit harder than it normally is when I'm at mum's parents. I had to check up on what he was doing all the time, so I didn't get that much of a rest. I mean what if he had gotten something to eat without me noticing it! Who would have taken care of the crumbs he dropped on the floor!? Martin was picked up by mum's sister Camilla and Stefan before mum came to get me, but I didn't get much time to rest anyway since it was time to start waiting for mum to arrive. When mum and I got home I ran straight to the computer room and got in under the wooden cabinet next to the computer to get some sleep, and when mum said it was time for a walk I was almost too tired to come. Fortunately mum spent the evening in the sofa watching tv, so I could stretch out in the corner of the sofa. Talking about the sofa, mum is wondering how I can take up most of the sofa all by myself, but that's easy! I just have to get up in the corner - which mum actually think is her corner - and roll over on my back. Then I stretch out as much as I can and if mum is in the way I just kick her slightly with my back paws and she moves. If she doesn't move I give her the evil eye and kick her some more.

Yesterday was Sunday and that was also an unusual day since we went to mum's sister with family for a birthday celebration. It was mum's sister's birthday and the humans were stuffing themselves with biscuits and cakes and all I got was some crumbs that fell on the floor. I'm not going to tell what I managed to get from Stefan when I was begging him for something to eat in the kitchen... Little Martin had a little girl friend over together with her parents. The little girl's name is Ella, and she's afraid of dogs so mum made me stay close to her most of the time. I had to move now and again and if I came too close to Ella she started screaming and got really scared. All I did was look at her wagging my tail! Then at one point I went to the kitchen to get a drink of water and it turned out that Ella and Martin was playing under the kithchen table and Ella started to scream again. Mum came out to the kitchen saying I was only going to get some water and then I'd come with her again to the grown ups in the livingroom. Then Martin looked at mum and told her he thought we could go home! I think that's a pretty rude thing to say to your aunt, but mum just laughed and actually we left shortly after since it was time for my dinner.

October 27 2005
The winter that vanished

Now we didn't get much of a winter at all! The little snow we had rained away last Tuesday and that is something I don't like at all, because when it's raining you get wet! Tuesday evening when mum was taking me for my walk and I realised it was still raining as it had done in the afternoon I didn't want to go for a walk. But my horrible mum made me walk around the block wich I reluctantly agreed to do.

This afternoon when mum and I went for a walk I found a lot of interesting things to smell. Only one bad thing happened and that was mum making me go to the vet. We pass outside there almost every day, and most of the times I find the stairs very interesting. Today when I realised mum was taking me inside I tried to make her understand I wasn't interested in the smells or anything, but she made me follow her. I suppose it wasn't that bad when I finally got inside, but I wasn't happy. I met a nice girl inside who works there. That she was nice was easy to find out because she gave me liver treats! While mum and I was sitting waiting I was following this girl with my eyes to see what she was doing. After a while someone called mum's and my name and we got to go into another room. I didn't want to go there either, I wanted to leave, but mum made me go to that room and when we got there there was another girl who came and she was nice. She was petting me saying how gorgeous I was and she looked at my teeth and then I got to go down from the table. Mum says I got a shot while I was up there, but I didn't notice that. I remember it was the same last year, mum said she was taking me to the vet so I could get a shot and I was up there on the table and nothing happened?! I'm actually not even sure what a shot is, I know I'm scared of shots coming from guns because they make a loud noise, but not only did I not feel anything, I didn't hear anything either! Anyway, when I was down on the floor this nice girl gave me a liver treat and then on our way out of the room mum decided she should check my weight. She told me to get up on some strange looking black thing but I found it so strange looking I didn't want to get up there. Who knows what happens if you get up on one of those?? I believe that if you get up on those things by your free will, strange things will happen like you being thrown out in the air or something or maybe you'll fall down into a hole! Since I didn't want to get up there by myself mum lifted me up and told me to be still. Then she looked at something on the wall and said my weight was 14,3 kilos which apparently was good. After she'd said that I was allowed to get down on the floor again and I thought we could leave immediately. Now you might have guessed I wasn't allowed to leave, mum said we had to pay. I really don't know why we had to pay, I mean we did spend most of our time there waiting, and the two little liver treats I got shouldn't be necessary to pay for. We didn't even get anything to bring home after our visit! The same thing happens when we go to the doggyfoodstore, I want to leave straight away, but mum insists on paying but at least then we get a bag of my food with us.

Talking about food, I nearly starved a little while ago! I had to tell mum it had passed my dinnertime and I was very hungry!

I was talking to mum for a long while trying to make her understand it was about time to give me my dinner, but instead she brought out her camera! Very silly! I finally got my dinner though, so now I suppose I'll live until it's time for food next time.

October 24 2005
A liiiitttle winter

I have to say I was a bit disappointed this morning when mum and I got out and the snow I saw last night wasn't there! Not that I really saw any snow on the ground last night either, but I'd hoped it would end up there during the night. But at least it wasn't wet outside, so our morning walk was rather nice. It got even better when mum dropped me off at her parents! I think they live in another country because where they live there was snow on the ground! I was so happy I nearly didn't want to go inside, I wanted to stay outside running like crazy on the neighbour's lawn. Mum didn't think it was such a good idea and opened the door to her parents house and told me to get in. Lucky for me, the snow didn't go away, because when it was time to go for a forest walk with mum's parents it was still there! It's not really a lot of snow, just a little bit covering the grass but you can run around in circles in it and have a great time. Hopefully it will be more snow tomorrow to jump around in like a kangoroo and dig tunnels in!!

October 23 2005
Wet and boring...and some fun!

What a horrible weekend! It's been raining almost all the time, and yesterday it wasn't one dry spot to find on me all day. It started on our first walk and to my surprise mum got her rubber boots on as well as her umbrella. It turned out the rain was pouring down, and when we'd been out for about 20 min's I'd had enough and wanted to go back home again. For once mum was nice and let me decide how long our walk should be. When we got inside mum needed two towels to dry me, and even so I was still wet. We didn't do much during the day, mostly spent it watching tv in the sofa so I was wrapped up in a towel and curled up on my blanket. In the afternoon it was time for a walk again, and actually it wasn't raining so mum took her normal shoes and no umbrella. The walk started off good and even though it was rather wet there were a lot of interesting smells. At least there was no water coming from above! But, when we'd been out for about 40 min's it started to rain again and I tried to make mum turn around but she said it would be quicker if we kept on going the way we were. So we walked along in the rain and I get more and more wet for each step I took.

The picture above mum took while walking so it's not very good, but maybe you can see how wet I am! I tried not to get so wet by using my "walk-very-slowly-technique". You see I have this theory that the slower you walk when it's raining the less wet you get. Now I'm almost starting to believe mum when she says that theory isn't very bright, because when we got home I was really very wet. Not fun at all! Mum didn't think it was very fun either, because she was wringing wet as well, and her jacket didn't dry up for the rest of the day so she had to bring her other winter coat out for our evening walk. She also took out her winter boots since her other shoes were still completely wet.

Today the weather was a bit better, at least it wasn't raining except for a little now on our last walk, But it wasn't only rain that came down, I could also see some snowflakes!! I wonder if it's winter now...

October 19 2005
Strange mum

As I've said before, I can tell the time by looking at a clock. Apparently my mum doesn't know how to do that because the last couple of days she hasn't come to get me when she's supposed to! Yesterday I heard it loud and clear when mum's dad called to ask if they should bring me in to town and drop me off around 4 when they were going to town to do some arrends. I also heard when he was talking that mum said she was going to come and collect me her normal time, but then she didn't. I got to go with her parents to town the time they had said from the start. At that time I was nearly starving since it was half an hour after my normal dinner time!! Turned out mum had called her parents a while after they called her to ask them if they could mind me a bit longer since she'd been asked to work in that place she worked in during the summer. Someone was sick and couldn't come to work, but do you think I was told?? No, there I had to go and wait and nearly starve to death! It was a little bit better today because mum had brought my dinner in case she would have to work in the afternoon again. That was lucky because since she did end up working, at least I didn't have to starve. I think she's working again tomorrow afternoon, so I hope she remembers to bring my dinner to her parents again tomorrow morning!

October 16 2005
More autumn

I think it's getting more autumn now, because there are more and more leaves on the ground. I really enjoy walking in all the leaves, and sometimes you find sausages under them! That might not happen that often, but it happened to me on Friday! Very nice, but mum wasn't very happy when she saw what I'd found, and I didn't manage to eat all of it before she caught me eating. I have no idea what mum has against me eating food I find outside?? She says I can get sick if I eat food I find, it can be old and bad and she also imagines that some people put stuff in the food that will make me sick. I don't understand why people would drop food with stuff in that can make me sick??

Oh, and some people have been wondering how mum took the photo of me standing in the leaves since it looks as if she was lying on the ground. I can tell you that mum was NOT lying on the ground taking my picture. She's never on the ground unless she falls, and at the moment I can only remember once when that happened and that was when I'd recently moved in with mum. We were walking through the park and since it had been snowing she decided to cross over the lawn, knowing I love snow and thought I could play a bit in it. She'd only just started to walk over the lawn and suddenly she was flat on her back like a pancake! It turned out that under the snow it was full of ice, and since mum didn't see that she just slipped, flew through the air and landed on her back. I stepped up on her then to see if she was going to stay there for long, but she didn't. She was happy she hadn't landed on me, and hurried to get back up on her feet again. She walked a bit funny after that, because I think she hit herself pretty bad when she landed. So it's only if mum falls she lies on the ground, and I'm happy it doesn't happen that often because then it would be even more embarassing going for walks with her than it already is. So, the photo of me standing in the leaves mum took when she was sitting on her heels and then she just pointed the camera hoping for the best. By the way, I find it a bit strange that mum doesn't enjoy lying on the ground rolling around! I'm not saying it wouldn't be embarassing if she did, but it's so much fun rolling around on lawns!

I've decided it's my job to tell mum when I see weird people standing around in the dark. Mum says that people are allowed to stop and talk on sidewalks or standing there waiting, but I find that strange. It looks as if they are standing staring at me, or they just look strange. Last Friday I was barking really loud and a lot at some people standing on the other side of the road when mum and I got out for our evening walk. I kept on barking until we came into the yard on the other side of the street and it was echoing between the houses. Mum told me to be quiet, but I wanted to tell those people they shouldn't hang around there looking strange. Then last night I barked at another strange person standing next to the street. Mum said the girl was probably waiting for someone, but what did I care! She looked strange so I barked. In a while I think I'll go out to see if there are any more strange people I can bark at in the dark!

One thing about the autumn that I really don't like is everything that gets caught in my coat. For example, in one of the parks some machine has been going over all the lawns where all the leaves are, and cut them into little pieces. They get caught in my coat so I'm full of tiny pieces of leaves. I also don't like grass seeds or other dried plants and flowers. Today all my left side was full of dry leaves and little seeds, and all I did was sniff along a hedge in the park. It was extra annoying since I'd just gone through a thorough brush and some grooming, and then when we got back inside I ended up on the table again and it took forever for mum to get all the leaves and seeds out of my coat. Sigh!

Now I'm going for a walk again and maybe I'll meet Doris again! I meet her sometimes, and last time was on our afternoon walk. Doris is a very fun golden retriever girl who is 2,5 years old and I've seen her now and again since she was a little pup and she moved in not too far from whre I live. The only problem with her is that she never stands still! She jumps around like crazy and it's really very difficult saying hello to her then! She has a flexi lead which makes it very hard for me to follow her when she runs and jumps around like a circus horse. I try to tell her to stand still, but she's never still more than 2 seconds. But even so it's always fun to meet her!

October 13 2005
This and that

The weather has been very nice the last week, and above you can see a picture of me that mum took during one of our walks during the weekend. The ground is covered with leaves all over the place, and it's very interesting to go around and sniff them. First of all lots of other dogs have walked there, and it's interesting to find out who's been there, and also there can be interesting things hiding under the leaves! Apart from going for walks, mum and I didn't do much during the weekend except from lying around on the sofa. Mum was busy watching stuff on video that she'd taped and I thought it was very cosy. I was cuddling up in the corner of the sofa or lying on mum's stommach, lying on the floor and then back up in the sofa again. In other words just being cosy. Except for when mum got the idea of brushing me and cutting my claws. I found that completely un-necessary, as well as getting my ears cleaned! But apart from that the weekend was very nice, and hopefully we'll have another weekend like that next week.

October 5 2005
Afternoon walk

Since mum works half days I get a short walk with her in the morning, and then a longer one with her parents, and in the afternoon when mum comes to get me we go for a long afternoon walk coming home. The last couple of days the weather have been very nice, and there has been a lot of things to sniff and look at. It seems there are more ducks than usual in the parks around the river, and sometimes I scare them! It's really fun when they fly away in full panic! Today though I wasn't scaring the ducks at all, mum stopped to take pictures of something so I sat down and had a look around.

Obviously mum saw her chance to take a picture of me instead of taking photos of just leaves and boring trees, and for once I actually sat still. I was watching the ducks wondering what they were doing, thinking maybe I should scare them a little, but then I thought I'd surprise them by not scaring them since I've been doing that every day for the passed week. Then we continued our walk and I found some very interesting little stones I had to sniff, and mum got a bit bored after a while and took out her camera again.

As you can see it was very sunny, and the way I'm standing sniffing in the picture is the way I kept on standing a loing while after mum took her picture. She kept nagging at me saying "This is enough! How long can you sniff some old little stone?? Did you fall asleep or what's the matter with you??" I heard her talking to me, but it was a very intereisting stone...

October 4 2005
I know...

...you're not supposed to stare at people, mum has told me several times, but sometimes I just can't help it! This morning when we were on our way home from our little morning walk this young woman comes walking towards us and I totally forgot what I was sniffing on. She came walking really fast, arms swinging back and forwards and it looked really weird. I just had to stop and stare at her. Mum told me to stop staring and to continue to sniff the wooden fence I'd been sniffing at. I really couldn't care less about some stupid old fence after I'd seen this woman walking. So I kept on staring at her, and followed her with my eyes and even turned around just to see if she was going to continue to walk that silly. Mum said she was probably out for some sort of excersise walk, but I just think it looked completely silly! Humans do such strange things!!

October 3 2005
Eeww!

Today I had to stay a bit longer with mum's parents before she came to get me. Apparently she'd been to someone called the Dentist which is someone she doesn't like to visit. I had started to wonder when she was going to come, because Mondays I usually get to go with mum's mother in to town and she drops me off with mum. I'd prefered if that had happened today as well, because then I wouldn't have had to suffer loud bangs! It was lout bangs in the forest when I went for a walk. Three times it happened, and I tried to get mum's mother to carry me home, but she wouldn't do it. I had to walk by myself and I walked really fast. The walk in the afternoon that I took with mum's father was a bit better, because then I met two American cocker boys! Ok, so it wasn't as fun meeting them as it is meeting the American cocker girl, but it was still fun.

When mum finally arrived to collect me I had tons of things to tell her and I tried to make her leave straight away. Instead she came right inside, took her shoes off and sat down at the kitchen table! I decided I should lie on her lap, and after a while she actually let me do it. She told me that even though she was sitting at her parents eating, the same rules applied there as it does at home. If I want to be on her lap while she's eating I had to put my head down on her lap and not turn my nose to put it in her plate. Since I was so happy mum had arrived I did as I was told. When mum and I got home I tried to make her believe I hadn't had anything to eat all day, but she didn't fall for that. First of all she did remember she'd brought my dinner with her in the morning, and secondly her parents had told me I'd just gulped my dinner down when they gave it to me.

It's started to be quite dark in the evenings now, even going for the first evening walk it's almost completely dark, so mum puts my reflective vest on when she takes me out. That's very good because then everyone can see I'm coming, and sometimes I get comments from people telling me I look very smart in my yellow vest. Tonight when we took our early evening walk mum saw something I would have liked to have seen! Two little rabbitbabies!! It was in a parking lot we pass, and the last couple of times we've passed there I've been very busy smelling the ground. I've smelled this interesting smell that I didn't know what it was. Those times it's been later, and almost no cars at all, but tonight there were quite a few cars left but I didn't even see the rabbits! I think rabbits should wear reflective vests too so that people and dogs can see them! And it's not very responsible of the rabbitbabies mum to let the little ones jump around with no vests on them! They could be hit by cars!! I think mum should go there and tell the rabbitmum to get her kids some vests, or even ask them to move in with us! Wouldn't it be fun to have your own rabbit family living with you?! If they did they could even come with me to mum's parents during the days, and maybe they could go for walks in the forest and meet real forestrabbits!!

October 2 2005
Weekend

Today I was at mum's parents even though it was a Sunday, but mum was working. I met a very cute American cocker girl on the walk in the forest and she was very nice. I'd loved to play with her for a while, but I was on the lead and mum's parents wasn't sure if I'd take off or not, so they didn't want to let me off the lead. I'll tell mum to tell her parents that I can play with other dogs without running away. Why run away when you can play?? But I know they are afraid to lose me, because if they did I'm sure mum would be very angry to find me lost when she came to get me!

Yesterday when mum and I went for one of our walks I stopped and didn't want to go any further. Mum wondered what had gotten into me, but it wasn't anything gettin into me, rather something getting at me. I had some sort of iron thread caught in my coat! It had gotten tangeled in to my right side and it was all the way from my back leg to my chest. Stupid that things like that are lying around, dogs and other animals as well can get hurt! I was lucky since it only got tangeled up in my coat, but it took a while before mum could get it out and throw it in a bin. It would have been much worse if I'd stepped on it and it had gotten caught in my paw!

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