Category Archives: beauregard

beauregard, dog, Molly, Sam

Meloncholy Fall and Dogs Of Our History

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A definite tang of fall was in the air today. The cold front came in and the temperature never got much above 60 for most of the day. To top it off, it drizzled for major portions of the day. So much for my plan to mow the lawn today! As I buried my ears in the joy of listening to a couple of football games and occupied my hands sorting out junk valuable stuff for our upcoming garage sale, fall was in my mind.

One of the more interesting pictures I came across as I sorted was of our first dog, Sam (short for Samantha). That set me to thinking of all three dogs we have had over the 30+ years we have been married.

Our first dog was Sam:

 

We got Sam from the Los Angeles dog pound as a puppy. She was a mixed breed pit bull who was extremely loyal, like most of her breed. We choose her because she looked like she needed us the most – turned out that she was sick and the vet had to give her a few shots to bring her roaring back to full on friskiness.

The first night we had her, we put her in the kitchen with a plywood barrier to keep her in the kitchen since the rest of the place was carpeted. When we got up in the morning and came downstairs, who was out of the kitchen but Sam. She had considerately jumped over the barrier so she could poop on the carpet rather than dirty the kitchen. {*grin*}

We thought we’d lose Sam when she went through teething. She ate an entire wooden doghouse and didn’t leave a scrap. We spend days anxiously waiting for her to die from an internal splinter. Sam was with us for years, until a bit after the the birth of the Son. Arthritis finally cut her spine and we had to put her to sleep.

Next came Beau (King Beauregard III):

The story of how Beau came to be with us was told here. Beau was with us from the time he was about three until his death of old age. He went from normal to deathly ill in just a couple of days. Beau lived a very long life for his breed and when he went down, it was fast. This was the dog that the Son was most deeply attached to.

Finally, we come to the current dog, Molly:

We got her from the local humane society. She is a border collie mix and quite a change from the sight indifference of Beau. If she can see it, she thinks she should be able to herd it. So not only is she the first sight hound we’ve had, she is also the first long hair. The long hair I could live without, but even short hairs of the breed shed a lot. I guess you just have to live with all the hair to have one of the most intelligent dog breeds. Sort of like people – you might have to live with a few warts to get the other good things.

Time to get back to the junk valuable stuff sorting. {*grin*}

beauregard, meme

Beauregard

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This is a picture of King Beauregard III – otherwise known as Beau. He was our dog before Molly. Beau was with us for many years until he finally passed away of old age. Here he’s curled up by the garage door napping away.

 
The Son grew up with Beau and grew very deeply attached to him over the years. Beau originally came to live with us via the sneaky ploy of “employees call and ask grandma to bring the Son down to work where they have Beau waiting and then suggest that he ask his parents if he could keep him.” No chance of saying no then. Beau was already 3 years old when we met him; he had been in an abusive situation and so had to find a new home. A full pedigreed Bassett Hound (with the corresponding long title) but he was always just plain old Beau to us.
 

Beau was a big one for curling up with certain of the Son’s old stuffed animals. Judging by the size of the Son’s BVDs wrapped around the stuffed dog, I’d guess that the picture is from about 10 years ago.

Beau’s death was hard on all of us, but especially the Son. L sometimes still calls Molly by the name Beau when she is distracted. May he rest in peace!

This post is in response to the tag I got from Margaret of Facts From A Fact Woman last week. I normally don’t continue to propagate old memes, but I am willing to participate. I did make the change to the 15th photo since I did the 10th photo version last year. In any case, consider yourself tagged if you so desire. The rules are:

â–ºOpen your first photo folder
â–ºScroll down to the 10th photo.
â–ºPost that photo and the story about that photo on your blog.

Enjoy!

beauregard, Molly, thoughts, weather

Have You Ever …

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Have you ever wondered what is going through the mind of your pet? Do you ever wonder if they think along lines recognizable by the human thought process? I do.

This particular revery was brought on by Molly the dog’s reaction to the thunder this evening. We had a couple of pretty good booms after a quiet day of overcast. When the booms happened, Molly sprinted into my office, put her paws on my leg, and stood up with her head buried in my chest. She was literally shaking like a leaf. So my first thought was that she was frightened. But then I began to wonder if that was just my human brain thinking. What makes me think that the thought processes of a dog should follow my expectations of human norms?

In any case, Molly has not ventured more than a foot from me since the incident. I suspect she can still hear subsonic rumbles from the now distant storm. If I stand up, Molly is right there with me. If I sit down, Molly is laying at my feet (but only after first pawing my leg and making sure she is not going to get more head rubs first).

The “attached at the leg” syndrome makes me think back to the Son’s toddlerhood when there were the days that you could not be separated from him by more than inches without a fit being initiated. I am sure that all parents have been through those tag-a-long days where there is no relief from the continuous attachment of the young ones. Somehow, it is a bit more tolerable when it is your child attached to you than when it is your big strong dog. Not only that, but this is a new behaviour for Molly compared to last year. So this summer when the thunderstorms really fire up should be an interesting experience.

Back to the initial topic. I am really curious as to what goes through the mind of Molly. Given she is at least partially a herding breed, it is tempting to attribute thoughts to her as she sits with her ears alert scanning the yard. Likewise when she is trying to herd the squirrels on the powerlines in the alley.

Oh well, at least Molly hasn’t picked up the habits of her late predecessor, a Bassett Hound named Beauregard. Beau used to go out in the back yard and come back with his jowels full of crickets, which he would then carefully release alive in the house. Once Beau finally caught on that the crickets were verbotten (Bassetts are not the worlds brightest dogs, it only took him about five years to get that idea), he switched over to bringing the occasional live toad in and letting it go in the house. So far Molly has been much better behaved than that.

I’ll leave you with this picture of Molly huddling at my feet: