When i was younger, living with my family, we always had pets. Dogs, cats, birds, hamsters, and the occasional goldfish. The big dogs, i think, were all called, Shep. Except the one's that weren't shepherds. Lassie, the collie, was very early, and i have no pics of her, there was also a Samoyed, don't remember the name, but it wasn't around for long. The big dogs lived outside, in a doghouse my dad built, very deluxe, asphalt shingles atop, for real dry inside space,....in the extreme dead of winter they would come in, down the stairs, and warm next to the furnace. I can't say which dogs are portrayed in these pictures. The shepherds were the one's i remember most. One of them was quite unruly for a fenced yard, very overly protective of the back gate, once scared the Naylor grandparents, visiting from Kelowna, in such a way that they wouldn't come in the yard, someone had to come hold back the dog. That one went to live in Raymond, Southern Alberta, with my Sister's family, and from what i've heard had a habit of interacting, in the dark, with the local cat population, not in a good way. And might have had someone get up in the middle of the night to bury the evidence out of town.
The small dogs, which always lived inside, except in the bright warm sun of summer, were sometimes called Sam.
The one you see in these pics is perhaps Sam 2, a pomeranian. With a wicked looking lower left canine tooth. Freaky. There was a pekingese before that, and a smallish mostly poodle mix, after that. And it did NOT die from licking the lawn after i had sprayed said lawn with Malathion, to subdue the mosquito's and ants.
I don't remember much of the cats. Except boots, and spencer. Maybe someday i'll have the patience to keep a cat.
There was a budgie, in a cage, atop the fridge, likely named budgie, that was occasionally left to fly about the house, on the wing. Some of the persons who might have released budgie to the open air space might have been trying to solicit a response from perhaps my youngest(?) sister, who at that time found that particular bird a bit frightful.
There's also a story about the hamsters, mostly tragic.
I think i have a picture of a few of the goldfish, in a bowl.
Suffice it to say, we like animals. Pet type animals.
It was Peter the budgie, and make that your OLDEST sister who was bird-traumatized.
ReplyDeleteAnd still is.
Very entertaining post. Still LOL ing.
wow who were the inventors of the very creative names. lol.
ReplyDeleteOh come off it, Jeff.....We did not name all our dogs the same name, that would be just too far out even for us. We had many different dogs over the years, mind you....mostly German Shepherds. The greyish puppy in these pics was indeed Shep; he had a built-in aversion to cats, I could not begin to hang onto his leash when he encountered a cat; one time he dragged me right across the lawn into the blue spruce tree trying to get at a cat. We loaned him to Linda (Rachel was a baby then, I think) when Stuart was on the road driving those big trucks and gone for days at a time, and yes, he cleaned out the feral cat population in Raymond, and maybe a few others who were genuine pets. Shep would actually molest the cats until they were deaddeaddead. We had another big Alsatian that Linda bought for her very own $5 at the pound, this dog lasted overnite....for some reason he had a great aversion to men, and when he would not let Dad in the house at midnite when he got off shift, well....that was the beginning of the end for that dog. I don't know if Linda got her $5 back or not, the dog went back to the pound the next morning. Another Shepherd that was very dear to us, even if she was deadly afraid of thunder, was Smokey. She had a lovely nature, but if it was stormy outside, she would almost break the back door down to get in the house, and then she'd curl up under the kitchen table and shiver. Then Randy "found" another Shepherd, I think we called him Shadow, he was a beauty, no response when we checked the lost and found people....well trained dog...we had him for just a few months when one day Randy and he were crossing the road by Sir Wm Place, and a guy pulled up in a car, and shouted "That's my dog!" Well, obviously he was, as he went to the guy right away and jumped all over him. So that was the end of Shadow. Sam was my pom-cross, and he was an epileptic. The kids threw him in the lake at Osooyos and he had a fit in the water, I dragged him out and laid him on the shore, we thought he was dead. But pretty soon he woke up and started running around, per usual. We had a black cocker spaniel when Linda was a baby....it would not get trained, it was such a ditzy dog, and after it messed on every step of the basement stairs, I said to Doug, either me or that dog has got to go. She went. Then we had another part cocker, also black, named Raven. She had puppies, TEN OF THEM, ON THE BASEMENT FLOOR. I don't remember what happened to them all...no, I didn't drown them. I only drowned Marie Saboe's litter of unwanted kittens....she begged me to, she was too chicken to do it. This was not a MACABRE act for a person raised on a farm, by the way, although some people are horrified that such things take place. The last dog I can remember was Lassie, she was Granny Naylor's dog when they lived on the acreage, when they moved to Kelowna they had to give her away, although she was getting on in years even then, She developed a hugh cancerous growth on her front quarter, and I had her put away because she kept ripping at it with her teeth and it would bleed all over the place. Oh, just remembered Randy's white Samoyed, I can't remember its name, Elaine somebody, Randy's first g.f. bought it for him for his birthday. It disappeared after a while, we thought it was stolen, it was beautiful and a pure bred. Never found it, Ran was so upset. Linda's the one that's still bird-crazy, I think one of our budgies landed on her shoulder or something when she was just little, scared her and she developed this paranoia. Judy's hamster "Hammy" crawled into the crawl space under the rumpus room floor and never came out again. I think he went to the happy hamster hunting ground under there. Cats? we had skillions of them too, over the years. Don't get me started on our cats, Boots was the worst one, he and David would chase each other all over the house, constantly, he was part Burmese and wild (and vicious) as a tiger. He made mincemeat out of Dave's hands, feet, whatever he could sink his teeth into. We put up with him 'cause he was so feisty! He would run straight up the drapes to the very top and perch up there precariously till I lifted him down. Ah, the good old days. Yes, our family had their share of pets of all sorts. We loved them all.
ReplyDeleteunfortunately I know that i'm going to have to have pets one day but I REALLY don't want them. I would mostly do it for Lee and the kids as they LOVE dogs which is weird since they've never really been around them except Neil's dog pip. I have grown to dislike pets ever since having kids, who wants an extra set of poop to clean up and when you go the playground you can't take animals nowadays.
ReplyDeleteI remember a shepherd that got hit by a car, he was a nice dog. and then i vaguely remember being a long dark haired cat at some point too
Linda, yeah, i didn't like that bird either. Birds are just too noisy. Seems a shame to keep them caged.
ReplyDeleteKristy, i don't know who picked the names, depended on the dog i suppose, but as you can see, Granny SAYS there was a bunch of other names.Sure...yeah...whatev. I say they were all sam and shep. I must be the CRAZY one. Though i've never drowned kittens. lol
ok my bird was Peter, but that was years before you came along, Jeff, so I dunno what yours was named. Since we are 14 years apart, the Naylor menagerie varied over the years. Some of my dogs at 99A street were Lady the keeshond, Ringo the mutt who got shot by our neighbor the cop in the front yard cuz he had distemper, Kayla the collie (oh wait she was the neighbor's dog down the street...I just WISHED she was mine), somebody the Spitz (I forget her name), there were MANY more, mostly from the pound just a few blocks away. I did love to go there and visit all the inmates. Ah, the memories.
ReplyDeleteInteresting. Then we did the same thing at 86st..the budgie, don't think it had a name, was in a cage on top of the fridge, you were out of the house by then, so it must have been Debbi that freaked, it was a sister, and you and Judy had moved out.
ReplyDeleteDuchess. Duchess the Spitz. I knew I'd remember.
ReplyDeleteYes, I too, remembered the three dogs I missed on yesterday's comment. The Ringo with distemper had the "running fits", including foaming at the mouth, and really bizarre behavior, that's why we had to get Bill the cop, who lived on the riverbank behind us, to come over with his service revolver and dispose of the dog SAP. The running fits are pretty awful, akin to rabies (only not). But similar behavior. And Lady, the keeshond, she was a nice placid dog, with a funny high-pitched bark. And then there was my mini chihuahua, Goldie....we inherited her from the folks next door who "had to get rid of her because we're adopting a child". I couldn't quite see the logic in that one, but I felt sorry for the dog, and we took her in. Her major feat was burrowing into our bed and scooting right down to the very bottom where she kept my feet warm all night. And Dad's too, although mostly he would kick her off his feet, and mutter dangerously "Do we have to have that nutcase dog in the bed every night?"
ReplyDeleteBut she was no trouble really, and only wanted to keep warm, being next to hairless. Oops, just remembered our dang cat that had her kittens right on our lovely satin comforter, so thick and comfy, she couldn't just have them on the basement floor like Raven had the good sense to do with her ten pups. Oh no, had to be on our bed and on our best piece of linenry....(made up that word, so don't bother looking it up, Jeff). She had a name but I can't remember it, should have been CARELESS maybe. I still have one more comment in this pet category, concerning how Linda ruined the guard dog at Capital Cleaners. So watch for this one, I'll do it today sometime, maybe, probably, if I get time, and the inclination perhaps.
jeez you two are obsessive about remembering pets names. How spooky-eery.
ReplyDelete'Linen' is singular or plural, as is. but making up new funny words is one of the popular internet trends, so carry on. (and, um, i don't have to look up a word to know if it's made up.)
but I don't remember ONE cat's name. Guess that tells what I must think of cats. Oh wait, I do remember Ginger and Paprika, two little cute orange baby cats.
ReplyDeleteBut that's it.
My neighbor named all their poodles "Petey". Shep nearly killed Petey 1 when he ran after Nathan, as Nate and Shep walked down the street. Shep was very protective back then. When Nate was just little that dog would follow him everywhere; he once even stopped Nate from going into the canal.
Man's (and kid's) best friend.
Interesting, if that's the same shepherd that we had, that dog was a fighter, insanely protective. One day i was walking him past strathearn elememtary, and the guy on the next block north of us was walking by with his HUGE mean Bouvier, and Shep took him on, a very nasty fight, only ended because the other guy was big enough pull his dog away from the fight..and shep was on a choke chain, i did as much as i could to pull him back. But i sure wasn't going anywhere near the fight, either of those dogs would take your hand off, by mistake. Good dog...that must be the one in the pictures, both as a puppy, and more grown up.
ReplyDeleteKristy, didn't you say in your blog, awhile back, something about an orange cat you had when you were little? And your mom commented that that cat peed on your clothes?
ReplyDeleteya my parents ruined him. It wasn't when I was little it was like just before I got married. i really wanted my orange cat called "Kitten" (yes i'm original too with my names, didn't think i'd have him for so many years because somehow all my cats were gone after a few months) a inside cat because of my previous cats that disappeared. My parents used to let him out of the house all the time when I wasn't around and so he became used to being outside all the time. So eventually he forgot what a cat litter was and when he was inside during cold streaks he would pee in random spots. I have a big pee stain on my mattress from him and clothes were peed on too. not fun.
ReplyDeleteOK...here's the scoop on Linda wrecking the guard dog. Capital Cleaners, over on the next block from us, were always getting broken into, so they decided to hire a German guy for caretaking duties, WITH A VERY VICIOUS, specially trained guard dog. The caretaker dude would do his janitorial stuff at the plant, then go home when he finished, and leave the dog on the premises for the rest of the night, where even the sight of him snarling at the window of the place was enough to deter anybody from breaking into it. Anyway, the fellow would walk his cranky dog past our place on his way to work every day. His confidence in his dog's ability eroded to the point of no return when he encountered Linda frequently; she'd hurry home from Grade 1 in order to pet the dog and beg to walk him! just for a minute, please??? Well, the dog threw off his dangerous personality completely, he was butter in Linda's hands, adored every inch of her as she threw her arms around his neck, he was her devoted slave from that time on. Well, needless to say, the dog's real master (his name was Heinz, or Ketchup or something) started to take exception to this strange, unafraid little girl throwing herself into the wicked jaws of hell, without a thought of major molestation by such a disagreeable dog, that he finally quit walking by our house. I don't know how long it took him to re-train his guard dog back to its original shape, but I strongly suspect Linda ruined the beast for future gigs as protector of the non-peace. He was also a German shepherd by the way; our whole family was sorta hung-up on shepherds......they were definitely the dog of choice in those long-ago days. By the way, this trait goes back a generation, I have a picture somewhere of my brother Jack and I borrowing a beautiful shepherd dog, in Stanley Park in Vancouver, and me prancing around with him (on a leash) while the indulgent owner looked on. That was about 79 years ago, btw. Attitude passed on.
ReplyDeleteIs that picture on your computer, or in one of your scrapbooks?
ReplyDeleteI think you could find space for your scanner, or maybe one of your loving progeny could help?