Where Does Your Dog Sleep?

[annageckos]

@annageckos, I think you need a queen sized bed.

Yes, it would be nice. Some nights I can't move. My oldest cat always sleeps next to my chest, another by my knees, unless the puppy comes up. Then he moves to the other side. Since Freyja(the 'puppy') sleeps at the bottom of the bed I just put my legs over her. But sometimes it's just easier to get up than it is to fight for bed space. I also always keep an extra blanket in case someone lays down on top of mine and I can't get it out from under them.

 

[annageckos]

I can tell Penny is accustomed to being on the couch and bed, in her former home, because she still jumps up on ours seemingly without thinking sometimes, then quickly gets off when she gets yelled at. One morning I hadn't made my bed yet, and when I couldn't find Penny after my shower, DH found her sleeping under the covers. I just thought it was rumpled covers when I had looked in earlier.
I have given over one wing back chair to her, though, and she sleeps there during the day a lot.
Uhh....by the way, what is the best way to get dog hair off stuff? Furniture; is there a special thing you use?
Are you all ok with going out in public with dog hair all over you? Do those sticky rollers work better than anything else?
Since Penny is mostly black, her hair doesn't show up so much, except the white parts. My grand daughters are always covered with white dog hair, from their white dog. I can't believe my son lets them go to school with dog hair all over their fleece jackets. Am I just too picky?

I don't worry about hair, at all. It happens, if it's not the dogs or cats, it's mine. I dunno, I've just never been bothered with it. The vacuum picks up most. Now that I have a dane it's the slobber, and I'm getting over that too. Luckily she doesn't drool much, only when she gets excited or eats.

 

[Smart Red]

So lucky, along the same lines as Penny being gun shy, when I first got my Irish Setter, Cindy, I came home one day to find her gone. Someone had taken her out of her pen.

I got a phone call the next day saying that a young girl and lost her Setter just as I had. She had offered a hefty reward followed by a call to come see the "stray" these people had found.

It sounded suspicious to her, so she went accompanied with a sheriff's deupty. Seeing the address, the officer told her these people were suspected of stealing dogs, taking them out to hunt, shooting any who were gun shy, and stealing another dog.

The dog they had wasn't hers, but she thought she recognized it as a littermate to her dog. The officer, telling her that "possession was 9 tenths of the law and knowing the dog wasn't theirs", took it with him and gave it to her after they had left the house. She got my name from the breeder and I got my dog back.

She sadly said that her puppy was gun shy and suspected it had been killed. My Cindy had never been hunting, but wasn't afraid of loud noises. That, and her reward offer for a missing Irish Setter puppy at the right time meant I got my baby back.

 

[Beekissed]

Man, people have gall, don't they? I can't imagine being that bold and devious and then thinking that I'd get away with it.

Hair happens, be it human or pet. My parents always freaked out about both and Mom still does but is getting past it more and more. I just tell her, "It's just dog hair, Ma, not toxic waste."

Different generation, different hang ups.

 

[Larisa]

We found our cat on the pavement. He was a kid and lived in a box near the metro. Now it is fat and lazy. But I love it.
My cat likes to sleep with me. Me - not. Every evening, I said to him: "Do not even dream!" Barsik stares me in the eye and go away. But when I wake up, it is always beside and purrs into my ear. Everyone says that the cats purring soothes the nervous system. But when the cat wakes me eight times in one night, my nervous system requires me to take a pillow and strangled cat.

 

[Nyboy]

Wow Red Your dog was lucky, that woman cared. Dogs are stolen and used to train fighting dogs how to fight. They are muzzled and placed with dog, that just tears them apart. If dog survives it is thrown out to the streets. kittens are used to train puppies. Man can be very sick.

 

[so lucky]

You know, I am not comfortable with the organizations that promote stopping the using of animals for food and research, the groups that say all animals have the same rights as humans. But there has to be some way of teaching people that animals are not to be tortured, used as bait to train fighting dogs, or bred indiscriminately out of neglect or greed.
While writing this I am realizing that my thoughts are a product of my values.
What is wrong with using puppies as bait if we use minnows as bait? We don't want animals tortured, but still it is OK to use them in medical experiments that are probably torturous. It's OK to eat cows but not dogs.

Is it all a matter of extremes?

Bah! I need a vacation from my brain.

 

[ducks4you]

@canesisters, if you don't want your animals on the bed, you Can retrain them to not do so. I know that everything that you read tells you that you are not being consistent by changing the rules from, yes, on the bed, to NO, off the bed, but dogs don't believe that you love them less or care for them less, if you decide to change the rules. If I go to bed before my DH, my two dogs jump on the bedspread to lay next to me. They get some petting then both of them move to the foot of the bed. When my DH comes to bed, they both jump off. "Rose" guards and often barks at things, and Pyg takes her place on the floor by the door.
Right now I am writing from my DD's house, waiting for a repairman. My dogs were out when I was stripping stalls, and they are now on dog beds in the basement because they have muddy feet. I tell them what is going on, and they accept it. Sometimes, when it's really muddy, they don't even get to go out when I do my chores. Rose even figured out that if she laid down next to the house on the cement, she wouldn't be muddy and wouldn't have to spend a couple of hours in the basement.
They are both very happy dogs who are told to Move when they are laying on our path. Pgy, especially, thinks that she is lucky to be able to sleep on the floor in the bedroom at night, close to us.

 

[Beekissed]

I agree! Dogs are just as happy and even more so, it seems, when the humans take charge and tell them how it's all going to go down. Seem to crave boundaries and authority when it's all said and done.

Even cats can be trained for such things. I had a cat that knew when to just hide under the bed until a certain someone left the room, to stay on the bed when other people came to visit and when to leave the house altogether when certain people came to stay. Didn't have to be told, just knew from my own behavior when certain things were acceptable.

Same with training cats on young chicks. Very quick learners, are cats. Much quicker than dogs. Folks just tend to humanize cats more because of their intelligence and independence but they can be trained for certain things very well because of that intelligence. I even had a cat that would round up the chickens for me and knew where I wanted them to go, knew when to stop the rounding up procedure and gained great enjoyment from it all. I could call him from wherever he may be, hunting out in the fields, and tell him to "Get the chickens back in the fence" and he would proceed to do so with great glee and effectiveness. Then he'd lie down and just grin at us all, as if to say, "Life is GOOD when you are allowed to chase the chickens!"

 

[canesisters]

@canesisters, if you don't want your animals on the bed, you Can retrain them to not do so. I know that everything that you read tells you that you are not being consistent by changing the rules from, yes, on the bed, to NO, off the bed, but dogs don't believe that you love them less or care for them less, if you decide to change the rules.

The dogs aren't the problem, they have a bed (nicer mattress than mine!) and they prefer that.
It's the cats that have got me beat. I've tried locking them out of the bedroom. They make noise (meow, bang the door against the door frame, pick the carpet, etc) till I let them in. I've tried yanking open the door and squirting them with a water bottle. They learned to RUN the moment they hear me move and then come back in a few mins to start again. I even tried setting up one of those timed air fresheners just outside the door so that it would spray every few mins and keep them away. They tipped it over so it sprayed into the carpet and didn't bother them. I've tried letting them in, but not letting them on the bed. We end up playing a little game - I push them off, they jump RIGHT back up - off/on/off/on/off/on..... I tried taking a small spray bottle to bed with me and squirting them. They sit on the window sill and GLARE till I fall asleep, then they jump up and make themselves comfortable - AND the water bottle gets tipped over and leaks all over the bed - NOT pleasant.
I've just given up. As long as they stay off my pillows, I'm ok with it.
Of course, that means that one of them MUST be on the pillow, mashed up against the side of my head when I wake up....