The Fox Terriers Settle In

C'mon, let's play!

The dogs are adjusting pretty well when you consider the changes I have asked them to undergo. I'm sure they would prefer to still be in that large fenced yard full of soft, clean, nanochigger-free grass and have the leisure to poop and pee at will. I wonder if Harry misses flyball or Mimi misses agility class. I know I miss all of those things.

I've been trying to establish new routines with them. We go for a 20-minute walk each morning at 4:30 am after they eat and before I shower. Every day sometime after I get home from work and usually before their dinner, we go for an hour-long walk. Harry, who is much more tuned in to such things, is already starting to anticipate our usual turn-off points. I let them stop and sniff as much as they want on these walks. It is their only time outside the house.

I also try to play some fetch games with them twice every day. We do this upstairs in the bedroom because it is carpeted. Until I get some nice carpets, the tile floor downstairs isn't a good place for them to run. The picture above show Mimi and Harry at the top of the stairs, waiting for me to come up and start a game with them.

When I was in the commissary last weekend, I stopped by the meat counter and asked the guy if he had any beef or lamb bones. He brought out a styrofoam tray of these giant beef ribs with plenty of meat and yummy bits still attached. When I expressed surprise, he assured me that they had already removed the meat. I asked him if he could cut them all in half, which he did. Total cost: SR 1.53, or USD 0.40, for six large pieces of beef rib, about a pound. You can hardly see the bones in the photos below there is so much meat still on them!

Mmmm!

Each dog had their assigned half of the patio.

Post-dining stupor. Despite it taking up so much room in my E box, I am very glad that I decided to put this dog bed in there.

Sorry for the poor quality of this picture. When I was home sick, Upul came over to walk the dogs. Here's a crappy photo of him with Harry.


Here are some pictures of the dogs totally absorbed in our fetch game. Playing tug and fetch with two hyped up terriers at the same time requires quite a bit of stage management. Thankfully, each dog chooses a separate toy and I can toss them in different direction to reduce collisions. I never play this game with balls as both of these dogs are far too obsessed with balls to behave themselves.

Mimi chose the squeaky innard pouch from a toy as her choice. I'm holding Harry's toy in my hand as I snapped the photo. You can tell that both of them are poised to explode.

Here, Mimi is tossing her little squeaky pouch off the bed so that it will land in front of me.

Harry has carefully positioned the bear baby on the edge of the bed, crotch up (Harry usually carries these toys around by their crotches; Iz did this too), waiting for me to throw it.