The Whippet Parlour Blog - The Whippet Parlour

How to sleep well : Part 2

9/15/2013

Masters' story :
When still a puppy, Charlie woke us up at any time in the night (preferably between 2 and 4 in the morning) with a few desperate barks. Two flights of stairs above (old houses have their charms ... and their failings), we pretended nothing had happened.

Ten barks later, we were not pretending any more.

So, what was the matter ? Charlie was found, scolding his blanket which had been scratched into a huge and messy ball.

And that's when I did the worst mistake ever : I scolded him and unfolded the blanket to cover him !

(Never, ever do that : buy ear plugs or even a helmet but beware of the Depressed Whippet ! )

Charlie's story :
Bad Blanket --> Charlie Bad Sleep --> Bark --> Bark --> Bark --> Slave Master comes (looks awful ... maybe because of her Bad Blanket too...) --> Masters scolds Bad Blanket --> Good Master --> Make Nice Blanket --> Charlie Good Sleep.

Today, Charlie is supposed to be an adult. Does he behave so ? ... You can guess.
Especially when it's a bit chilly at night, he gets on everyone nerves.
We tried to dress him with old sweater : scratch - scratch - scratch, he could scratch his back skin off if we let him do so !
We thought of buying him a cosy cave - seems to work wonders on whippets but : Ouch ! Just look at the price tag (this is the down-shifting Mrs Scrooge speaking !)

Here is thus our 50 pence cosy cave (made with an old patched army blanket and some strings) - it seems to work fine so far for the masters've been sleeping well !

(Click on the pics to enlarge them)

A little bit of sewing...

9/3/2013

One more...which is for a very sweet British blue gentleman called Banjo.
The making :

The result :

Wild Garden

8/29/2013

Sexy cows in Kazakhstan

8/22/2013

One of our neighbours

Here is "Camomille", a really nice name for an angry cow.

Camomille is a specimen of the Aubrac Cattle. She is a very sexy cow like all her sisters indeed : her long dark lashes gives her a languid look and her furry ears look so cosy (must make wonderful sleepers !)

But as every sexy being on earth, these cows are not so easy to get along with.
They are definitely not afraid of anything and they like charging at people, dogs, wolves, etc. That's why a herd has been sent lately to freely graze in the Kazakhstan plains - they are big girls that can deter any ferocious animal (the Aubrac bulls tend to be somewhat duller - and nicer though they look like a cross-breed between Attila and Genghis Khan ...)

However, our playful pack and this willful herd have been charging at eachother for a couple of days (which means : painful adrenaline shots for us and a terribly good fun for the whippets...hopefully, the fence can resist those long and sharp horns) and now, they seem to get used to each other ... a little...

The cows have been extremely hard to approach until yesterday when one of them appreciated some strokes and a few cross-breed calves (mixed with Charolais bulls) even enjoyed drinking directly from the watering can !
Lovely moment...

(Just click on the pics below to enlarge them...and learn how to drown a cow !)

How to sleep well

8/19/2013

Rule 1 :
Find a nice and soft spot with many cushions if possible.

Rule 2 :
Take something you can really trust : a toy, a bone, anything reliable.

Rule 3 :
Take something sweet smelling : your master's underwears, socks, scarf, anything that you can burrow your nose in.

Rule 4 :
Adopt a suitable sleeping position - many are available and are equally healthy.

The rules in pictures (click on it) :

Ball Forever

8/3/2013

Soundtrack :
This ball is a very defiant one which implies :
a lot of barking and growling in mid air.

Charlie has always been a great speaker. To teach him to be quiet, the so-called great trick was to make him lie down - for a dog cannot supposedly bark in such a posture...Ah ah !! Too bad for us, for Charlie can bark in any positions !!

Sleeping Beauty Castle

7/24/2013

At home :

Dozing has become Rule Number One ...
The masters and the whippies alike are overwhelmed by a whirlwind piece of news.
As a consequence, we are all sleeping to anticipate the arrival of a 4th (hairless) playmate in a few months if everything goes well...

Lonesome Dove

7/15/2013

Six wonderful neighbours kept us company for a month, they left two days ago which was sad enough to write a post in honour of them.

Hearing them fully galloping through this large field to meet a fellow pilgrim donkey made us travel to Lonesome Dove - this Pulitzer Prize Winning western novel written by Larry McMurtry ...

A gorgeous colt and a shy filly were the pride of the herd - they loved having their muzzle rubbed. Their father was a daring (and staring) stallion which loved staring at the pack and made them bark out of their wits.

Stubbornness

7/12/2013

Definition :
A steadfast adherence to an opinion, purpose, or course of action in spite of
reason, arguments, or persuasion.

People who live with whippets tend to become like whippets, that is to say : WILLFUL (a nicer way of putting it...)

We are stubborn - though Charlie comes first - and our vegetable garden is at an altitude of more than 1000 meters, and we do love gardening.

Do tomatoes grow at such an altitude ?
No, unless you fancy eating tomato's leaves.

Do melons grow ?
No, but they make really nice and organic balls for the dogs.

Anyway, squatting among our tiny vegetables, we labor hard everyday in what seems to be the utmost fashionable place to poo according to the whippets (the fence is just making it more desirable...)

At least, we can have strawberries : two pounds a day... it's the only thing we can eat from the garden at the moment (that's a depressing thought) but we are puntiliously eating them, all of them ! (Is that a case of stubbornness ?)

A Cute Pilgrim

7/6/2013

We live on the Way of St James and we can see pilgrims walking eagerly, or dreamily, on two feet, or on four (with two walking sticks - very fashionable at the moment), some start the Way at an early age (and are happily babbling in their pushchair while their parents wonder why they've left their cosy home to walk under that rain), other have waited almost a century before starting it...

Some knock on the door for some water, for some help or just maybe to talk to natives (which we are not ! We've understood that you need to have at least 3 generations registered at the local church to dare say you belong to this place otherwise, you're just a tourist...)

For this reason, we feel a lot of compassion with them.

Here is a very shy pilgrim who knows what "Slow Tourism" means, we've baptized him 'Slowy'.

'Slowy' not liking very much being photographed...

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