Garrr and Poe

My husband and I got our first cairn terrier when my mom died. We inherited her five-year-old female named Skye, a Toto look-alike who was very sweet, easy, and fearful of plastic bags and thunderstorms. When she died eight years later, we got two more. Ten weeks old. Brothers. Adorable. A ton of work. Fearful of nothing. Unlike Skye who hid behind the toilet with an approaching storm, these two barked at their first experience with thunder. They continually challenge us.Cairn terriers are funny, curious, adorable, frightening little bundles of energy. They are not for everyone but we can't imagine being without them. There's lots of advice out there and if it works for you, great. Some ideas have worked for us, too many have not.

Prior to picking up our two brand new three-pound bundles of joy, I did my homework. I read the books. Not just one. No. I read seven books on raising puppies.

And this is what they had to say:

When you first bring home your new puppy, it will certainly have to pee so make sure you immediately take the puppy to the designated pee area outside so it will know that's where it should pee. What I learned is that after carrying your little one over to the pee place, it will stare at you with big curious eyes while you sit on the hard ground in the rain with your legs crossed (because you have to pee so bad) while you beg the little creature to do what page 12 said it should do. After a half hour you give up and bring the puppy inside where it will immediately pee on the floor. House training a puppy, we were told by the experts, is not rocket science. All you have to do is follow a few simple rules and your puppy will be accident free from day one. FROM DAY ONE. Of course at the very least, rocket science is understood by rocket scientists. There is no puppy science. No puppy scientists. A puppy will pee whenever and wherever it feels like no matter what book you show it, or what chapter you quote to it. You want puppy science. Here it is: "I gotta pee. This spot looks good."

Along with house training, learning to chew on appropriate items is another crucial element in your puppy's education which the books will tell you is easily achieved by going out and purchasing all kinds of chew toys. Your puppy, they say, will be content for HOURS chewing on these toys. I bought soft fluffy chew toys, hard rubber ones, some that are stringy, some you stuff with treats, some that are hard and squeak, some that are soft and squeak, some that don't squeak, some that roll, that bounce, that look like some poor little baby creature your dog will love to rip apart. What I discovered was that a puppy will spend approximately 1.3 seconds on a chew toy, about 8 seconds on a stick, and maybe 12 seconds on a plastic bag. It will, however, happily spend hours chewing on any soft, fleshy part of your body with its tiny, needle-like teeth.

Those wonderful store-bought puppy treats make teaching your puppy to come when called a snap. Nothing's more enticing than store-bought puppy treats. Unless, of course, your sweet little darling has stumbled on some yummy wild animal poop. Your puppy will come if and when it damn well feels like it. You might as well be trying to coax it with one of its worthless five-dollar chew toys.

Your brand new puppy is a puppy after all so of course it's going to nip. Not to worry. By simply yelling "yipe!", your puppy will understand that biting is inappropriate and immediately stop. Orrrrrrr, it just may make your puppy go crazy and come after you like a snarling beast from hell while you run away yelling "yipe yipe yipe, no no no, stop stop stop, eh eh, eh eh" (eh eh is recomended by pet trainers as an alternative to always saying no. I have unfortunately eh eh'd my husband on a couple of occasions, who I might add, has caught on much more quickly than the puppies).

A great deal of exercise is highly recommended by the experts. Some suggest walking your dog an hour and a half or more a day. I guess the idea is to exhaust your four-legged friend into behaving. If that much walking sounds a little daunting, the experts say training your puppy to run on a treadmill should do the trick. Okay, that does sound a little over the top but we were actually, sort of, half way thinking it might not be such a bad idea. But I just couldn't get past the image of the little ones running their puppy hearts out as my husband and I sprawled on the couch watching TV and eating ice cream. So I walk them. And walk them. And you know what? You cannot tire out a puppy. I, however, am exhausted.

One of the most vital things you can do for your new puppy is to sign it up for training class. In just a few short weeks, you will teach your new puppy how to be a well-behaved member of the family. However, don't be surprised if on "graduation day" your puppy lays spread eagle on the floor refusing to do anything you beg it to do as you drag it from test station to test station like a dust mop, turns its nose up at all of those yummy store streats you try bribing it with, poops on the floor, attacks the new foo-foo puppy coming in for its first class, and bites the teacher. Of course your little student will still get a diploma because you can't sign up for the $100 intermediate class unless your devil dog graduates.

Skye's Many Names

Over the years Skye developed quite a few nicknames. Early on Geoff started calling her Punkerdoodle Dog. That got abbreviated to Doodle. Which got altered to Noodle, Snoodle, Snoodler, and Toodles. Skunkerdoodle (after rolling in poop). There was Snoodlepus and Miss Snoodlepus. Puddles which got shortened to Pud. Snow Face and Hoover (after watching little tidbits of dog food tossed on the floor disappear as her muzzle methodically scanned the area). Skye Dog. Skye Bean. Thunder Chicken. Little Shit. Toots. Corn Dog (Geoff would leave one row of corn on a cob and Skye delicately nibbled off each kernel). Puddinhead. Pumpkinhead. Licorice Lips. Toe Toe. Button Nose. Bubbles. And finally, and very affectionately, The Nude. How she ever learned her name I'll never know.

Skye, meet Lola

We had acquired a bunny. I won’t go into detail how we came to have a bunny but let’s just say that I bullied a mother with two children who are now interested in the opposite sex and driving and not so much bunnies. I immediately got online to check out bunnies. Uh oh. Time and effort would be required. Along with a vet who deals with exotic animals. Exotic animal - give me a break.

Lola was much more cuddly than Skye, our Cairn terrier (Toto), especially when you held her really tight so she couldn't move or possibly breathe. The first few evenings we had her, she spent either in her cage or jammed against our chests which both satisfied a maternal kind of experience and protected her from Skye who watched her intently, drool occasionally glistening at the corners of her mouth. Remembering Toto, the word predator doesn’t come to mind. But Cairns were bred in Scotland to ferret out small rodents. We had certainly seen Skye chase after squirrels with more than playful exuberance. It was, however, only time before Geoff would want to see the two nose to nose. I agreed on the condition we each held onto one animal and after Geoff proved too permissive while holding Skye, we switched so that he held Lola and I smothered Skye. Their noses did in fact touch and Skye even licked Lola which Geoff found adorable and I assumed to be simply taste testing. I was hoping that this little encounter would satisfy Geoff’s curiosity but really, I knew better. A day or two later Geoff called to me from the bedroom to “come and see”. As I walked to the doorway I was not surprised to see Geoff lying on the bed, Lola plopped next to him sniffing this and that, and Skye looking like she was about to wet herself. Geoff beamed with pride, his two little girls together, no blood spilled. Yes, very cute. I couldn’t help but think of those predators who for whatever reason do not strike their prey unless the prey takes off running. The next evening, Geoff, Skye, and Lola once again retired to the bedroom. After a little bit I could make out some sort of activity followed by the hum of a fan. Someone had peed. Geoff later confessed it was Lola. Could you blame her, her only weapon being cuteness? If I found myself face to face with a tiger, I can imagine the bodily functions that would suddenly switch on.

 Despite the pee incident, Geoff was determined to take his social science experiment to the next level. Skye was in the living room with me when, to my horror, Geoff set Lola down on the floor next to Skye. Again he beamed as the two sat quietly checking each other out. And then it happened. The bunny took off running with Skye shooting off after her, Geoff scrambling to get Skye, while I tried to snatch up Lola. Fortunately for Lola, we didn't have our new carpet intalled (this was a new house we moved into before being completed - but that's a whole other blog) so that Skye’s initial few steps were much like those of a cartoon character running in place before making forward progress. Seconds later Geoff and Skye sat on the couch looking at Lola and me on the loveseat opposite them. For a moment all was still and quiet except for heavy breathing by all parties.

After a few days, I must admit I got a little cocky. Noticing Lola lounging under the dining room table, I left Skye alone on the couch to get a drink, throwing a few “stay stays” in her direction (she always looks so attentive when you talk to her). I turned my back, Skye jumped down from the couch, and Lola shot off – in Skye’s direction! Skye responded by crawling under the coffee table – followed by the bunny! I ran to the coffee table and then felt paralyzed as to what to do next, waiting for sounds of gnashing teeth and tearing flesh. To my surprise Skye immerged from beneath the table, albeit tail between her legs, and jumped up onto the couch next to where I stood. Oh my god, our dog was scared of a bunny. How could that be? Perhaps it had something to do with the previous evenings when Lola, being extremely curious and apparently having the street smarts of road kill, would hop up next to Skye causing me to let out a scream, flip Skye to my other side, and shoo Lola off the couch. If I didn’t act quickly, Lola would springboard off Skye’s back to hop onto my lap followed by more screaming and shooing. Then again, perhaps Skye still wasn’t herself since trying to jump through the glass in the French doors leading into the sunroom. In Skye's defense, Geoff hung the doors several months ago but installed the glass only a few days ago and we apparently neglected to tell Skye.

Skye, Our First Cairn

We lost our 13-year-old Cairn terrier, Skye (also known as The Nude, Snoodlepuss, Puddinhead, Licorice Lips, Thunder Chicken, Noodle, and Little Shit), to cancer several years ago.

We first met Skye at her place of birth not far from where we lived. We were in search of a Mothers’ Day present from us kids (Mom had been looking at a book about Cairn terriers) and although I was thrilled with the little exuberant puppy I saw investigating every inch of the breeder’s living room, Geoff was thinking the crazy thing running wildly from one spot to the next was certainly brain damaged. We returned home to ponder our decision, which took me all of ten seconds before reaching for the phone. I was too excited to notice that Geoff was quiet, noncommittal. I thought we were on the same page when I made the call to the breeder to give the thumbs up. After hearing several rings I was startled by Geoff suddenly yelling out “HANG UP!” just as the breeder picked up the phone. My confusion led to a brief pause following the breeder’s hello, and feeling the weight of the silence, I guardedly explained that we would take the new puppy. I hung up and stared at Geoff in bewilderment. He confessed his concerns about giving a mentally challenged puppy to Mom. As it turned out, Skye was a perfect Mothers’ Day present. She was creative (blowing bubbles through her nose as she submerged her head into her water dish to retrieve a treat mistakenly tossed in by me – which we later did repeatedly with great delight), independent (licking Geoff’s nose on demand but turning her head when I approached no matter how much I begged), adorable (burping like an adult male which cracked us up for years), and a perfect match for Mom who called Skye her “baby girl”, which by the way had been my position for the previous 38 years.

Like most dogs, Skye lived for eating and going for walks, and to our repeated surprise she was often able to combine the two activities. It’s amazing to discover how much food is discarded out into the street, which Skye seemed to find with little effort. I can’t tell you how many times we looked down to see an entire slice of pizza hanging out of her mouth, or a huge chocolate chip cookie, or French fries, or half a roasted chicken for crying out loud. And if she didn’t find a treat, she made one. Poop. We were not thrilled with her eating her own poop (or any animal’s poop – mention the horse manure sticking out of her mouth and Geoff will start to gag) and we did what we could to discourage it, running toward her yelling “Yuck, stop that you little shit-eating dog!” which would only result in her eating the tootsie roll turd faster as we approached. This seemed to amuse her to no end, given the enthusiastic wag of her tail and the number of times she engaged us in her game of shit-away. If we managed to get to her in time, she would run off leading us in some new direction, and then knowing how short our attention spans were, circle back to her pile of poop. On one occasion, she made two poop piles and had us running after her between the two mounds of joy. She even continued this game the next day. As the three of us walked outside together, she led the way, strolling off toward a field down the road. Suddenly we recognized that not only had this been the path we took the previous day, but that she was headed directly for those two piles. Still not sure if her intent was to revisit the day old dung, we started to walk a little faster to catch up to her. This resulted in her quickening her pace. We countered. She saw our counter and raised us. Now the three of us were running like mad and again she had us chasing her between the two piles. Let me tell you, if a dog is capable of laughing, when she was playing shit-away, she was laughing.

While most of our memories of Skye are sweet and fun, there was one fretful time when I lost her while on one of our morning walks at the golf course down the street from our house. The sun was just coming up, it was very cold, and snow was on the ground. I let Skye loose to run around as I walked the perimeter of the course. Nearing the end of my trek, I lost sight of her, and when she didn’t come when I called, I started retracing my steps and looking for her tracks. After some time I started to panic but then found some small footprints in the snow that I thought could be hers. When the tracks faded into the nothing, I started to cry. I continued to call for her and ran to the township office that we passed each morning just before entering the golf course. By the time I entered the small building, tears were flowing down my face, my hair was a tangled mess, and my nose was running without even an attempt on my part to wipe it with my sleeve. Somehow the women there were able to translate my words into English and immediately went out into the cold calling Skye’s name. I ran home, crossing a busy road with high-speed traffic, along a wooded path, and down our street, hoping to find her romping through the snow in our front yard. But I saw no sign of her. I ran inside and checked the answering machine. I was still crying, my glasses were frosted over, and I was still greatly in need of blowing my nose as I pressed the play button. The message was brief: Skye was found, a phone number was left. Excitedly I pressed the play button to replay the message and hear the phone number again. What I heard was:  “no messages”. I pressed it again:  “no messages”. And again “no messages”. Oh my god, I had pressed the delete button. More crying. I called Geoff, who had already left for work. I don’t know what I said. I don’t know what he said. I ran back outside and called for Skye. I started back down the trail to the golf course feeling nauseous and unsure of what to do. Almost back to the golf course, a car pulled out of a garage just in front of me. A woman rolled down her window to say that she had Skye. I had no idea who she was or how she new Skye belonged to me, although my ragged appearance might have given her a clue. Apparently she kept dog food outside for stray dogs, and not surprisingly Skye had found it and gone on an eating binge. I was overjoyed. We had our baby back. I found out later that a gentleman I had met only briefly a few weeks earlier while out on a walk had recognized Skye at the edge of the road pacing back and forth and coaxed her across that busy road with the high speed traffic. He was unable to get her to jump into his car but his efforts were enough to help her eventually come back home to us.

It is sad that we have lost her again with no one to help her back home. She was a good dog. We will miss her.