RUMINATIONS...
by BoxerKate
On May 8th, a new litter of
beautiful brindle boxers made its appearance at my house. Although it's not the first time
I've experienced this delight, things are different the second time around. This time,
mama underwent a c-section, and as a result, she's decided that certain rights accrue to
her that didn't apply with litter number one.
Can I have another pillow for my head?
|
I hope that no one will
take offense when I say that I consider my foundation bitch, Hedy, to be a charter member
of the spoiled rotten bitch club. Clever and intuitive, she does things her own way --
where she wants and when she wants. Runs rings around her human ma, that's for sure.
I know she likes her pups, but
it's become clear that she likes her freedom better. It seems that she's been taking what
she apparently considers to be a well deserved vacation after having given birth for the
second time. (How many of us get vacations of two year's duration, then work for a week,
and decide it's time to take off again? At any rate, the whelping box doesn't catch her
fancy as it once did.
Reclining on the carpet in
front of the bay window, Hedy does a heck of an impression of a bathing beauty at spring
break; her figure's absolutely wonderful -- back in shape already, with her waist
My figure is back!
|
restored, she resembles
your average college girl catchin' the rays on an expanse of pink sand. No wonder she
prefers this activity to the call of duty. Would you choose boot camp over Camp Daytona
Beach? Heck, no. And as I said, she's a bright, inventive girl who knows how to get what
she wants.
This second
"hands-on" litter has provided me all sorts of lessons previously unlearned. For
example, if you put your index finger in a puppy's mouth, there exists in the interior
such force of suction that it is not possible to remove said finger without consent of the
puppy and, in fact, it is possible to dangle said puppy a foot above the whelping box as
if it were a Christmas ornament.
Supplementing puppies forges a
bond with the supplementer such that, when the feeding machine lifts the puppy out of its
box, said puppy will immediately commence slurping and sucking noises in preparation for
nipple insertion. Even if the feeder has no intention of nourishing at present, but wishes
only to clean up newspapers or rearrange bedding, subject pups care not at all for the
feeding machine's purpose. THEIR purpose is clear, and mine be damned.
A corollary to the above
described event involves those times when the feeding machine actually DOES provide a
nipple backed up with warm Esbilac and goat's milk. It came as a bolt of lightning to this
feeder when she realized that not only could she mimic the mother's provision of edible
material, but she could also copy its method of eventual disposal. One has but to tickle
the subject pup somewhere near its hind end and VOILA! excretions of more than one kind
appear, sometimes even in tandem! In fact, performing this function became requisite, as
the actual mama seems to have abdicated clean up detail right along with her nursing
duties. Hedy seems to be saying "If you're gonna fill the children up...don't forget
to empty them!
Now... wonder what she thinks
I should do with the empties?
