Tag Archives: animals

fear phases

All dogs go through what’s called “fear phases” – where one day they’re fine with something, but the next day the same thing could cause them to be incredibly upset and scared.

Unfortunately, Azzie was going through one of those when the fighter jets started their dog fights over the town. Too loud, too low and I now have a terrified dog. We tried to have a nice walk this morning, but the range fire coming from across the valley had Azzie in absolute conniptions. Frothing, panting heavily, tail clamped flat down, wide eyes and MOTORING forward to get back to the car where she felt “safe” but still carried on panting heavily.

She hasn’t eaten her food today (she did have her piece of chicken and her tablets this morning, and she’s still eating treats – but that’s it) and she’s listening and waiting for the next kaboom from the range. I’ve closed the balcony door (despite Gina’s annoyance) I’ve tried to remain calm and unaffected by the noise (as I did before) but now every time there’s so much as a thump nearby or from the range, she’s up and panting and restlessly pacing around the apartment. She comes to me, goes to Gina, goes to the kitchen, comes back to me. Then she relaxes and lies down… until the next thump or kawumpf. It’s just so unlike my brave girl, that it’s quite concerning. Even Gina was unphased by the noises on our most recent walk ( thought Azzie might need to poop, but she’s still too scared to! G pooped and it was good and she’s fine and had her tail up on the walk, despite the noises)

So I gave her two benedryl (they seem to help her relax – plus she’s been scratching because she’s been rolling in the grass) and hopefully they help her.

My poor girl. I’m trying to act like nothing is wrong, but this is so unlike her that I am feeling a little icky in my stomach. This is NOT how I wanted her to “grow up” and I feel so sorry for her. But I know you mustn’t coddle them when they go through these phases, so I’m just acting normal. Put some tv on, loudly, so it might cover the noises coming from outside, and I’m going on with my day. I was GOING to go out and do some errands, but I don’t want to leave her in a state of unhappiness, so we’re just going to chill today. Hopefully she will be ok tomorrow. That’s one thing I won’t miss about this place – the noises from the range and the STUPID FIGHTER JETS!

Quiet days

My husband and I have spent today waiting… the story of what we were waiting for is too long and complicated to go into, so I will just leave it at that. Let me just add: I hate bullies.

We put off a whole bunch of things – just in case we were called. It annoys me when people who should be more responsible about time just brush it off. My husband and I are very serious about being prompt and on time. Usually, we are early for everything.

But anyway…

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While we waited,and during the quiet hours of the quiet day, we played games with the dogs – we just finished a game of “find it”, where my husband hides some pieces of chicken (or any other “high value treat” that your dog loves) around the house, while I kept the dogs focused on me in the kitchen…

It took Azzie a few tries, but she got the idea pretty quickly. Gina, of course, is a seasoned professional at the search game 🙂

It’s excellent for their minds and it really tires them out. It’s great for when you can’t get out to take them for a long walk, or play outside.

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Gina is already in bed… our bed.

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Azzie is fast asleep here in the lounge with my husband and I. She never strays too far from us these days. These dogs really are “family” dogs. She started out very insecure – not surprising with the way she went from foster home to foster home – but she is growing into a confident, happy young dog now that she feels safe with us. I think she is realising that we are not going to send her to someone else. We are her forever home.
She’s come such a long way.

I would not give either of my beautiful Berners up. There would be violence against anyone who tried to take them from me.

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Strangers in a Strange Land.

I am an Army wife. I live on an Army post with my Army husband.

He is American. I am not. We live in Europe. We are both foreigners here, except when we are on our little “piece of the USA” which is the little post up in the mountains where we live. Then I am the foreigner. It’s a strange concept to me sometimes, but not a terrible thing. I like being different, and I don’t really need social interaction much, as I live with my best friend anyway! 🙂

If we were living in the USA, I think this would be more of an issue than it is here. Here, there are many “foreign” wives – wives who are not American, I mean. I have met many German spouses living here – so they are only foreigners when they are on post, like me – and I have met many Russian, Spanish, French, Italian and other European spouses. We (the “foreign” wives) seem to be drawn to each other in many ways. The language issue – not so much in my case, as I do speak English as a first language – seems to be the biggest barrier for making friends with the American wives. Another major thing is the cultural issue. Americans are very different to the rest of the world – it’s not a bad thing or a good thing, it’s just a fact of life – and this stands out very clearly in a place like this. They stick with each other and tend to gravitate toward each other in the same way us “Ausländers” do. Perfectly natural, anthropologically. Trying to explain these cultural differences is very difficult when you can’t see it in person. It’s little things and big things.

The unfortunate attitude toward family pets is the one that gets to me. It’s not everyone, for sure, but it’s an upsetting amount of the military/American population living here. They don’t seem to understand that dogs need space. Dogs need to interact with other dogs. Dogs need to WALK. Dogs need mental AND physical exercise. Big dogs need physical exercise, small dogs need mental challenges and lots of exercise. A large majority of the people living on this post (and I’m told, generally everywhere) don’t seem to get this idea. They seem to think it’s perfectly acceptable to keep a big dog (there are many Golden Retrievers, Labradors, GSD’s that I have seen/heard) in an apartment and only take them out twice a day to pee and poop. And that’s it.

And then they wonder why their Chihuahua is nasty and nippy and attacking visitors, or their Labrador chews on their furniture and shreds their socks, or their poodle is pooping on their bed, even after going outside. It boggles my mind that, despite so much evidence for exercise and social interaction as a correction for this, they just don’t see this correlation. It actually pisses me off. I offered my services, when I first arrived, to walk dogs for people who were just not getting the time (babies, half day jobs, etc) to do it themselves – but I had no responses. It was quite surprising to me! I wasn’t even charging much!

As I said – it’s not all of them! I know quite a few who walk their dogs regularly and take them to the dog park to play almost every day or on the weekends. But they are, sadly, not as many as you’d hope. But, in comparison, I know FAR more “foreign” pet owners (especially the Germans – they love their dogs) who are truly dedicated to the well-being of their pets. In fact, I don’t think I’ve met ONE foreign spouse here with a dog, who I have not seen out walking with them daily.

Of course the rest could just be inside and I’ve never seen them because they never get out! *shrug* I am open to convincing arguments…

The number of pets (cats, dogs, rabbits, you name it!) that are abandoned on army posts when the family leaves, is disgusting. It’s not surprising that the local rescue centres and adoption agencies generally won’t ALLOW Americans to adopt animals from them. They refuse. If you are in any way affiliated with the US military, they won’t let you even look. They’ve had enough of cleaning up after them. This is sad for the wonderful people who DO care for their animals and DO want to make a difference.

The reason I am ranting away is because recently we have been trying to catch a stray dog running around on post. Initially I thought it was a friend’s dog, but thankfully, he is safe and sound still. So this big, stray dog (and he’s most likely a mountain dog, like mine) has been “loose” for about 2 weeks or more now. Sightings have him looking thin, bedraggled, matted and dirty… and very scared. 2 Weeks and there have been no posters put up (and you CAN get permission for a lost dog poster) nor any postings on the local animal support websites or Facebook pages (and there are quite a few) and the MPs have only now gotten involved because someone actually piped up and said she’d seen him digging in the garbage and was worried for the poor boy and she posted this on our local animal support site. So now that more eyes are involved, the search and rescue operation is now in full effect. But, TWO WEEKS? How can any caring soul have just done NOTHING when their dog went missing? They could have told neighbours to be on the look out, or told the MPs, or asked for an email to be sent to their unit to keep an eye out.

If it was intentionally left out, so they didn’t have to deal with the cost of flying him/her home to the US, what does that say about them? How does a HUMAN BEING make a conscious decision to just abandon a trusting, loyal dog? Or their cats (so many are just left in the buildings, or in the stairwells, or just kicked out into the cold completely) and even rabbits? German animal shelters are no-kill shelters. Surely they could have tried taking the dog to one? The Germans won’t refuse any animals if they have space. If they are full, they suggest somewhere else. They _love_ their animals and they are RESPONSIBLE for them through their whole lives. There’s a sad lacking of that in the military community. Everything seems to be disposable. And that’s very sad, to me.

Once again, it’s not all of them – but it’s a scarily large number and it breaks my heart. It gives the good military people (and that’s 90%, seriously) such a bad reputation and it makes things difficult for them to do any good.

Ok. Rant over.

I just needed to get that off my chest.

My thanks to all my friends (foreign and “domestic”) who love and care for their animals – AND other people’s animals – and are trying to do the right thing, always.

I hope we can catch this poor bedraggled pooch before it’s too late.