Life in the Philippines

Another day is about over, and another work week set to begin.  And just to welcome in the new week we have special weather…MORE RAIN.  Rain here is quite different.  It can be absolutely gorgeous outside and before you know it, there will be torrential downpours.  Those downpours may be followed by a short sprinkling period and then it’s gorgeous again.  Of course there are days when it just rains and rains. Latley it is the night time when it pours.  It is a horribly hard rain.  You can’t hear the television because of the noise on the roof.  You know it has rained to much when even the Basset Hound won’t walk in the yard!  Yesterday she was in the back yard and squeezed herself up close to the fence so she could walk around to the front via the sidewalk.  The yard looks fine, but it is definitely decieving. One step into the grass and you’ll feel the mud between your toes.  I guess the royal Duchess doesn’t like that mud on her feet!   The no mud thing should not surprise me, I think she belives she is human. She’s still a pillow dog, loves having one to lay on and loves being right beside you when sit on the couch.Maybe the rain will stop soon.  For the sake of those whose houses flood, and for those who have no houses at all, I sure hope so.

The royalty of the house, Miss Duchess, has a new tale to share.  Actually this time it’s a tail. Her tail to be exact.  Mid week last week, we noticed she had been chewing at the tip of her tail and upon closer examination we found what we thought was a gash because it was bleeding.  On Friday, Rhoda and I loaded her up and took her to the vet. Good thing Rhoda knew where they were because I would have never found them!  It amazes me when she goes places like this, full of other dogs and strange people she never barks once. Yet, she will sit inside my house and bark for hours at the gardener who is here 2 days every week!

It has been raining geckos here lately.  Actually it has been been raining about anything you can think of. Just based on how much rain is falling it seems we are covered inleaves, flowers, limbs, fronds, coconuts, and yes geckos.  They are everywhere with the latest rounds of water from above.  This morning I went out the door and on my way back in I was accompanied by a very small gecko, probably not even 2 inches long.  Duchess saw it as soon as it came in the door and instantly went on the charge.  The gecko ran, Duchess followed. It was a humorous site to see a big dog follow a tiny little four legged gecko.  The gecko hid himself in the rug where he was camoflauged.  Sorry gecko, color does not trump a basset hound’s nose. She knew exactly where you were hiding.  But the gecko was faster and could get behind the furniture where the hound could not. Even though she could smell the gecko, she could not get to him.  So I assume the little gecko survived. After about 10 minutes the basset hound got tired of the game and retreated to her normal daily activity shown below.

I’ve mentioned before how much Duchess just loves have wild cats around -NOT! She barks and howls and lets the world know when they are in her space. Cat watching is her favorite outdoor activity lately followed closely by Carlos watching.  Carlos is the gardener and for some reason he and the cats are on equal footing with Duchess, she likes neither.

One night recently we went out for a short while and made the mistake of leaving the back door open so Duchess could go out if she needed to. It surely won’t happen again.  We returned home and Duchess met us with sad droopy eyes and that “I did something bad” look. We started looking around and I hear the words “bad dog” coming from the kitchen. If you read in the archives you can find Basset Hound versus Corning Ware and from that experience I can only wonder what was destroyed this time.Before I even make it to the kitchen I hear an expression with a less than publishable four letter word.

 I headed that way and was met by my husband heading out of the kitchen in a hurry.  His “bad dog” expression had come when he noticed a mess in the pantry floor and assumed Duchess had made it.  But when he walked in he realized the mess was honey from a broken jar. He thought we must have had an earthquake since the honey was much to high for Duchess to have knocked off.  As he was investigating he looked up and spotted a wild cat staring at him from the pantry shelves…that’s when the four letter phrase was heard and he made his way out of the kitchen.

What occurred next would have made a perfect funniest home videos if I could have gotten a good angle for filming it. The cat wasn’t budging, the human didn’t want to get scratched and be subjected to rabies shots.  Since the cat was way up in the top shelves, the human grabbed the pool hook on a long pole.  His first attempt to pull the cat down resulted in the crash of two more jars of honey, and a container of oats.  The cat came down, took one look at him and jumped back to the top shelf.

The second attempt cleared the shelves of cereal boxes and emptied a container of coffee creamer to mix with the honey but NO CAT.  So much for hooking the cat with the pool hook.  While the human plotted his next mission to rid the house of wild cat, the critter hopped down and slowly walked out of the pantry to the back door and outside….totally covered in honey!

Basset hounds are funny dogs. They definitely have their own personalities.  Duchess gives the yard guy fits.  She will move from the back of the house to the front just to bark at him. The vet was a total stranger when he showed up and she never barked, but Carlos is here 3 days a week and most days she barks every time he changes locations. She’s still on the cat hound chase.  As a Basset hound of course her nose knows if they have been in her space even if it was 3 days ago.  Every time she goes out to the front yard she catches the scent of them and just goes nuts. The cats hang out just on the other side of the gate by the trash cans.  I think they do it just to tease her.   When we take Duchess out for a walk the Basset hound nose definitely sets in.

It’s nose to the ground immediately in the quest to find those cats. She would not know what to do if she caught one, but she sure tries.

She doesn’t forget either. In the picture above, she is scoping out the pile of logs. The day before, a cat was hiding in them. She has learned all the hiding spots. And she has learned which ones not to bother with. If the cat goes into a stare down with her, she just keeps on moving. She isn’t wasting her energy on one that won’t give her a good chase!