I think it's time for an update on the Generals. The boys have been growing up admirably in some ways, not so admirably in others. Let's start with the bad first.
Custer has been feeling his oats. He's determined to wrest the position of Alpha Male from Sherman. There have been some knock-down, drag-out battles between them. Think bears fighting on their hind legs, with plenty of biting and swipes with their front paws, just on a smaller scale. I'm no lightweight, but I had to give up trying to separate them phyically. I've had to resort to the spritzer to get them apart. It's sad.
Sherman sleeps most of his days. But when I go out and come back, with his brothers squestered elsewhere (more of that anon), he gets animated and wrestles with me like back in the day. He's so smart that he knows we run no risks of Custer trying to impose his will on us since he's locked up. Today, for example, he and I played for a good ten minutes until he got winded.
Custer, for all his pretentions to the throne, is a bedwetter and a covert pooper. If I leave him out, the odds are even that I'll come home to a load deposited in a couple of select places in the family room. I've had to cordon off the living room to try and keep that safe. Once in awhile I'll bring the galoot down in the basement with me, but that engenders a host of other issues. On our way up the stairs, Cus thinks that it's play time. As I get to the landing, he jumps up on me as if to play. I push him down with my knee, but it's difficult, especially if I'm carrying something.
There are times when Stonewall is trying to play with him in his inimitable style, which entails grabbing onto Cus' jowls and pulling -- hard -- and I go after Stonewall to get him to stop it. Cus, not realizing I'm trying to protect him, thinks it's time to play and jumps on me. Again, that just makes everything more difficult.
But Custer's biggest surprise for us involved the fireplace. It was always my impression that animals feared fire. Not Custer. He's already demonstrated that he has no fear of the water, having jumped into Lake Michigan, but now he's quite comfortable sticking himself as close to the fireplace as possible. I have to block him off so I can build the fire in the first place, and if I go near it to stoke it, he comes to help me. Once the fire is roaring, he'll lie down in front of it with his snout inches from the safety grating. With his flatulence problem, Karen and I joke that if he ever lets one loose while in front of a fire, he'll incinerate us.
As fearless as he is of the elements, he's that scared by sound. Yesterday I clanged the dog bowls together and Custer ran with his powder-puff tail tucked in tightly.
Perhaps the funniest thing that Cus does is follow reflections. Karen's cousin Robert first discovered that Cus followed the light made by a flashlight. He'd twirl the light on the floor and Custer turned round and round chasing the light. The other night I was reading a book, unaware that the glossy book jacket reflected light from the lamp on the ceiling. As I turned the book in my hands, Custer would chase the light on the ceiling.
Stonewall is now taller than his brothers, but he's not filling out. Karen says he's a lower grade bulldog. He's very energetic and fast as a whippet, but he's slowly learning how to behave. He still piddles when my back is turned. But now he and I roughhouse the way I do with his older brothers, and he's catching on as to how hard he can bite my hands. He's every bit as affectionate as he always was, and he is beginning to understand that he's the lowest man on the totem pole.
The funny thing is when we're watching television and a dog barks in a scene on a show. Both Stoney and Cus go nuts looking for the dog. Stoney barks, Cus mewls. When the doorbell rings in a scene, the three of them run to the front door.
It makes me sad when people are cruel to pets. I can understand putting down a rabid dog or a violent animal, but when the harmless and reliant pets have done nothing, being subjected to man's inhumanity is unforgivable. Were anyone to hurt one of our boys, I'd lose my mind.
(c) 2013 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles
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