There's a voice in my head that drives my heel

[lizblackdog]

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This didn't work the first time I tried it, but it did this time. Computers is weird...

Spike is mightily pissed off. His leg is all bandaged and I have to tie a plastic bag over it before I can let him out to pee. He refused to eat anything yesterday, and spent the whole day snuggling with Mum. Every time he felt he wasn't getting enough attention he whinged and grumbled like the attention-whore drama queen he is until both of us scratched his ears and his back and made him groan with pleasure instead. The thing that upset him most was trying to jump onto Mum's bed and missing, because he was still dopey from the drugs - he likes to make people laugh, but not inadvertently, he's as conscious of his dignity as a cat...

He isn't wearing the lampshade collar, for two reasons - one, he's perfectly capable of removing a bandage with the lampshade collar on (it took him a couple of hours to work this out, way back when I first brought him home - he trapped the bandage between the edge of the collar and the floor and pulled) and two, I've asked him not to fiddle with his bandage, so he doesn't - Spike is like that.

Oh, man, this is going to be a long ten days...

One more meme, nicked from watervole: Look through my interests list and ask a question about one of my interests - what it is, why I'm interested in it, or anything relating to it.

Comments

[niorah.livejournal.com]

Ok I think that's an interesting meme your friend passed to you, so I'm going to ask about ferrets, I have an interest in them ever since one of my colleagues got among the important staff of the Italian ferrets' lovers association or something like that... and she wouldn't stop talking about the four or five she has at home...

Have you ever had one in the house? How do they behave to humans? Do they have sounds or movements to communicate happiness or irritation like dogs and cats have? What do you feed them? How long do they live?
I find them to be such cute animals... If I didn't have a brand new couch and several antique furniture items that I don't want to be ruined by pets, I'd consider getting one of them little critters... :)

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

We had loads of ferrets - we used to rescue unwanted and lost ones, and we hunted rabbits with them as well. They never lived in the house - indoors in Europe is a little warm for them, and it would have been too easy to step on them or hurt them if they fell asleep under a rug or in the laundry or something - but we'd bring them in the house for playtime most days.

In character, they're a bit like kittens that never grow up. They love humans as long as they've been handled from a young age, like any other pet. The most common noise they make is a sort of quiet chuckly chattering that they do nearly all the time, like talking to themselves. If they're upset or overexcited the hair on their tails all stands on end - if they're extremely frightened or hurt they scream like children and let off a terrific stink from their musk glands - in the wild that would make most predators drop them at once.

We fed ours on dead day-old chicks and rabbit - they can eat cat food, but they're better on real raw meat. I've heard of them living as long as fifteen years, but 9-10 seems about average.

If they're happy and excited (which is a lot of the time) they bounce madly about sideways, chuckling like mad. They're fearless and they love to explore, especially small spaces and tunnels.

If you do ever decide to get one, get at least two - they don't like to live on their own. They'll also be healthier, less trouble and much less smelly if they're spayed or neutered. Unneutered male ferrets will stink and fight each other in summer, and unspayed females need veterinary treatment (or mating) to bring them out of season every year - it's a big pain in the arse.

They're lovely, fun animals. If the new place only had a garden I'd be getting some straight away...

[niorah.livejournal.com]

Thank you for all the info... :)
they do sound like a lot of fun to have around!
I think here in Italy they only sell them neutered, both males and females, to the occasional buyer, only breeders keep them "intact" so to speak...
Even my mum got interested in them after she saw her very first one a few months ago... :D

[grimprime.livejournal.com]

OK, I'll bite:

Bone carving: what is it? (Apart from the obvious of course) What sort of bones are used? What sort of designs etc. are carved? Why do you like it?

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

Two confessions: first off, I became attracted to the idea partly because it was a Cardassian thing (it's mentioned in the DS9 episode Second Skin - for lo! I am a Geek!) and secondly, my own involvement hasn't yet gone further than gathering together some basic tools and materials and reading up on it. This is partly down to laziness and partly down to lack of space at my mother's - I shall be forcing myself to do some actual work once I'm established at the flat.

The bone needs to be the weight-bearing bone from something large like a cow or a deer - I have plenty of beef marrowbones knocking about, and Spike and Squish are very helpful about gnawing off all the gristle, marrow and chewy parts and leaving me with lovely clean white bone to work with. It's a beautiful, living, material - I love the look, feel and texture of it, the fine grain and the weight.

More info: http://www.carving.co.nz/index.html and http://www.boneart.co.nz/

[greenmood.livejournal.com]

I'm glad your puppy is going to be okay. If I were you I would really do something about all the glass in that park. Write a letter... or something.

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

Thank you :)

Hunt suggested having a word with our local community policeman and I think I will do that - it might inspire him to wander through the park after dark and encourage the adolescent yard apes to go ruin their livers somewhere they won't injure my dogs. I'm also going to phone the Parks Department on Monday and whinge politely to them - I doubt that'll achieve much, but it makes them aware that there's a problem and it'll make me feel a bit better...

[mencc1701.livejournal.com]

I think I'm a compulsive commenter... I seem to end up in the top 10 of nearly everyone on my Flist.

[mencc1701.livejournal.com]

Forgot to do the interests thing: You have "wilderness" down... I didn't think there was much in England... lol.

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

Nowhere near as much as the US or Canada, no - but we do have some. I've spent time in the wilder parts of Wales and Scotland, and, more locally, the New Forest, (http://www.thenewforest.co.uk/) which is not new and large chunks of which are not forested...

[mencc1701.livejournal.com]

I see, that's cool. I love living here since there's so much wilderness around.

[kronob.livejournal.com]

I hope the pup calms down a bit over the next few days..hugs from the badgers :)

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

Thanks :)

The words "Spike" and "calm" aren't likely to be in the same sentence again until after he has the stitches out, unfortunately... but I may, with luck, be able to prevent his head from actually exploding...

[scifi451.livejournal.com]

Have fun trying to control Spike!!

About your interests: mind games?

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

I'm interested in people and I'm interested (somewhat) in game theory - there's nothing more fascinating than working out what someone wants and then playing with their head. Not in a mean or destructive way, but it's the most terrific rush to calculate something to have a specific effect on someone and then see it do just that. It's usually sexual in nature, though not always... the very best thing is to meet someone else who thinks the same way and do it to each other in an escalating spiral of one-upmanship...

[(Anonymous)]

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm? (G)


CC

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

Exactly. But you're out of my league, dear heart... ;)

[(Anonymous)]

I, fair one? But I am but a mere, naive, ignorant provincial... (G)


CC

[(Anonymous)]

Ah, I see I misunderstood. Thy comment was meant but merely to highlight my own poor standing and lack of ability in this field. With this I find no objection and recongnise the lack of necessity for my previous speaking... (G)


CC

[the-reader.livejournal.com]

Mythic archetypes. I'm fully aware of what they are, but I wanted to ask what your interest in them is specifically. And if you've ever wondered how come both the Greeks and the Norse had the legend of the Three Fates.

(Then, I guess they're both Indo-European, but meh. Some archetypes seem meme-ish in their persistence. Then again, I guess archetypes are memes...)

Drat, I want to buy you a copy of the Mythic Tarot now. Ever been interested in tarot?

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

I'm a mythic archetype myself... (http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=black+dog+legends&sourceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official)

Apart from that, well, they're just interesting. So many of them span so many different cultures - it makes me wonder about the origins, about what it was in the human brain that locked onto these particular things and made them eternal. That ties in with evolutionary psychology as well.

Tarot is on the long, long list of things I've been meaning to learn about for ages and haven't yet got round to. I have several friends who do tarot readings...

[the-reader.livejournal.com]

I was thinking, actually...the only references I could bring to mind were the black hounds of the Morrigan and of Hecate. It always seemed quite a Celtic motif to me - at least until I remembered everyone's favourite Greek goddess, of course.
Thanks for the links - I need to get back into myths and legends. Used to be the biggest Roger Lancelyn Green nut.

(And we had a black cat once, but all he did was dribble and fall off windowsills. Hardly occult activities.)

I became a tarot nut more by accident than by design...a friend got me to buy a deck, and they worked so uncannily well that I simply couldn't stop using them. I do occasional readings for an online tarot community, as well as reading for my friends and work colleagues, and, well, the cards are right a disturbingly high percentage of the time. I can't yet explain exactly how tarot works, but work it does.