I found my GPS!

Exciting news and I'm sure you all feel better for knowing this.

Back in January I wrote an entry about the case of my missing GPS that was in the safest of all safe places. Yep, January. It's now, what, almost the end of June and it's only just re-appeared.

Before exploring this scintillating topic further I do need to correct a slight untruth in the heading of this blog entry. I didn't actually find my GPS. I need to extend my gratitude to the hard-working cleaning staff at Bulleen Wash and Wax, or Suds and Duds, Clean and Spiffy, something like that. I had attempted half-heartedly on a few occasions to track down that hiding place of my GPS with no luck. Using The Force to find locations had been working thus far with no major mishaps. Now before you go and call me lazy, I have some damn good excuses (excuses - classic sign of a lazy person).

1. Usually my back seat (and rearvision mirror) is taken up with these two furry critters.

And even if they're not in the back seat, their dog rug is, which makes rummaging under the seats a trifle difficult and if I'm wearing a material that fur can cling to, I exit my car resembling a female version of Chewbacca after just a few minutes of hunting. So really, unless I was going to go hunting for my GPS naked, it wasn't going to happen. And I don't know the neighbours well enough yet for them not to call the cops on me.

2. Even though I've been living in this house for almost 5 years now, each time I go to see my parents I seem to accumulate another long lost possession of mine that they don't want to keep on storing and it ends up in my boot.

Anyone want to play, guess that object and its purpose?

There's many layers to the contents of my boot. And I did briefly start shifting things around to have a hunt around for the GPS, but once I realised that it has taken years of speed humps and vibrations to make those objects click together to fit into the boot I didn't want to disturb it further. And before you state the obvious by saying, "Why don't you just take all that stuff inside?" I'm going to rebut with, because our house is also full. The previous owners of our house were not storage idea geniuses. Who installs a set of wardrobes in a bedroom where the doors never open up completely to give you access to the shelving? You can either get to half on the left or half on the right, but never the entire shelf! Sheesh.

Anyhoo....

So back to Bulleen Vac and Wax, Shine and Gleam, maybe I should go and check my receipt for their real company name?

I can see the look of despair on the faces of the staff of this car wash when they see me pull in. I try to make the time between their tortuous task as long as possible, because I care about their mental health, but sometimes the fur just gets beyond amusing and I have to make the trip.

The Manager walks up, greets me, looks at my car, sighs, I make my best "Sorry" face and go and get a coffee while they go about their business.

It's amazing some of the long-lost objects they uncover. If the car-washing business doesn't work out for them, I'd be happy to write a reference to pursue a career in archaeology.
This time the Manager came to see me mid-clean with a message from the cleaners. "They want to know if your dog is now bald". Ha ha, very funny.

He then went on to suggest ways in which I could perhaps reduce the amount of dog fur accumulating. He suggested one of those dog harnesses. Yep, got one. Imported from Germany by BMW no less. He said that maybe I should leave the harness in, rather than pulling it in and out as the fur is probably falling out during that process. No worries, except that the only time I take the rug out is to come here for a clean. Out of ideas, he then asked how big the dog was. When I said there were two and one was 45kgs he muttered under his breath, "Well that explains it".

And indeed it does. I know how much I moult, and while I weigh the same as our big guy Ralph, there's a much greater fur/hair to surface area ratio happening. I just have my head, he's got an entire body of moulting potential. And he has the pointy sticky-in fur too.

So now a week on I still haven't put the dogs back in the car and I'm the worstest dog Mum in the whole world... according to them.

Just give me a few more days enjoying my fur freeness and then they'll be back in the car, furring it up, heads out the window, doggy grins on both their faces and I know I'll feel better having them back in there too.

Next time, leather interior.

Living with Nature...

The Good and the Not So Good
If you've read some of my other blog posts you'll know that from our little home on our bit of land we wake up to sunrises like this...

Marvel at the beauty of nature on mornings such as below...

Be amazed at the colours in nature when one of these appears ...


And other times just think, "Wow".

All which make us sigh in contentment and is a big part of why we love our little patch of dirt.

There are a lot of people that move to our suburb so they can experience old trees, sunrises, sunsets, rainbows and watch storms, but they forget what also comes with living surrounded by nature.

For example, meet Edward. Arachnophobes, I dare you to click on that picture to see it enlarged.

The irony of what we named this spider only became apparent after I'd read the Twilight saga (yes, yes, start mocking me). And also for the fact that due to the size of the spider we believe it's a female.

She stupidly wandered into the house one evening. Luckily I found her on the wall before my Husband. He has a shoe/spider reflex that would match that of an upset Iraqi with a certain former US President placed in front of him. I managed to trap her and throw her outside. Even though I can't bring myself to kill spiders (or anything for that matter), it's still a little unsettling when you throw the spider out into the dark and you hear a deep "Thud".

Now meet Jim. He's a 2 foot long Blue Tongued Lizard. Harmless. Really. Just don't go poking at him with your digits, should you value them. During Summer he brings himself to my attention when I can hear him at the front door trying to get in.

It's good to have a lizard like Jim living in your backyard. He keeps away the snakes. So yeah, watch out for those too in the warm months.

So now I come to the actual point of this entry. Our latest moment with nature is mice. And naturally there are no photos to show you because the little buggers are so damn fast. Except for the one we found last night lodged in the bread crumb tray of the toaster. Glad I didn't feel like crumpets. It would have been interesting to see how long it took either of us to correctly identify exactly what that burning smell was. "Chicken with its feathers still on?", "No, no, it's a more meaty smell".

In an effort to drive them away just by removing opportunity, our pantry is now empty of anything that they could possibly find appealing. Ok, now that we've removed the chicken stock cubes there's nothing else they could find appealing. Then there's the things that you just forget about.
Such as that personalised Easter Egg that you never got around to eating. Mice took care of that for me.

And last night, as I'm cooking away at the stove, my Husband and two dogs are diving around the house in pursuit of two mice who had decided to risk showing themselves in public. A Kelpie, Ridgeback x Bullmastiff and a man who refuses to be outwitted by a mouse make a formidable and determined team.

I have friends who say they couldn't live in a house knowing there were mice, but if you decide you want old trees, uninterrupted views of sunrise and be surrounded by nature, you need to take the good with the not so good. I'm still yet to coax my friend down from the ceiling after telling her about the mouse that kamikazed out of the pantry onto me before scampering away.

We haven't had this many mice before, but previously when we've had a few around, nature usually just balances itself back out and they disappear. What's the hold up nature?!! Ahem, sorry about that.

So why did I decide to write this pretty meaningless entry? As I was typing this up I had a mouse run out from under my desk and another jump out from the empty box I'd had my lunch in. It seemed appropriate. Hey, at least it's not rats.

I thought I knew dogs - until we went to Thailand

Hubby and I love our dogs.
And like most owners we think they're pretty smart and rather special.
I think Jack is pretty smart and Ralph is rather "special".

Yes, Jack is in this photo.
Just look closely under Ralph's chin.
You can see Jack's little grey nose.

As our Niece put it, as only a 5 year old can, "So, Jack and Ralph are your kids?". I had to nod and agree. Points to the kid. Jack and Ralph go everywhere with me in the car, they have their Gran's house they go to when we are away and generally they live a pretty carefree life and don't ever grow up.

This had always been my impression of dogs; an IQ of a two year old and were just always bouncy balls of fun who did whatever we asked them to. Perfect kids.

Then we went to Thailand.
There are so many reasons that we love Thailand, and their dog culture is just another reason.

The towns in Thailand have two different inhabitants; the humans and the dogs.
These dogs are not like the kiddy dogs we know and love in a country such as Australia where they are dependant on humans for their survival, but they are independent and adult-like in their actions, you can see thought in their eyes and can I say probably behave in a more mature fashion than many of the humans.

What I loved was that the humans did not control the dogs.
There were no Rangers, dog catchers, signs up about leashing your dog, fines if you didn't clean up your dog's poop, and why? Because the humans don't own the dogs. The dogs are their own society. Good luck in fining the dog!

They are completely aware of the humans but they co-exist. Not once did we feel threatened by any dog. They hang out on the beach in the morning enjoying the shade and cool off in the water happy to get a tummy rub off a passing stranger, then they move into the main streets at night and hang out at "their home". It seemed they each had a shop they called home and every night the same dog/s would be there. Sometimes there would be a sleep over where the usual dog would have a couple of ring ins for the night.

On a few nights you would have a dog follow you for a few hundred metres. You look behind and they would stop. Give you a tilted head look of, "I know I act all independant and all, but I can chase my tail and eat my foot if it means you'll take me home". And yes, I wanted to take them all home. After a while they would realise you weren't going anywhere they wanted to go and would head back to where they were laying.

We nicknamed her "7/11 dog". Imaginative I know.
Each night we would wrap up our leftovers and take them to her.

Have you ever watched a dog cross a busy road by looking left, then right and then left again? I was forever amazed at their level of intelligence. But I am blonde so maybe it is all about expectations.

Every now and then you would see a dog with a limp. He either forgot to look left again or he got bowled over by the scooter in his blind spot. All the dogs were very similar in shape and size so it would seem that natural selection had a part in which dogs have formed their society.

Credit also to the Thai's who treat these animals with such respect. I know there are issues with dogs being in poor health and no one to take them to a vet or provide assistance so there's always a down side. I'll buy that Tatts ticket next week and if I win, I'll quite happily move over to Thailand and open a free Vet clinic that can treat these dogs.

I can see the negotiations now for the dog in the photo above.
Dog: "So, here's the deal. Let me hang out in your air-conditioned shop and I'll keep and eye on the place for you. Fair?"

Here are some Big Buddha dogs on Koh Samui. Just trying to stay cool in the shade during the hottest part of the day.

In Phuket we found the dogs had beach territory. An invisible line that would mark their patch of sand. We sat and watched as a dog wandered into another dog's territory. Our automatic reaction was that it could get nasty.

The wandering dog saw the dog who's territory it had passed in to.
He lowered his head and walked slowly up to ruling dog.
They sniffed.
And sniffed.
And sniffed.
And sniffed.
We got distracted by the huge wooden crate that came in on wave - closer inspection showed it was from Indonesia.
We remembered what we were watching again and checked back on the dogs.
By this point they had started to run around together and about 10 minutes later both flopped onto the sand thoroughly puffed.
It was worthy of the comment, "Now if only we could learn to share our territory like that".

So to the Thai's and their impressive dog society, Love Your Work!
And I mean it about opening the clinic if I win the Lotto.
Donations anyone?