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Murphy's Newsletter May 4, 2002 Hello All! Ok, I'm taking a break from my studying
to update Murphy's page. I have more than 150 photos of him,
taken between mid March and the beginning of May, so I'm not
too sure how I'm going to fit them all in here. This update has
been put together over the course of a couple days since there
are so many photos to go through! Really, this digital camera
We start with Murphy helping out with the laundry. Well, more "supervising". I took this, what appears to be, banal picture because he was actually lying down, not diving in and eating socks. This was quite the feat for Murphy! Below we have Murphy hanging out with me
on my couch. Murphy, as you can see, lives a very rough life.
How boring it must be to have to laze about on a couch all evening,
while getting scratches and hugs! Poor thing, I truly feel deeply
sorry for him.   
The two shots below show Murphy having some fun in this swimming/drinking/digging in the sand area that Murphy loves. Note in the second photo he's coming when called! We've had to do some remedial work on that, as he'd decided to get all independent and ignore my call. So, he was on a leash for every walk we had for maybe...6 weeks or so. But he's started to respond to me again, so he's had a few off leash walks in the last few weeks. He's behaving much better, and I'm much less stressed when he's off leash. Although, he did manage to steal the sock
of our 4 year old neighbour who we ran into down by the river,
but that's another story entirely. Never boring, my Murphy!
#1, above left: You give him scratch, he gets all hyper, starts misbehaving. #2, above right: Then you have to get firm, and explain that he's going to have to calm down, or he's going to get ignored. #3, left: Finally, to your left, you see how Murphy deals with scolding; with kisses. We go through this several times a day, lol.
I've included this next picture because it struck me as kind of funny. To me, with the way he's lounging on the bed, it looks like he's purposefully posed himself to look relaxed, yet alert...comfy, yet ready for anything. He loves to do this when we've just come in from a long day. He lies there looking at me like; "Maybe I haven't gotten permission to get up on the bed, but just look at how comfy I am! Why disturb me?"  But what's funny these days is that he won't go to sleep for the night with *me* on the bed. He'll lie there by himself, he'll nap in the middle of the day on the bed if I'm studying on it, but he won't settle down for the night on the bed with me. I can't figure this one out. So what I've been doing is just opening the door to his crate when I come in to go to bed. Sometimes he wakes up, gets up, starts acting all mischievous, I growl at him, he retreats back to his crate. Now that makes sense to me: he's been scolded so he's goes back to where he feels safe and isolated. But other nights I'll encourage him to come out of his crate, and he either gets up, has a drink of water, then goes back into his crate for the night, or he just doesn't get up at all. Even if I bring him out, put him on the bed and pat him, he eventually gets up and heads for his crate. It's certainly true that dogs think of their crates as their den, because Murphy clearly prefers his crate to my big bed, when it comes to a good nights sleep! Below we have me waking him up, when he's sleeping contentedly in his crate:
He loves sleeping curled up atop his pillow, frequently with his head propped up against the wire, his face all squished. Here we have the non-face-squish posture. Streeeeetching Then, when he's finally gotten the urge to come out and socialize, he's goes through his stretching ritual. Finally, he sits all squished up against the door of his crate, like his body pressure is somehow going to speed up his exit. Alternatively, he paces back and forth, sometimes making a "woo-woo" sort of sound that i take to mean; "Hurry your ass up!".  Mornings have their own ritual. By the time about 6am rolls around Murphy is up and about, and I get woken up by kisses. I've always just put him back in his crate, closed the door and given him a treat. Then I go back to sleep for an hour or two (or three, to be honest). The funny thing here is that Murph has learned the pattern. So now the pattern has changed. Now I wake up to kisses, start to get up, Murphy bolts for his crate, and waits anxiously for some treats. Smart dog. So that's not even half of the pictures I have for this update. My "work" day is coming to a close, so I'm going to end this update here, and start a new one tomorrow. This has been a very strange update, hasn't it? And that's coming from someone who thinks it's normal to have a web page dedicated to their dog. Who writes multiple paragraphs about their dog's sleeping habits? Apparently I do. Look for another update this week! Meghan
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might turn out to be more of a
curse, as now my propensity for photos knows no boundaries...
Next up, some photos
from one of our recent walks at Inter River Park. I love the first photo. I had had to return to
the car to get something...in fact I think it was this camera.
Allie and Murphy had stayed on the trail, but apparently once
I was out of site Murphy decided that he wanted to see where
I had gone. So they turned around and raced back towards me.
Quite the action shot! I especially love the smile on Murphy's
face.
This series of three photos demonstrates
a common pattern you see around the house with Murphy:
