Bailey, the Buck mid night special

Wednesday evening 04-28-10, we lost a special member of our family, Bailey Frank Petramale Kliese. Bailey passed on to puppy heaven, a place where dogs are forever young and bones are plentiful.
Bailey's age has always been a controversy at every family gathering of the Petramale's. The only age we are positive of is that he was old and getting older. One time while I was at the vet with Bailey during a routine exam, I had mentioned how no one wants to ever play with Bailey any more except Bruce and I. The Doc explained that since he was so old, it would be like taking some ones 105 year old grandmother out to play and hope not to break her. I think It finally sank in how old he was.

It all started about 10 years ago when I met Bruce. He was renting a room from his sister in her house. She moved in with her boyfriend, leaving Bruce to tend to the dog and cat. Bailey
Frank was the dog and Tounces the driving cat was the cat. Bailey was what we called a "Buck Midnight Special". Bruce's cousin Ding had a old dog named Buck. Buck got around Athens, procreating younger versions of himself. Hence Bailey, a lab mix, the result of one of Bucks evening runs through town with the lady dogs.
The first time I met Bailey I fell in love with him and maybe Bruce too. Bailey was a slightly crazy dog with a lot of pent up energy that needed releasing. He would bark, run and act like a crazy dog all the time. Suddenly Bruce had to go into the hospital, instead of running between two houses, taking care of dogs, I brought Bailey to my house. My yard was fenced for my two dogs, K-K and Sasha. My only issue was getting Bailey accepted by Sasha or Cujo as I fondly called her. Sasha tolerated Bailey, and he was in heaven, running in and out through the dog doors doing laps around the yard. Every now and then there would be a cat chasing problem, but how else would I find out a cat can run sideways on a wood fence. I honestly didn't think something like that was possible but I guess with claws, it can be done.

Another one of Baileys issues was bolting out the front door. Every time we had company, they would open the door, Bailey would plow them over and take off up the street. Bruce or I would have to jump into the car and hope to keep him in our sites. If we could get close enough, we would attempt to entice Bailey to get in the car. Car rides ruled over anything. Bailey would sit in the back seat, head hanging out the window, biting the air the whole ride.

Eventually Bailey fit into my household of creatures as if he was born and raised there. He calmed down, the escape issues lessened and he learned not to chase the cats as much. He still barked like crazy at anything he could.

We had the opportunity to purchased the farm house where we currently live, we needed a bigger yard for our puppy's and this was the dream house we both always wanted. Now the dogs, have a 1 acre fenced in yard to run wild in.

K-K and Sasha are gone now, we still have Jake, who is 15, Max, who is 5 or 6 and Pumpkin who is 2 1/2.

For the past 5 years, Bailey and his age has been one of our topics of discussion. He's turning 17, no 18, no 19??? Who knows for sure? We are only sure of one thing, he was old and had a long, happy life with us. Bailey will be missed greatly by Bruce and I along with the lives of other people he has touched, licked and sniffed.

Pumpkin

Life has been a little crazy lately, more so then usual. Our precious little orange dog Pumpkin started a new hobby recently. Pumpkin who we lovingly call Demon, Agent Orange, Urchin, and Creature from the Orange Lagoon, Pumpinator, The Beast, seems to always find herself in trouble on a daily basis. We honestly don't know how she thinks up enough stuff to get herself into so much trouble. Maybe because she is half Beagle, very stubborn and a smarty paws. Pumpkins latest "hobby" or escapade involved her collecting eggs one by one and burying them, only to dig them up later and have a yummy snack.
Suddenly we noticed a dramatic drop in our egg production and found the chickens hiding what few eggs we could fine in odd places. For some orange reason they were afraid to lay in their nesting boxes. We found eggs all over the yard, upstairs in the barn, downstairs in the workshop, in a bucket, on a bail of open wood chips, everywhere. Not one egg was deposited in the nice nesting boxes we built for them. Then one morning Pumpkin went running up to me showing off the egg in her mouth. I tried to get her to drop it, no such luck, Pump ran off at high puppy speeds to bury her prize. Of course I followed, watched her bury the egg, and then retrieved it. This happened a few more times and then she broke an egg, discovering how yummy they are. That was it; the egg internment would only last a few hours then dug up for snack time. That short period of time in the ground must have added some special flavor.
It took us a week or so to figure out the tie between Pumpkin, the birds, the eggs disappearances and the daily egg hunts for hidden treasure. Pumpkin was stealing the eggs away while the birds were still laying them, terrifying the poor things, chasing them out of their nesting boxes. We decided to try an experiment, lock Pump in for the day and go to work. Don't worry grandma came up to let her little grand puppy outside for pee-pees.
That evening when I went out to pick eggs, there were actually a few more eggs, imagine that. Then pumpkin tried to steal an egg before I could collect it. I caught her red pawed, or should say saw her. The stinker ran off and ate her snack; after all she didn't have any eggs all day. Now we have only one choice, out came infamous "collar of shame".
Pumpkin is the sweetest dog on the planet. She charms kisses out of strangers, snuggles endlessly and has the saddest beagle face you have ever seen. But Pumpkin knows the collar of shame very well. In 25 years of having dogs I have never had to resort to the collar of shame. I hated doing this but it's either no eggs and a fat dog with egg breath or the collar of shame. She is just one stubborn girl.
Off I go to dig through my work kitchen drawes, find the collar and install it around the little orange demons neck. If looks could kill, I would have been dog food. Pump snorts, glares at me with narrowed eyes and goes off to pout in the kitchen. She is not a stupid dog, just stubborn and very smart.
The next morning, on goes the collar and we go off to do chores. I'm stepping out of the barn, guess who is trotting out of the chicken pen door, with an egg in her orange mouth. This time I've caught her red pawed! I give her the command to stop and drop the egg, no response. Then I use the warning beep on her collar, this does not faze or slow her down, she's walking off with the egg. So now I have to do it, a very low zap, she stops drops the egg and gives me the evil orange eye. We have a little chat over what she has been caught doing; she goes off to pout sitting outside the back door for the whole day.
Now realizing I have a huge problem of dog egg snatching. I hunt through the interned looking for a solution. That's when I come across a New Improved collar that responds to a transmitter. The transmitter is on the barn over the chicken door, the collar is on Pump, and hopefully this will work. She pouts then tries to go into the chicken coop, hears the beep and stops. Amazingly we have more eggs!