Lucy, the African Grey Parrot
Practical Joke Corner
Presented by Lucy, the African Grey Parrot
(written by Jesse Basler)
The microwave has started to cook some food. I had been studying the sound that the microwave produced when the machine stopped glowing. I practiced the beeping sound without the others knowing and I really wanted to test my ability and see if the sound was right. The person had left the microwave and went somewhere outside the room. I decided that the time was right to test my joke out. He can still hear the microwave from what I can tell so he can probably hear me too. I tried to make the sound as loud as the machine makes when the food was done and it worked. He came around the corner to go to the microwave. It was still going and he looked confused. I laughed as you do when your prank was successful. However, the person didn`t seem pleased with my prank and my laugh gave me away. Oh well, it was still funny.
Lucy, the Phony Dog
By Jesse Basler
Lucy, our African Grey Parrot, climbs down off of her cage and walks when her wings are trimmed so she can`t fly. She causes a lot of chaos this way. The bird believes that she is just one of the dogs, one of our Basset Hound pack. We have a bell hung on the wall beside the outside door so that when the dogs have to go out, they ring the bell with a paw or nose and we let them out to go use the bathroom or play in the backyard. The bird walked from her cage to the backyard bell and hit it with her beak. I saw her hit the bell and so did the dogs but like usual, they thought that the bird was being weird and a bit annoying. They left her alone. She started to scratch the floor. She saw Rocky, our boy dog, doing this once into his dog bed to get comfortable.
She watches Rocky and has tried to emulate him and become friends with him (or has attempted to make a minion out of him; that’s really up for debate). She formed a mutual respect relationship between Abby, our girl dog, and herself. Our dogs were eating at that moment when she climbed off her cage. The bird tried to take food from Abby once and Abby looked at her like, “What are you doing (*bird takes a piece of food*) …ok? You’re weird”. Other times, Lucy feeds Rocky with peanut shells and we have to take them away from him before his stomach hurts from the shell. After the food incident, she was placed back onto her cage and the dogs rang the backyard bell. We let them out and they started to bark outside the door. The bird had to help and barked with them, but she did it in the way that people bark, saying “bark, bark” over and over. She wants to be part of the dog’s pack.
Abby and Rock, Our Basset Hound Dogs
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Basset Hound Drama
Abby and Rock
The two basset hounds interacting and causing drama with each other.
Abby Silent Protest
Rocky upsets Abby in different ways. She uses a silent protest trying to get the message that he did something wrong. She goes into his crate to make a statement that she is annoyed with him. He loves his crate and so he becomes antsy when she is in his crate. He does not knowing what to do. He whines and looks into his crate, and comes to us for help. We look and see Abby laying there asleep or looking at Rocky. She gives him the look like you know what you did and that`s why I `m in your crate. He doesn`t understand most of the time why she enters his crate. It is his space after all.
Rocky Blockade
Rocky can keep Abby from the living room. He lays in-between the two chairs where he likes to stay. She can`t go past him into the room. She sometimes whines wanting to go into the room and we pick her up and over Rocky. Other times, she will go over and ask to go out. We will get up to let her out and like the boy dog he is, he gets up to go out too. Rocky comes into the kitchen and she slips past him into the living room and lays down next to someone. She wants attention and doesn`t want any fights with Rocky.
I Dream
You Dream
We both Dream for Dream Bones!
They have very sensitive stomachs and can`t have many different types of food. They both love Dream Bones and they wait until we are back for errands. We come home and the first thing that they will do is ask for their Dream Bones. They will wait until they finish their Dream Bones to go outside or do anything else.
Abby stands on the nearest object usually soda boxes to ask for her Dream Bone. Rocky waits and dances in anticipation of his bone. We give the first one to Abby who runs to her dog bed in the living room. Rocky receives his and runs in the opposite side into our family room and lays on the floor to eat his snack. A gate separates them and they search for more when they are done. Then, they will decide to go outside.
Duke's Story
By Jade Boz
Duke was the first Basset Hound who was only mine. I’d grown up with Bassets my whole life, so I knew what to expect. However, I didn’t know he’d get me through a divorce, move across country with me, and once even save my life. He became a bit of a guard dog, self-trained, and helped raise a Sheepdog. But, to me, he’ll always just be Duke and have a very special place in my heart.
Buying Duke:
I fell in love with the brown and white “puppy in the window” of a Mall Pet Store. They were kept in small cages for display and he wore the Basset expression of sadness, though the sadness seemed more from loneliness. My first husband and I filled out the paperwork to buy him, but since it was a Sunday, they couldn’t process it until Monday, when I’d be working. I hated leaving him behind. However, the next day, my husband brought him to visit me at the gas mart during work. I was so excited and couldn’t wait for the end of my shift. He was wiggly with soulful eyes, full of puppy energy and sniffing everything. After work, amidst much discussion, we named him Duke.
Divorce:
Duke loved everyone as a pup. His nose sniffed everything on walks and, as is typical with Bassets, he wanted to chase small game, so bunnies and squirrels were put on notice in our area of Illinois. My husband and I took him on some adventures. However, as sometimes happens, my husband and I were having many arguments and eventually headed into divorce. I know Duke was sad that his family was changing. I kept custody of Duke, but since I was working a lot of hours, my one regret is that Duke spent a lot of alone time because of me. When we were together, Duke and I consoled each other in our mutual sadness, cuddled a lot, and got each other through the tough times together.
Duke Saved my Life:
One day we went to Cahokia Mounds, a big plateau with many stairs and beautiful views. This was one of my few days off during the middle of a week day, and Duke and I were all alone. A man walking along the nearby road was staring at us, then suddenly bee-lined for us. His determined appearance made the hair stand up on both our necks. Duke, who usually would only lick someone, watched this man carefully. As the man took the many stairs to the top towards us, I realized I’d have had to pass him on the stairs to get down and away. This guy had no good in mind, but I only had my friendly Basset there for protection. Duke, however, never stopped watching. When the man took the bazillion steps to the top and changed course at the top to go directly towards us, Duke jumped up, menacingly to my surprise, and growled with his head lowered. The man saw Duke, stopped, and made up a flimsy excuse of needing directions to somewhere. (No one would take that many steps up, just for “directions”.) I told him I wasn’t local and didn’t know, but Duke never let up. The man asked if my dog bites, and I said he was protective of me and could. The man turned, went back down the bazillion steps, and went on down the road. No doubt, Duke saved my life that day.
Reggie, the Sheepdog Friend:
After months went by, I wanted to date again. When I went out with a great guy, and, a year to the day later, married him, life for Duke changed. My second (and current) husband had always wanted a Sheepdog, so we bought our dog a dog, a habit that went on with future dogs as well. Duke was older than this young whipper snapper of a pup, and he growled and refused to accept him at first. He made sure this young pup knew who was in charge. Once they went on walks together and we had to carry this young Sheepdog, Reggie, at times since he didn’t have a long walk stamina, Duke worried about him having to be carried and eventually became his friend. This began their relationship, the short Basset who sometimes walked under the much taller and bigger Sheepdog but made sure he was the “boss” from day one. Reggie was a gentle sweetheart who was happy to let Duke be in charge.
The Hedge Chasing Game:
They played the chasing game with my second husband around a short, straight-lined hedge that outlined the backyard concrete porch. Duke was short enough to run underneath one spot in the hedge, but Reggie couldn’t fit, so Duke “took the short cut” and often came out better in that game. Once, when Reggie was tired of trailing behind, he decided to jump the hedge. He leaped, but came down in the middle of the hedge, sputtering and spitting out bush greenery. Duke smiled, as if giggling at this, but still joined us in being sure Reggie was not hurt. He got used to having this companion Sheepdog by his side.
Cross-Country Move:
Duke, however, had other adjustments to make. As a pup, he’d been an “inside” dog. When Duke and I moved in with my second husband and then Reggie came along, Reggie was too big, clumsy, and hot to live inside, so they both became “outside” dogs. Then, within a very few months, life changed again. I lost my job, found a new, promising prospect several states away, and with hubby’s job in jeopardy of layoff as well, I took the position, less than a month after our honeymoon. My hubby later got a position where I was, and the pups moved to a new state with us. On the final day of our move, we found ourselves pulling one vehicle with the moving truck, which had very little extra room for two dogs traveling a long distance. So, being inventive, we had the dogs travel in the vehicle we were pulling, thinking they would lay down and sleep most of the trip and be more comfortable. People passed us, gesturing to the vehicle we were pulling behind us and laughing, which perplexed and worried us. We found a rest stop, wanting to be sure our dogs were ok. Reggie was sitting with his paws in the steering wheel, with Duke sitting in the passenger seat beside him, giving the impression that they were just driving the car themselves. This would have gone viral in today’s world.
Duke, the Guard Dog:
Duke became more protective of our family and tried to teach his amiable Sheepdog friend the ins-and-outs of being a guard dog and how to bark at strangers. It was really a lesson in futility, as our Sheepdog was happy to let Duke be the enforcer, but Duke gave it a good shot. One day, when a friend came to visit, both dogs were at the fence. Duke would usually bark, with Reggie a foot or so behind him, wagging his entire butt (his two-inch tale would wag as well). However, this time, Duke was quiet, looking pointedly at Reggie, as if to say, “you know what to do”. Reggie looked at Duke, realized he was supposed to “step up” and be the guard dog, so he excitedly stepped forward, glancing at Duke with a “is this right” expression. Then, Reggie, who was twice Duke’s size, barked excitedly while bouncing backward, like small pups do out of fear. Duke’s head fell as he shook his head back and forth and walked away, as if saying, “they just needed to give me more to work with here”. Duke gave up trying to “convert” Reggie to a guard dog at that point. Reggie was just not guard dog material.
Duke’s End:
Towards the elderly years of his life, Duke’s back caused him pain. He was a hunchback, a horrible position for a long Basset to be in, and he barely came out to eat. Reggie watched out for him, but Duke’s time had come. Then, as my husband and I were facing another cross-country move, back to where we began ironically, we had to admit that Duke would not be able to survive the move without a great deal of pain. To take him with us would make us feel good, but it wouldn’t be the right thing for Duke. After all the love and devotion he gave me his whole life, I couldn’t be selfish and put him through that. Just climbing in and out of the car on the trip would have made his pain unbearable, over and over. A few days before the move, we made an appointment with our vet, who agreed with our hard decision, to put him down. (I’m in tears now, just thinking about this.) I held Duke in my lap, talked with him and told him how much I loved him, and, as he licked me and gave me his final kiss, they gave him his final shot and I held him and cried. He died without the pain he would have had if he had come with us, but starting life anew again, but this time without him, made my heart ache. His love and friendship got me through so much, and as much as I knew I was doing the right thing overall, I felt like such a traitor. I know his love never faltered, when he was left alone years before, when he was saddled with helping raise a Sheepdog who would never learn to be a guard dog, when I changed his life so many times, and here I was deciding his end of life situation. But, I know that only my love for him made me make the hard but best decision for my loving Basset. And, I held him as he passed, and cried into his fur. He was an awesome Basset and a great furry friend.