Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Easter Creatures

This is Fozzie Bear's Easter rhyme,
To eat our chocs it is nearly time,
Syd has an big egg and I have one too,
No way Sarah, we won't share them with you!

How come she says 'NO! You can't eat that!'?
It has my name on; from Bruce and Pat,
It's written with 'Fozzie', it's definitely mine
So if I can't eat it, then YOU can't have wine!

What stupid nonsense; no chocolate for dogs,
No jumping, no barking and no chewing socks,
See how you like to get told what to do
We say 'enough' and now we're telling you;

Leave us in peace, to do our 'bloke stuff'
Of sofa and football, we can't get enough,
I hope I will see the Easter rabbit,
Or wombat, or rat and if so I will grab it.

The country is crawling with all furry creatures,
And bald ones called snakes, who are dying to eat us.
Next door are living the Easter hens,
I'd chase them if I could just get through the fence.


But escaping is naughty and gets you in trouble,
Last time I did it there was a kerfuffle.
I was rounded up and I got a smacked bottom,
Outrageous! And proof that the S's are rotten.

On our big pond we've got Easter ducks,
But those ones can fly, and that really sucks,
They sit in the water and do all that quacking,
But when I get near, then they take off by flapping.

So my top favorite creature with whom to do combat,
Oh yes you've got it, of course it's a wombat.
They don't fly away and they don't bounce like Roos
Did you know, quite amazing they do cubic poos?

So back to that chocolate and those hot cross buns,
Easter's for eating And dogs having fun,
I hope that you all have a jolly good time,
And your humans behave themselves better than mine!


Happy Easter
Love from Fozzie Bear

Monday, April 25, 2011

Bali Dogs

The S's are back from their holiday. I have forgiven them for not taking me, as where they went was too hot for me in my winter fur. They went to Bali, which they said is a very nice place with nice people, but also with a lot of sad dogs.



I am glad I did not go and see those dogs, as Sarah said a lot of dogs, maybe a million (which is more dogs than I can even imagine) live in Bali but don't have a home, or anyone to look after them, or enough to eat. They never go to the vets either, which I think is good, but Sarah says is bad, and all dogs do need to go to the vets sometimes, because they might be itchy, or have been injured and need to be mended (like when I got a sore paw recently). The dogs are everywhere in Bali, and you can't even pat them because some have rabies which is terrible for dogs and humans, so that means they are lonely too because no one is nice to them. I love to get pats, apart from when they are from small people or old ladies, so it made me feel very sorry for the dogs in Bali to think they are missing out on even that.

The people in Bali are not cruel to the dogs but they don't have any spare money to spend on dogs because many people don't even have enough money for themselves. Some people feed the dogs but otherwise the dogs just have to find food for themselves. Sarah saw one poor dog who was so hungry he was trying to eat from a pile of rubbish that was on fire, and a puppy who hardly had any fur left because he had parasites and could not get rid of them just by scratching. Sarah said the strangest thing was that although she saw dogs everywhere, a lot of other tourists didn't seem to notice them at all, it was like they were invisible. Maybe because they are quiet, and are not making a fuss or bothering people, but just trying to survive, it is easy for people to pretend they are not there.

I have been thinking a lot about the poor dogs and what I can do to help them. I have sent some of my pocket money to go towards looking after them and maybe some pigs ears for them (all dogs should have access to treats and pigs ears.) The S's have also sent some of their pocket money to help the dogs, and Sarah says we should tell our friends about the dogs too, in case anyone else wants to help them. You can send any spare pocket money to these kind people at www.bawabali.com who spend all their time helping the dogs and other animals too. They send vets to help the dogs and make them better, and stop them from breeding so there are not too many sick dogs in future, and find homes for dogs too.

Syd suggested I should get my friends to sponsor me to do something. Perhaps a sponsored haircut or something. I said perhaps HE should do a sponsored haircut, and shave his fur off, not me! (He is nearly as hairy as me, but not on his head.) Anyway, then Sarah had a very good idea about what we could do. Or what Syd could not do! To raise money for the dogs, Syd could do a 'sponsored not eating chocolate!' Haha! He could not eat chocolate for the Bali dogs! Syd does not know about this yet, we did not tell him because we don't want to make him grumpy. I think he will be VERY grumpy when we tell him, firstly because he likes chocolate A LOT and secondly because Easter is coming, and we've got Easter eggs to eat! Oh dear, I don't think he would like this idea at all. I think Sarah should do something too, she thought perhaps a sponsored massage, like they do in Bali, if we could get $100 for the dogs, but I don't think she has the right idea do you? I think a sponsored 'no bossing' would be much better (although the dogs would not get money because she would not be able to do 'no bossing' for very long.) I am cross with Sarah, by the way, she went next door and told Bodger's human, Adam, that I had been tunneling under the fence and now they have made a plan to block up the hole. It is just not fair, I have not even had chance to chase Bodger round his own yard yet as he's always out when I go round. Spoilsports.

I am going to tell all my friends at the park about the dogs, to see if they will sponsor us. It makes me realize what a lucky dog I am, when I hear about those poor dogs in Bali, to lve in Australia, even with the S's. Only last week, I was in the park and someone had kindly left me 3 lamingtons on a picnic table. I ate them straight away. For any non Aussies, a lamington is a special Aussie cake with coconut and sponge, not normally for dogs, which was why it was such a nice surprise to see then kindly left out for moi. Yum.

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Sore Paw

I have been 'in the wars' again. Not fighting because I never do fighting. Just hurting myself. Syd says I am accident prone.... I can't type very well at all, so sorry if I do mistakes. My paw is VERY SAW, I mean sore. Last week Sarah found a lump between my toes. She pressed it and I did a big squeal and gave her one of my looks. This kind of a look.........A not happy look.





















So we had to go the vets. Do you know what had happened to my paw? A grass seed had gone inside my toes and made my foot all swollen, and so today I had to go to the vets AGAIN to have it taken out. You know how I feel about the vets......... mmmmm. I gave them a look too, just before I went to sleep........

Anyway I have to say that even though I am not keen on vets, and I feel a bit woozy, I am glad I went and let them take it out as my paw feels a little bit better. Grass seeds are evil, like Bodger. The vet says they can travel through a dogs leg and even end up in his kidneys. Yuk!

I have to wear a sock for a few days on the sore paw, just one sock though, not four, which looks a bit silly so I think that tomorrow I will take it off (I nearly got it off already, I am nibbling it when noone is looking). Now I am just having a snoozy afternoon. Actually I should not really be writing, I am not supposed to do 'any work', or 'make any major decisions' for the next 24 hours. That is what they said at the vets. I don't generally have any big decisions to make, which is lucky; apart from which park to go to for my walk, or which side of the car sit on when leaning out of the window.



Other news - Sarah is leaving work, and all her friends. I don't think she should, I am worried she might spend more time hanging round here. Anway we shall see. She and Syd are going on holiday without me for a week after she leaves work. Yes that's right, without me. But you know what - I DON'T CARE! I have decided it is good when they go away sometimes, not all of the time, but sometimes it is good to get a little break from them. And be in charge. A dog can have too many S's around the place. Angie Paws is coming to look after me. I think that I will be able to 'get away with stuff' whilst she is here, because she is very nice and never tells me off. And also because she cannot find my report card book that she usually fills in, telling 'tails' about what I have been up to. Noone can find anything in our messy house anymore; it is all covered in dust and the only food we have is dogbiscuits (fortunately). I think I will tell Angie that I am allowed pigs ears on demand, that I sleep where I like, and that I don't have to share my bones with Ruby and Gracie. And that I never wear socks.

We still have Ruby and Gracie and Neil and Anthony at our place, building us a new house - in between drinking tea and doing the crossword of course. Sometimes it feels like they have been here forever. They make a lot of mess, which means I have to have more baths because I get very dusty and itchy. You know how I feel about baths..... Also I had to have a special dogdoor sent from England for me which has to be put in the new windows. I will be in charge of supervising everyone whilst Syd is away. It is a big reponsibility. I will intruct them on where to put my new bed, and what kind of plants to put in the new garden (the digging up kind, obviously).

 Also I will make sure they don't fill in the exciting new tunnel I have found which has twice now allowed me to tunnel through, commando style (I mean by digging, nothing to do with not wearing underpants) under the fence to BODGER's HOUSE! Disappointingly, he was out on both occasions but I had a thoroughly good sniff around for him, and checked out his toys, and his yard; which was much tidier than ours by the way. Mind you, our yard has mostly been stolen, and replaced with a pile of rubbish, a bit like our house.





 After my tunneling adventure, I was only persuaded me to come home by the whiff of pig's ear that I suddenly caught, near the tunnel entrance on our side of the fence. I came back quick before someone else got it. It is bad enough sharing bones with Ruby and Gracie, I REFUSE to share pigs' ears. It was Ruby's birthday last week and Sarah bought us all a liver cookie each, but I accidentally ate 2 of them, so Gracie didn't get one. I felt a bit sorry that I did that, but not that sorry. I made sure  that I got all traces of it out of my beard before Gracie saw me, I think I got away with it.

I can't wait for my next excursion into the tunnel, but please don't tell the S's, I have a feeling they will not be amused by the thought of me leaving home without permission as that is NOT ALLOWED...... so it can be our secret. A bit like the liver cookie.

Sunday, April 10, 2011

My friends and Cleaning the Park





I thought I would mention some of my friends who I play with down at Elkington park. I am talking about my dog friends of course. They have humans as well, and some of the humans are not bad - I have sometimes considered swapping my humans for some new ones from the park in fact....


Anyway, first here is Prince. Prince is my age and he likes to play rumble with me. We play at bitey face and sitting on top of each other until we get very tired. His friend is Jack who does not really play. He likes to sit and destroy his toy or his ball, and he especially likes fetching sticks in the water swim. I can swim, I learnt when the S's threw a sausage in some deep water.....but I prefer to paddle and dig in the water. I like to watch the other dogs swim, and I really like paddling on hot days, right up to my neck.















Next there is Shorty the chocolate labrador (he does not taste of chocolate though). He is a great friend of mine. When we see each other, we do a stand off, and a staring competion, until one of us cracks...... Then we charge at each other and we really rumble until we get so tired we have to go and get a drink from the tap. Sometimes I win, as I am taller than Shorty (he is short of course) but sometimes he rolls on me and I get out of breath. He comes to the park early, so it is a good start to the day if I see him. He is not as fierce as he looks in this picture, this was an 'action shot'.

Next is Tigger. Tigger is the old man of the park. He is in charge of us all and he is a bit bossy. I usually see him at the cafe, on the way to the park. He howls at me and I woof at him and then we sit and wait whilst Sarah gets coffee. I like Tigger's human, Ted. He always scratches me on the top of my tail, my itchiest part, and he says I am a 'very amusing dog'. I think this is a good thing? Tigger mostly ignores me in the park but sometimes I can stir him up enough to get him to chase me. This is great fun!



















There is a gang of small dogs who also go to the park, and I used to play with them, but now I am a big dog, I like to hang out with other big dogs. There are 2 pugs who always follow me around whilst I am 'aloof'; this one is Wolfie.





Aso there is Katemba. She is a girl but I do let her play with me. She is very fast at running and everyone likes her. Another lady friend of mine is Frankie. I really like her - we play at bitey face a lot. Sarah says I have a crush on her, but I do NOT, she is just my friend. I have not put any pictures of girls on here.

New to the park is Dave. Everyone loves him, he is only 6 months old and wants to play ALL the time. Sometimes I have to run away from him for a rest and hang out on my own for a bit. Dave has a face that looks like he sniffed a bad smell or ran into a tree or something. Sarah says I should not make rude comments about people's faces and it is personalities that are important anyway. I think for once that I agree with her but I do spend quite a lot of time looking at Dave's face and wondering how it got like that. A dog should have a LONG nose, not a squashed one. I don't know how he manages for poking his nose into really good smells, it must be very challenging for him.



Anyway enough of Dave, he gets far too much attention already. Our park is sometimes very dirty because a lot of people leave their rubbish in it, especially after the weekends. I don't know why because I am not allowed to leave my poo in the park. I have to take it home with me! Well Sarah does...... Recently one weekend it was Clean Up Australia day, so we had to go and pick up rubbish for all the people who cannot manage to do it for themselves. We cannot clean up ALL of Australia as it is quite big, so we just concentrated on a little bit of it. We did not pick up other people's poo though, we draw the line at that. I was mostly wandering about looking in the bags of rubbish to see if there were any sandwiches (there were no sandwiches, only bags that used to have sandwiches), but it was still helping.

Monday, April 4, 2011

Fozzie Stats

Remember how I had an end of year review once? Well, Sarah has apparently been 'compiling my stats', whatever that means. It is review time again. I don't think everyone really needs to know all this stuff about me, but here they are.
Me and Ringo eating carrots

No of leg related injuries = 3(1 broken leg and 2 x grass seeds in toes, both requiring surgery)
No of times weed on a lady =2 (both times lady was wearing long skirt, easily mistaken for lampost)
No of times weed on a man = 1 (not at same time as lady)
No of times stolen food from strangers = 4 (lamington incident, croissant from baby in pram, broccoli from lady's shopping bag and putting of face in little girl's birthday cake in park)
Best thing stolen from S's =  a pack of strawberry shortbread sent all the way from Scotland
No of time tunneled under fence into Bodger's yard= 2 (that the S's are aware of.....)
No of gardening gloves eaten = 'we have lost count'
No of wombats and ducks chased = not nearly enough!
No of carrots stolen from garden = enough
No of bald men's heads licked whilst they were mending the washing machine = 1
No of Christmas cakes eaten = 1
No of times vomiting induced by the vet after a whole Christmas cake had been eaten = 1
(That was terrible actually, I will never, ever steal another Christmas cake I promise)

Me at my Saturday job
Ok I think that is enough!! I have been compiling my own stats on the S's, also interesting reading;

No of times gone on holiday without Fozzie =3, yes that is right THREE!
No of bottles of wine consumed per week= MANY
% of time spent moaning about builders= 80
% of time spent moaning about other things = 20
No of times told Sarah he had sushi for lunch but really had chicken burger and chips= 3

Right Syd says I have to stop there; I was just getting warmed up!

I used to have a report book filled in by Angie Paws - I got stars if I was good and no stars if I was bad. There were a lot of days with stars. But quite a few with no stars at all........ Anyway what the S's say is bad (trying to get Bodger by tunnelling into his garden) another person might think is totally fine. And what the S thinks is good (gardening and going round in circles on Tractor all day) someone else might think is the most stupid thing ever. Talking of Bodger, I got in trouble yesterday because of HIM. I was just coming home from my walk and I spied him under a car outside our house - I spied him before Sarah and I took off without telling her and then there was a lot of screeching and Syd had to come and help because I was wedged under the car. The bad news was that the fiend escaped. Sarah says her arm was nearly dislocated. I had to go in the house and sit in the corner and think about what I had done. I nearly had him, it was sooooo close.

Me leading my pack
Anyway back to my stats, I don't think it is right to judge dogs like this. I say, live and let live, which translated into Airedale talk means don't harrass your dog when he's just doing what comes naturally to him (chasing cats, eating unmentionables found in the park, sitting on your newly made bed with his bone which is not supposed to come into the house - actually I am not sure if they knew about that one, anyway never mind let's talk about something else now).

Me helping an old person around the park
 Check this out - this is moi on a label which was on a lot of bottles of wine the S's bought for Christmas. Apart from that silly hat I look rather cool. This is a good idea  - it is Goodwill wine www.goodwillwine.com.au - and it means you can buy wine for your friends and some money gets sent to charity. We supported Airenet this way which is a charity that helps Airedales to find new homes ( I might check that out actually....) Of course Sarah likes that idea becuse it means she can drink a lot more wine and 'do good' at the same time. She's not fooling me.....

Famous me!