Greyhounds have unerring internal clocks. And they love routine. They were born to routine. They were raised with routine and they spent the majority of their adult life up to the point they joined their forever homes living in a comfortable routine.
Woe is you if you don’t continue to provide them with a semblance of routine. Actually, I take that back. If you don’t continue to provide them with a semblance of routine, no problem. They’ll provide one for you.
In their racing life, Blue and Girly Girl, the two furry loves of my life, would rise very early. They would be fed, taken out and then they would go back into their crate, or, more than likely, they would go for training or to the race track for pre-race activities.
In Mumma’s world, there is a lot of sleeping in whenever it can be managed. Except that now, I have two furry alarm clocks. At 5:45 am sharp, every morning, Girly Girl’s cold, wet, nose pokes its way under the covers to announce it’s time to get up. Thus begins a round of pleading (yes, pleading) with my dog for 30 more minutes to sleep. She will lie down beside the bed and give me 15 more minutes to sleep. Then she will get very close to my ear and begin whining. Soon Blue joins her with his dragon breath.
I begin pleading again. “Come on guys, just 10 more minutes. Then I’ll get up and get you breakfast. I’ll even give you extra.” That sometimes works. I get 10 extra minutes. But no more. Some mornings I may wheedle up to 30 minutes extra out of them and sometimes no more than 15 minutes. But there comes a time when they will not leave the side of the bed and I know it is time to get up.
There is a similar process at 5:30p when it is time to quit work (I work from home). And I have to promise my life away in order to work any extra time. Another process to keep me in line about their lunch time snack, and their dinnertime. They herd me around all day long. But if they seem a little obsessive compulsive, you can’t blame them. It’s just the way they were raised. Schedule = good. Chaos = bad.
More than once they’ve saved my bacon when my less than reliable alarm clock did not go off. But more than once I’ve seriously considered whether a beagle or a miniature schnauzer might have been a better choice when that nose came poking in at 5:45 am. “Come on guys! It’s SATURDAY!!!”
Woe is you if you don’t continue to provide them with a semblance of routine. Actually, I take that back. If you don’t continue to provide them with a semblance of routine, no problem. They’ll provide one for you.
In their racing life, Blue and Girly Girl, the two furry loves of my life, would rise very early. They would be fed, taken out and then they would go back into their crate, or, more than likely, they would go for training or to the race track for pre-race activities.
In Mumma’s world, there is a lot of sleeping in whenever it can be managed. Except that now, I have two furry alarm clocks. At 5:45 am sharp, every morning, Girly Girl’s cold, wet, nose pokes its way under the covers to announce it’s time to get up. Thus begins a round of pleading (yes, pleading) with my dog for 30 more minutes to sleep. She will lie down beside the bed and give me 15 more minutes to sleep. Then she will get very close to my ear and begin whining. Soon Blue joins her with his dragon breath.
I begin pleading again. “Come on guys, just 10 more minutes. Then I’ll get up and get you breakfast. I’ll even give you extra.” That sometimes works. I get 10 extra minutes. But no more. Some mornings I may wheedle up to 30 minutes extra out of them and sometimes no more than 15 minutes. But there comes a time when they will not leave the side of the bed and I know it is time to get up.
There is a similar process at 5:30p when it is time to quit work (I work from home). And I have to promise my life away in order to work any extra time. Another process to keep me in line about their lunch time snack, and their dinnertime. They herd me around all day long. But if they seem a little obsessive compulsive, you can’t blame them. It’s just the way they were raised. Schedule = good. Chaos = bad.
More than once they’ve saved my bacon when my less than reliable alarm clock did not go off. But more than once I’ve seriously considered whether a beagle or a miniature schnauzer might have been a better choice when that nose came poking in at 5:45 am. “Come on guys! It’s SATURDAY!!!”
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