My dog Mandie has not always been the fastest gun in the West and she is most definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Although we love her dearly, she has a slow speed which she downshifts into both mentally and physically for the largest portion of the day. She moseys to the door laboring with every step, causing the cool air to leave the house and the flies to enter as I stand there holding it open for her....waiting. She spends most of the day laying lopped to the side like a beached whale, occasionally switching rooms for a change of scenery. She's lovingly referred to as a "foot stool" or a "dog skin rug" by me and my husband. She's just in no way, shape, or form remotely in a hurry to do anything......except to eat. That she does with record speed.
I wouldn't even call it eating, really. It's more like an inhalation of solid particles, much like a Dustbuster. There is no chewing, no tasting, no pleasure. It is purely utilitarian. She's like a professional food-eating contest champion, always in training. But that's really where it ends. Everything else is slow and deliberate. Of course because of her ho-hum attitude and her remedial intelligence level, we never pegged her for much of a huntress. Most of the time when we drop something on the floor we have to point directly at it, almost touching it and wait at least 30 seconds for her to gear up and arrive at it from across the kitchen. Most often if we don't guard it for her, Maggie snatches it up with a "you snooze, you lose," sort of approach.
So, many times we've had the conversation that if the world were to end as we know it and humans were wiped from the face of the earth, Mandie would be dead inside of a week. Of course her storage of body fat may keep her going for a little longer, but not by much. Without a human to stand next to a deer carcass or an overturned garbage can and point at it for her, Mandie would surely perish.
Well, this is what we believed until we discovered Mandie's bloodlust. Recently, we've started walking in the city park just for a change of pace. The park is fairly large, complete with a pond for ducks and fish, a walking path, many recreational areas and a grassy, tree area. Now, it is important to visualize Mandie to truly appreciate this shocking display of behavior which we have witnessed. Mandie is a Corgie-Sheltie mix. This means she is long with very short stubby legs, a big head and large pointy ears. She's got longer hair and a mane like a Sheltie, a stub where her tail used to be and she weighs in at about 43 pounds.
So, one afternoon as we took our daily exercise in the city park, Mandie noticed squirrels. Suddenly, with a sound like someone was repeatedly backing over her with a car, she screeches and starts tugging furiously at her leash. I learn quickly that my "foot stool" has a very low center of gravity and can pull me down pretty easily if she wanted to. I've walked Pitbulls with less force, to be totally honest. Taken completely by surprise, I struggled desperately to hold on to her and keep myself upright at the same time but she was foaming at the mouth at this point.
Charging like she is carrying an Inuit family of four on a sled in the Iditarod, Mandie fought me to get at this stunned little squirrel. I think the rodent had Fatty identified as a low threat grazer, but was shocked to find out he was now being pursued with the passion of brides-to-be at an annual wedding gown clearance sale. So, interested in seeing this play out of course, I drop her leash. And like a greyhound she's off. I couldn't believe my eyes. My morbidly obese, sloth of a dog moved faster than anything I'd ever seen. Now, she did not get the squirrel of course because she cannot climb trees, although she tried. Her adrenaline got the best of her and she screeched to a halt and leaped onto the trunk, just missing the tail end of the squirrel.
Nevertheless, I was amazed and so proud. To this day, I can't believe it so every day now we go to the park hunting for squirrels so I can see with my own eyes that I was not dreaming. And a couple of times since, we've been lucky to find a few helpless little guys caught totally off guard by my champion squirrel hunter. It's awesome and it's become my new sport.
Well, since the opening of this new door, Mandie has become quite the little killer-on-rails. During our recent trip to the cottage in the woods in Amish Country, we went for a few hikes. On the first one, we came up out of the woods into a farmer's field to find an oil pump teetering slowly back and forth. From a distance, Mandie spotted it on the horizon and like Don Quixote charging the windmills, Mandie let her rip and tore after the pump. Upon her approach, though she realized how big this horse-like figure was so she put on the breaks hard and fast. But it didn't stop her from harassing it. From about three feet away she taunted it furiously barking and bearing her teeth.
Of course Chris and I were on the ground crippled with laughter over this ridiculous behavior. We concluded that her legs can be wound up but apparently not her brain. She's still not too smart. Anyway, we reeled Slugger back in and got her back to the cottage. The next day we did an experiment to see if she would fall for her own blunder again and she did not disappoint. She tore after the defenseless pump and cussed it up one side and down the other, from a safe distance of course.
Our most recent episode with our aggressive little beast happened the other day. And we're sure now it most likely will not be the last. Apparently Mandie has been reborn. Anyway, last weekend I woke up and stumbled into the kitchen to make breakfast. As I turned toward the refrigerator I saw a horrific sight on the floor. Mandie had caught a mouse. It's lifeless body was placed right next to her food dish. Now we've had a minor mouse problem in this house for some time and have even discussed getting a cat because our two dogs had proven themselves useless in this profession. But on that day, to my great surprise, our Mandie caught her first mouse. It's her first official kill and I think after this she is really going to develop a taste for it.
So, let the bloodlust begin. And have mercy on the city park squirrels. Mandie the Fat and Slow has morphed into Mandie the Fast and Furious. Don't get me wrong, she still holds down the floor boards like a paperweight and will only come upstairs at night if I promise her a cookie, but given the right motivation, she changes like a super hero and takes on her new persona with a zeal that is unrivaled in our household. Not even Maggie's vicious kamikaze guarding of her spot on the couch or her persistent investigation of the trash can has as much enthusiasm as our Mandie's pursuit of random victims. She is our new little pride and joy, our champion warrior, and we have a new found respect.
