Seems like any time after the Sun goes down chances are I am the only one still awake around here. This may account for the number of sleeping Rotts pictures here - and sleeping wife, as well. (see below) Any way, I decided to take some new shots this evening because the boys were in a playful mood.
This next one was taken a half-second after momma got a sneaky kiss from Ruff.
Wouldn't have it any other way.
Yeah! Good thing Mom and Dad are still awake. Somebody has protect the house. Last night, as usual, mid-way through the television programs I spotted our two sleeping beauties, Axl and Ruff. This always leads to the observation about who, exactly, is protecting whom. And, how long would it take them to wake up if someone rang the doorbell?
I have started to call my little office "The boys club" because it seems that every day now it has become the favorite hang-out for Ruff and Axl. Maybe they come in to keep me company or to find a quiet place to take a nap but I enjoy having them in any case. This little room is so small that the only way I can take this picture is to hold the camera above my head as high as I can.
I don't know how other Rottweilers get along but these two love to be close to each other. They often take naps together laying on the same couch butt to butt.By the way, we seem to have all survived our recent heat wave. Today it was only 95 outside but the last few weeks it was brutal. Two weeks of 90+ degrees temperature and three days over 100 degrees. It has been so humid as well as hot that the only reason we went outside was to let the three Rotts take a potty break. I have been running the garden hose around the clock trying to keep some of my shrubs and trees from drying up. Three days ago I took this picture from one of the rear windows of the thermometer on the tool shed. It was 105 outside and 115 inside the shed.
Ruff has a thing about horses. For the life of me I don't understand him. He has only met one horse up close in his life and I thought it was a friendly meeting. After all, he went nose-to-nose with the horse and never voiced any complaints. After that every time he has seen horses on TV he growls and runs up close to look at them. He has sat in front of the TV to watch a horse race. And last night he saw them again in a Nature program on the local PBS station. Here he is doing his thing.
By the way, if you haven't seen the pictures of that famous meeting when Ruff met his first horse in the field where his father lives, here it is.
It started like this:
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Ruff's adventures.
I just realized that Ruff was only a year and a half old when he met this horse. Maybe he was too young to be afraid of something that big. But he sure looked brave when the horse walked up to him.
My daughter on Long Island called the other day when our friend Lucy was here for a visit. After a few minutes on the phone we decided to complete the conversation on Skype. I turned the short couch around to face the web cam and everyone got into the picture, literally.
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I know now that this is not a very unusual scene. We had just finished watching television and it was time for bed and then I discovered I was the only one who was still awake.
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Pay no attention to the pumpkins and Halloween designs on my wife's sweatshirt. She wears it all year long because she gets chills, especially when the air-conditioning is on in the Summer.
Just wanted to share some cute pictures of our Rottweiler family and when I opened my blog I noticed I haven't posted anything here in three weeks. With the nice weather outside there has been a slew of projects that had to be finished. Here is a photo I took yesterday morning. I spotted my wife relaxing on the deck with her ever vigilant protectors right beside her. It was such a peaceful scene and I didn't want to disturb anyone so I took the photo through the glass door.
Click the pictures for a larger view.
The new wall project has been completed and the flower garden planted and now we have a nicer place to sit by the pool to enjoy the evening.
Haven't forgotten our best friends. We do manage to taken them for long walks down the back after dinner so they can investigate every new scent they find. We have a variety of creatures that visit us, mostly at night, but there are always the startled rabbits that grab their attention.
And Ruff always enjoys playing peek-a-boo from behind a tree.
Hope you all enjoy a nice Summer. Looks like its gonna be a good one.
After dinner we took the three Rotts for a run down the back. On the way back we stopped to have a conversation with our neighbor and while we were talking Sassy started to do her howling WOOO WOOO alarm. Then I noticed that another neighbors dog, a German Shepard name Maggie had spotted our boys Ruff and Axl and had come running over for a visit. Maggie lives on the next street about a 1000 feet away so we decided to walk her home. Ruff and Axl always get excited when Maggie comes for a visit and they were both running around playing chase with her.
When we got back to our house everyone was tired from all the running so we had a very quiet night watching television.
In our house the Rottweilers get fed before we do for the practical purpose of not having to be surrounded by starving hungry dogs while we eat. That doesn't mean it takes their minds off food, it just removes some of the anxiety. Well, last night after they had their dinner I started to put our's on the table and I spotted Ruff and Axl taking up their spots around the table. They were just laying there, quietly waiting for something to happen. I wonder if they dream of me tripping over them and spilling our dinner on the floor? Now that would be exciting.
I can't imagine what life would be like without them because they have a natural ability to fill in all the little empty spaces in our day.
We celebrated the completion of the stone wall project yesterday and threw a beer party. Our good friends Bev and her husband Rich came over and Ruff was thrilled to see them both. Acting like he used to when he was much younger, Ruff made repeated attempts to shower his friends with kisses and face licks. He then tried to get what he wanted by jumping up on the back of the chair that Rich was sitting in. Well, that called for the old Nikon and I managed to record some memorable shots before it was over. The pictures that follow are posted in sequence from the first one I took when I walked back in the room.
Click the pictures for a larger view.
I think it is fairly obvious that Rich was enjoying his buddy Ruff as much Ruff was enjoying his friend Rich. And Bev holds the distinction of being Ruff's "Auntie Bev" and as the last shot taken a few years ago shows, Ruff has a fond affection for his Auntie.
The crew of masons from Don Moore's Masonry who rebuilt my stone walls by the swimming pool came by after work tonight and installed the slabs I made for the caps. Now I can begin getting the backyard ready for Summer. Take a look.
These guys worked fast and finished up at 8 PM just as the Sun was setting. Now I have to get some flowers to plant where those weeds are.
And this is how it looked the next day in the morning sunlight.
It took about 5 weeks to make the 11 wall cap slabs I needed but it saved a bundle of money. I went to a stone company to price limestone and they wanted $300 for each piece cut to the size I made (3x14x34).
As soon as I turned on the TV tonight to watch the Kentucky Derby, Ruff took up his spot right in front as soon as he saw the first horses. The local favorite from Northern Kentucky, a horse named Hanson, started out strong but fell way back after the last turn. Here are some pictures.
Well, I finished making the cap stone slabs for the new wall and because they came in to weigh 110 lbs each I hired the same crew who rebuilt the wall to come in next week and lay them on the wall with mortar. It took me six weeks to make them and everyone thinks they look pretty good. I used two kinds of Portland cement, the common gray and two 100 lb bags of white along with some brown cement dye to give them a tint. The idea I had was to simulate cut sandstone which was way too expensive. The caps I made are 14" x 3" x 34" and it would have been more than $200 each from a quarry. I spent about $20 each for my material and made 16 of them. Here are two pictures.
During the time I was working on this project we did manage to take the happy crew out for a few runs in the back yard. The weather here has been really strange with daytime temperatures running as high as 88 degrees (which would be normal for August) and many night-time temperatures dropping below freezing. In fact, I managed to propagate seven Montauk Daisies last year from seeds that came from a plant I brought down to Kentucky 20 years ago and this year have had to cover them at night to several times to protect them from the cold. The early Spring has has them growing like crazy along with everything else. In fact I did get some frost damage on the top leaves of our Japanese Maples.Any way, here are a few pictures of the three Rottweilers enjoying the nice weather. In spite of the warm temperatures my wife was still wearing her hat and coat, but that is a different matter.
Sassy doing her upside down excercises.
Ruff and Axl exploring.
I'll post some news pictures next week after the wall is completely finished.
We had no Winter here last year. In fact, the day before the First Day of Spring it was 85 degrees outside. As I feared, it has been necessary to start cutting the grass more than a month earlier than usual. Now more yard work is required along with a special project I'm working on to make some heavy cap rocks for the new stone wall I had rebuilt. All this takes time and I haven't had any to spare to take new pictures, which I'm sure is the main reason people visit this blog. I hope to have the project done in a few weeks so please check back for the updates.
Thanks for visiting and for all your nice comments about my wonderful Rottweilers.
Here is a nice shot of two of our Rotties. The smaller one in the background was a Christmas gift and the larger one in the foreground is our pride and joy. His name is Ruff.
This next picture is our oldest Rottweiler, Axl, whom we adopted 2 1/2 years ago when he was almost 8 years old. I know when he is happy because he smiles and his eyes seem to twinkle.
And here is Axl and Ruff. They have been best friends since the day we brought Axl into our home. Axl is 10 1/2 years old now and Ruff is only 5 and they have two different personalities. Ruff is very strong and filled with boundless energy, always excited and just waiting to give anyone he meets a ton of kisses. Axl is quiet, gentle and reserved. I'm not sure if he is the product of his training as a service dog or his breeding but he has been a perfect companion to my wife and seems to know how much she needs him.
Axl takes lots of naps all day long because he works so hard.
And here is a picture taken today of the two boys taking an after-breakfast nap on a rainy Sunday morning. And why not? There's nothing else to do when the weather outside is nasty.
