Since Brindle's little accident, which happened on a Sunday 4 weeks ago now, we have been more careful with her whereabouts while at home. In general, she has learnt a valuable lesson and we have learned a costly lesson as well. She doesn't wander out the front at all and when she follows Steve, she rarely ventures past the carport and into the front yard. Now she is older, we can tie her up and she doesn't get tangled around the outdoor setting or the staircase. Every evening of late, we need to tie her up because a man walks his dachshund through the reserve next to our house and she rushes over to greet them which isn't good despite her only being curious.
When she wakes up early, she is ready for the day simply because Steve has been taking her to his early morning jobs from the time he brought her home. However, during the Christmas break, neither Steve, myself or the girls, were interested in joining her for the early morning starts. Steve prefers to walk her after dark after the girls have gone to bed. She has been sleeping upstairs since the accident with Steve getting up at least once a night to give her a pee break but at 5am when she stirs, he has been putting her downstairs in the underground. The underground is the downstairs part of the house which can be locked but which we only use for storage. There is plenty of room for Brindle to wander around and its airy with loovers and open brickwork to let the breezes through. Steve made Brindle a collapsible kennel for her stay with friends while we were in Cairns and she is quite happy to use it when down there. Usually when I get up, I go downstairs and let her out and allow her upstairs after frenzied excitement, licks and whimpering.
Last Sunday (I don't know what it is about Sundays), I did my usual thing and went downstairs to let Brindle out but was not greeted at the door. My initial reaction was that she was still in her upstairs bed and I just didn't notice her. I wandered inside to have a look around just to be sure. As I walked into the washing line area under the house, I could hear whining and there was Brindle with her head stuck through a besser brick. When she heard me, she started struggling and trying to get out. I tried to unstick her but she was jammed in that besser block. I raced upstairs to get Steve who was not comprehending what I was telling him as I woke him from his sleep.
We all went downstairs and Steve assessed the situation while chastising his stupid dog for doing such a nutty thing. There must have been something pretty interesting out the front for her to need to put her head through the brickwork. I was just grateful that she didn't do this on a day that we had gone to Townsville. We lock her in the underground because it's too hot to take her in the car with us to Townsville although we did it when she was a tiny puppy and too small to be left home alone. Thankfully it wasn't that hot when she was tiny.
Our first reaction was to soap up her head and try to slide her out of the diamond shaped hole. She had been standing on Steve's whipper snipper (obviously to get a better look at whatever had attracted her attention) so I was supporting her body while Steve tried to turn her head on its side and free her. No good. Steve and I swapped places which I wasn't entirely happy about because I was still in my nightie. There I was out the front of the house squatting down trying to thread a dog's head through a brick. More neighbourhood amusement.
I could see from where I was that this wasn't going to be possible. Her jaw was wider than the brick hole and her wrinkly, pig dog brow was also stopping us from pushing her back through the brickwork. She must have seriously squeezed her face or narrowed it quite a lot to get her head through in the first place. Our only remaining alternative was to chisel away at the brick to make the hole bigger and so enable Brindle to get her own head out. Imagine Brindle's reaction when Steve came at her with a chisel and hammer in his hand and started banging away at the brickwork. I was trying to calm her and protect her eyes while brick dust and debris was flying everywhere. Even after knocking out a portion of the besser block, we had to be careful and get rid of sharp edges before guiding Brindle's head back through the brick. Eventually she was free and shook herself silly before proceeding with her morning meet and greet which she had missed out on because of her predicament.
Now that particular area of the underground is off limits when we go to Townsville because we don't need a repeat performance where she gets stuck. Hopefully she has learnt her lesson otherwise the front of the house will look like it's got mortar damage with all the holes chipped out of the brickwork. Of course locking Brindle into the other section of the underground has resulted in our Christmas wrapping paper being strewn all over the place on one occasion (it was sitting down there waiting for recycling day because the bin had been too full after Christmas). Yesterday when we got back from Townsville with Steve's mum, she had removed the pink rubber handles from Erin's scooter and proceeded to tear them into irretrievable pieces. There isn't enough to amuse her while locked up and is highly likely the reason for her sticking her head through the brick in the first place. Hopefully soon her head will get too big to fit through the bricks but until then we will endeavour to take her with us when we can and when Steve returns to work, she may have her curiosity satisfied with new adventures. Oh the joys of owning a dog and a kelpie at that!
