That's Not How You Treat Snacks!

I feel sorry for this guy! That just cruel and a waste of snacks! My snout isn't big enough to hold that many snacks... I prefer them in my tummy. Woof.

SNOUT OUT - Petey the Volleyball Dog

That's one strong snout Petey's got!!!

Up Up and Eskie Away!

I'm ready for my close-up Mr. DeMille.

Hollywood has come to this corner of Teggie's little world. They're filming parts of the new Superman movie in our neighborhood right now! The photo you see is the "pretend" traffic jam they created that's just past my Mommy and Daddy's highway exit. I don't know, I guess this Superman character is going to super direct traffic or something.

There's an area near our home that they're using to store lots and lots of "pretend" wrecked cars. Again, I don't know, maybe he's a super mechanic or something and will fix them all.

Both Kevin Costner and Russell Crowe have been spotted RIGHT ACROSS THE ROAD on our area bike path. If I see either of them I will bark at them. Well, maybe not Kevin Costner, as my Daddy ADORES his movie "No Way Out."

I was going to offer to play the part of Krypto, Superman's super white dog, but I think I'm going to have to let my Eskie friend Casper play that part. He's already got the Superman shield on his collar and all that. BUT... as he's way out West and I'm about 800 yards away from filming, I can at least be his stand-in. I don't think Casper will mind. :)

Casper's probably got a better agent than I do anyway. Woof!

The Saddest Post Secret

This is one of the saddest Post Secrets I've ever seen.
I don't know which pooch it is, but I wonder if they ever found their fur baby.

YAPPY BARKDAY MOMMY!

IT'S MY MOMMY'S BIRTHDAY TODAY!

YAPPY BARKDAY MOMMY!!!

HOPE YOU ENJOYED STALKING RICHARD MARX AND WOLVERINE LAST NIGHT!!!

Mom's Out Stalking Again

Mom's going out to stalk Richard Marx and Wolverine tonight.
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

GONE STALKING

Well, it's that time of the year... AGAIN!

My Mommy has ditched me so she can go stalk that Rick Springfield character... AGAIN!

Honestly, I don't know what she sees in him. Whenever her phone rings, I hear him singing and I howl, and howl, and howl, and howl.

Yappy Easter - 2011

SUE ME, I'M RECYCLING LAST YEAR'S PHOTO! BUT STILL AND ALL... YAPPY EASTER EVERYONE FROM TEGAN THE EASTER ESKIE!!!!

Damn...just damn

I am soooooooo ashamed of my Bears performance that I must hide out under the covers.

Go Steelers......NOT Packers. I am so sad today.

Dog Psychology 101

SOURCE: CNN

Good morning class! I'm Professor Tegan. You can tell I'm a professor because I'm wearing a white lab coat. Well, my fur's white, so you probably can't tell I'm wearing a white lab coat now, can you? Let's just say I'm wearing a white lab coat and black glasses like that dog Duke in the Bush's beans commercials.

(CNN) -- Sit! Shake! Quit barking! Get off the couch! Go find your toy!

Ever wonder what your dog is thinking as it gazes at you while you are barking commands?

Duke University's Canine Cognition Center in Durham, North Carolina, is one of the few labs in the country focused on how dogs think.

"We're excited about describing the psychology of our dogs," says professor Brian Hare, the lab's director. "Different dogs solve different problems differently. And what we want to understand is: What is it that either makes dogs remarkable as a species or what is it that constrains the ability of dogs to solve problems?"

To test the dogs' ability, Hare and a team of graduate students put dogs through a variety of games similar to those you might play with young children.

"We don't want to look at cute pet tricks. What we want to know is, what does the dog understand about its world?" Hare said.

Hare has been analyzing our four-legged friends for about 15 years. He says dogs have figured out how to read human behavior and human gestures better than any other species has, even chimpanzees.

"The way they think about their world is that people are superimportant and they can solve almost any problem if they rely on people," says Hare.

Children start relying on adults' gestures when they're about a year old. That's about the same age that dogs start to recognize and rely on humans, too, Hare says.

When both I and Hare tried to direct Hare's dog Tazzie to a cup that had a treat in it, Tazzie took his master's cue and went toward the cup. I was a stranger to Tazzie, so the dog didn't rely on my information.

"He's grown up with me," says Hare. "We do lots of stuff together. He's never met you before, so he's saying, look, if they're both telling me where to go, I'm going to trust the guy who I'm with all the time."

According to Hare, this proves dogs are complex social animals who understand they have different relationships with different people.

"They really narrow in and pay attention to you and they want to know what it is about the world that you can help them with," he says.

Researchers at Duke are studying dogs to better understand their limitations. If they can identify why dogs make mistakes, they believe they can help them improve. That could mean making dogs better at working with people with disabilities or better at working with the military.

"They are a very different species and they think about the world differently than we do. And we need to figure out what are the constraints on how they solve problems, how is it that they think differently from us. And I think that we're going to be able to have a much, even richer relationship with dogs than we already do if we figure all that out," says Hare.

The professor says even though domestication has made dogs smarter, they are not perfect. Still, they're so smart, he says, that they can understand the principle of connectivity.

"They know they're connected on a leash and [dogs reason] 'Well, now I have to listen, because if I don't do what you say you can stop me. Where if I'm ... not on a leash, well, yeah, I know the command but I don't have to listen to you now,'" explains Hare.

And just like children, dogs also understand that if you turn your back, they can misbehave, especially after their owners have told them not to do something.

"Your dog takes the food you just told it not to take, and you're really upset because your dog disobeyed you, and you think that your dog is not obedient. Well, no, no, no, your dog was obedient but it realized that it could get away with it," says Hare.

At the end of the day, dogs may rely on humans, but they also use their skills to manipulate their owners and the world they live in. And even though dog owners like to think they're in command, the professor says it may actually be Fido who is really in charge.

POSSUMBUSTERS!!

There was lots of excitement at the kitchen’s sliding glass door earlier this morning.

I was doing my usual little morning snooze in the living room while my Mommy was in the shower, when all of a sudden I heard something and shot towards the back door.

There was a foul, evil vermin roaming around outside and nibbling at some of the bird seeds that fell from Mommy’s two bird feeders!

It was a possum!!!!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! Ew! Ew! Ew! Ew! Let me tell you... this little Eskie hates possums. Hates, hates, hates, hates them! They’ve got beady little eyes and weird funky looking tails, and when you bark at them like a banshee, they run away in a creepy little fashion.

My Daddy was half listening to the news while reading through one of his cooking magazines. He had to get up and go see what all the fuss was about. I barked and barked at the foul creature and it ran along the side of our garage and out of sight.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! He better not come back, or there just might be a little more barking to be done.

It reminds me of a song that Ray Parker Junior's dog wrote (stole) from Huey Lewis' dog...

“If there’s something strange… in your old backyard… who you gonna call??”

“POSSUMBUSTERS!!!”

File Under DUH!

SOURCE: THE BBC

File this under the something we dog's don't already know category:

Scientists have shown just how much dogs rely on seeing their owner’s faces in order to recognise them.

The researchers also measured how much dogs prefer to gaze at and follow their owners, rather than a stranger.

In the journal Animal Behaviour, the team described how dogs had difficultly recognising their human "best friend" when the person had their face covered.
The study sheds more light on how thousands of years of domestication has affected the behaviour of canines.

Paolo Mongillo from the University of Padua in Italy led the study. He explained that, although many researchers have studied how dogs interact with humans, no one had yet investigated how the animals focused on one person in preference to another - or just how much companion dogs "prefer" their owners.

Dr Mongillo's team invented an experiment to measure this.

"We had the dog in an empty room and we instructed the owner and another person - someone unfamiliar to the dog - to walk across the room several times," the scientist explained.

"The people walked in opposite directions, so they crossed many times in front of the dog and we measured how long the dog looked at one person versus another."

The research team then instructed the two people to leave the room via two different doors and allowed the dog to approach one of the doors.

"Most of the dogs gazed at their owners for most of the time and then chose to wait by the owner's door," said Dr Mongillo.

He described this as an "expected" result but something that no one has measured before.

"If you imagine a dog in a real setting in a city or anywhere in the middle of a crowd or a crowded space, you can see how the animal must have adapted to give preferential attention to its owner," said Dr Mongillo.
In the second part of the study, the scientists asked the people to cover their faces; the human volunteers then walked across the room with bags over their heads.

During this phase of the experiment, the dogs were much less attentive to their owners. This revealed just how much the animals relied on human faces for recognition.

Wild dogs rely on body signals and on cues from other animals in their social groups, but studies including this one suggest that domestic dogs are so attuned to human social groups that they are even able to recognise some human facial expressions.

"This is very likely to be a by-product of thousands of years of domestication," said Dr Mongillo.

Studies of the genetic differences between dogs and their wolf ancestors suggests that canines were first domesticated between 15,000 and 40,000 years ago.

In the same study, the team investigated the effects of ageing on the dogs' attention.

They found that "aged" dogs - seven years and older - were less able to focus on their owner and also were less likely to choose the owner's door.

"There have been studies to show that dog ageing is similar to human ageing in terms of cognitive impairment," said Dr Mongillo.

So studying ageing in dogs could help our knowledge of human as well as animal age-related diseases.

Mommy Is Out Stalking Rick Springfield Again!

Wait a minute.....it's not May and Mommy isn't in Milwaukee so what gives???

Well, it seems that Rick wrote a book and is doing a signing in Naperville so off she goes. What is it about this guy? Anyway, Mommy was very happy as she left the house this evening and said something about being number 75. I hope she's not out all night.

Daddy went out and got a huge burrito for dinner but he wouldn't share it with me. You know Daddy, you COULD have brought me chicken nuggets!!!

My Mommy Is In Rick Springfield's Movie!!!!

It should come as no surprise to anyone who knows her, but my Mommy is a HUUUUUUUUUGE Rick Springfield fan and she's in this video for the upcoming Rickumentary!

She's the person who says: "You meet friends from all over the world and your family becomes a little bit bigger."

Wow....she's famous now...how cool is that???!!!

STAYCATION

Staycation is my new favorite word. Mommy & Daddy are on Staycation this week which means they are home with me and Gromit so much more!!! Whoooo Whooooo!!! Extra love, treats and outside trips this week!! I wish they would win the lottery....then they could be home 24/7!

Also, speedy recovery wishes to Gromit's brother, Dakota who had tummy surgery to remove a blockage yesterday. Sending lots of love his way.

Happy Tuesday everyone!
Love, Tegan

The Great Escape!!!

YOU GO DAWGS!! WOOF! FREEDOM!!

To all readers, casual viewers, and passers-by at "A Whiter Shade of Eskie", have a fun and safe Labor Day Weekend!

WOOFS FROM TEGAN!!!

Dancing In The Movies

My Mommy studied and performed ballet for a number of years and loves movies that have dancing in them. This is for her. Woof!

COMPANY IS COMING!!!!

WOW OH WOW OH WOW....we have company coming tonight!!! My Auntie Lisa is coming from Wisconsin!!! I've never met her but Mommy says that Aunties are always good people! Hahahaha.....I've noticed that everyone who comes to visit is called Auntie but I won't tell her that I've broken her code word..tee hee! Lisa will be staying with us the whole weekend so I'm looking forwrad to extra lovin'!!!
Happy weekend everyone!!!
Love, Tegan

Stuck In The Middle

So this morning Mommy was walking me and we saw other dogs and kids waiting for school busses. Mommy starts laughing and singing to herself....
"German shephards to the left me, school kids on the right...here I am...stuck in the middle with you." Hahahahaha....I'm a WEE bit territorial!

I Don't Know Much About Art

I don't know much about art.
But I know what I like!
WOOF!