Daisy never did much cotton to CAT while we were living in the apartment, although I admit I became quite fond of her scrappy feline calico presence. CAT just cracked me up. She loved to be held, petted, especially on her tummy, and loved to be held lying on her back (which in my experience with cats is kinda weird). We never let her in the apartment; she drove us crazy because she was so “talky”, especially at meal times.
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| CAT wtih one of her relatives or friends |
One of the funnier things was that CAT got pissed that we were letting Daisy inside and CAT figured out how to open screen door to get in…much to Daisy’s chagrin.
CAT tried to buddy up with Daisy, but Daisy was having nothing to do with that. I think Daisy is just a little scared of cats. In Daisy’s younger days, she loved chasing cats, but I’m guessing a few of them got in a few well-placed clawed nose swipes during her “let’s hound cats” learning curve.
Daisy spent most nights with us at the apartment (breakfast and dinner included), but couldn’t wait to get back to her “hood” every morning and loved hanging around with all the fun folks staying in Jardines de Olon during the busy season. And honestly, all of our visitors were great with her too… We tried to make sure that all willing guests had a bag of dog food around, just in case she came around looking for a snack.
For awhile we left her “official” food bowls at Big Deck’s house since family and friends were there for most of December through March during the holidays (while we were at the apartment). That’s Daisy’s usual favorite house to hang out at (when we’re not home), because she can keep a sharp eye out on the beach, especially for the rogue beach donkeys and cows that dare to come around and threaten our well being. One kind guest mentioned that Daisy was the “perfect vacation dog”. Daisy loves everyone and everyone loves her – she is the ideal neighborhood ambassador and mascot. In particular, Daisy became extremely fond of “Big Deck” Doug while he was here, and those two became the best of buddies. She also became enamored with my little brother Jack, who played and petted her, and teased her unmercifully.
Daisy is a well mannered dog. She’s just plain smart and independent – she needed to be. By the time we all discovered her hanging around Jardines, I guess she was around 6-7 months old. She knows she is not allowed in anyone’s house, she’s not a “barky” dog nor a “lickey” dog (though we are still trying to teach her some manners about sniffing peoples’ butts). Our guests have been good about only feeding her from a designated bowl at mealtimes - she’s NOT allowed TO BEG at tables, though she is not above trying occasionally (STRONGLY DISCOURAGED WITH ANY DOG HERE – Daisy or not). She doesn’t usually jump on anyone (she’d better not) except when she’s really excited to see someone familiar and missed them – and please nip that in the bud with a good knee to her solar plexus if she tries it. She’s a big girl, and doesn’t always know her own strength.
A while back, on a drizzly December day, Todd and I took a walk south down to the Montanita Point with Daisy, and found a coveted Galapagos turtle washed in (coveted because they are already usually dead and the shell of these things are treasured…but before they are ready to use or display, a lot of nasty, smelly, elbow-grease work required after the vultures get done).We hid it in some tall grass near a more or less empty stretch of beach and went to retrieve it around a week later with Oswaldo’s borrowed wheel barrel.
Vultures had barely started eating it and its head and legs were dangling by rubbery skin. It smelled awful when we lifted the carcass into the barrel. We got about 20-40 ft with it, and then decided the chore might be easier/weigh much lighter if we used a couple of sharp beach rocks to chop off few the superfluous flesh fragments. That was a mistake, because between the dead turtle smell and plethora of maggots in wheelbarrow, we both tossed our cookies. We ended up letting the corpse wash back out to sea and we are pretty sure our neighbors would be grateful to know that we didn’t bring it back here to “cure’ it in one of our empty lots.
Daisy protecting us from the dangerous paper mache dinosaur effigy we burned on New Year´s Eve.
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