We live in a flat

Many Adults, 1 Boy & 1 Dog's Montessori Life in a Singapore flat

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Author: weliveinaflat Page 14 of 31

Worm into the bedroom mission continues

Three weeks ago…

Last night…

Time, has not made a difference to her persistence in the mission :P

“Go to your bed” or crate/kennel cues are so useful in this case :P

It hadn’t occurred to me until now but it is dangerous for any animal to hang around the door frame, especially in our case since we live on high floors with crazy winds that sometimes slam doors really hard. In this case, we had the bedroom balcony door closed which shuts off the wind. Normally we do keep the door securely hooked to the wall, and not ajar. 

Loo, loo, skip to the loo~

Ears back, climbing, seeking attention, yawning.

Yes, I know. Thank you for telling me.

I know she is nervous, but sometimes I wonder if I coddle her too much. Mr P ignores her and she seems calmer with him. But when she sees me, she gets really pushy like above. And if you study her eyes, no dilation. She’s nervous, under some stress but still managing.

She wants something with that automatic sit.

Soon she figures we’re both taking it easy, even with the approaching rain and seems calmer. I talked to her a little and she gets excited. Oh-oh, I probably should never talk to her again. Ever!

The thunderstorm got really loud. And then she starts to circle her sleeping towel in the study determinedly. (- – !!!) I reactively screamed, “NO!” And she did. Thank GOD!

Urgently got her into the toilet. There she goes. For the record, because Mr P did once let her do it on the carpet because he thought she was circling to go to sleep. This is what it looks like.

She circled deliberately on the spot more than 10 times.

I probably should have taken a video but it seemed voyeuristic to me. Don’t ask me why I think an animated gif is any better. – –

She is toilet_trained, but when she gets over-excited, common sense/trained behaviour always flies out the window and any mat/rug-like texture becomes fair game for elimaination. That is why when we leave her alone in the house, she has no access to any towels, rugs, mats, only the pee pad in the toilet. And when we are at home and these things lie around, we need to really keep an eye on her to shepherd her to  the right spot to do it during stormy weather conditions.

Since she seemed to calm down better when I am out of the room, I went to sleep the rest of the day away. I wasn’t feeling well anyway.

Later in the night as we sat in the living room, she went and slept in her crate. Good.

We had a power failure today. Did a little bit of crate training today with her, while the electrician presented himself as the distraction working on the power unit. I was able to close the crate door with her inside for minutes, yay!

P/S It was difficult to get any electrician on a the phone on a weekend it seems. We waited more than 2 hours before the original electrician we called came along after his praying session at his temple.  During that time, we tried Town Council-listed numbers, companies that advertised themselves as 24hr emergency services, etc and they all never picked up the phone! D: Good idea to keep a reliable emergency contact for such services handy.

What’s worse than thunderstorm phobia? Thunderstorm phobia at night. – –

I will want to remember August as the month where it stormed at night. Nights in the last two weeks stand out, and not in a good way. Apparently the clouds thought to do the late shift and suddenly the wind and thunder visited in the dead of the night.

The dog that had gotten used to sleeping by herself in the living room, rotating between her many beds, was suddenly restive. One wakes in the middle of the night, sometimes to the thunder, sometimes to her whining and her jumping up and scratching at the bedroom door.

The first night it happened, I was patient. Sat with the poor trembling animal, got out the tuna treats. I eventually managed to get her to fall asleep inside her crate. By then it was nearly time for the sun to rise, no point going back to bed.

But the same cycle repeated night after night… 2am, 4am, 5am… no matter the time. No matter that it’s just the howling wind, no rain or thunder. Suddenly, Donna seemed to excite easily. One could hear her outside alternating between her running click up and down the corridor and scratching at the door as her agitation grew. And yet, when you open the door, she was excited, not fearful and she calmed down very fast if the human just sat there and ignored her.

The lack of sleep made me a perfect zombie in the day. I was never one that could go without sleep for long. It slowly became easier to just lie awake and wonder, should I just leave her be outside? Will she stop it once she learns that we will not respond to her?

But it is not easy to ignore your dog, who might not just be over-excited, who might be really fearful. It is also not easy to ignore a persistent dog. Within 3-4 such nights, she had perfected the persistence of trying until she could open the bedroom door by herself.

It’s going to rain. It’s going to rain.



Do you hear me? It’s going to rain. Yes, I hear you, my dear. You make it impossible for me to ignore the weather.

Thankfully, out of the last two weeks, there were only 2-3 days where she was truly fearful and went over threshold. I’ve realised it’s not a good idea to let her stay still and focus on her own fearful doggie thoughts. Getting her off the sofa and moving, seemed to help calm her down somewhat, not a lot though but at least to rid her of the trembles.

And when she settled down, it was in a tighter curl (right) versus the more relaxed lounging pose (left).

I’ve started to take her out for long walks before bedtime – 1hour, 1.5hours – in the hope that she will wear out and sleep better through the night.

Have to say one has got to salute the parents of newborns. They’ve got to get it worse than this!

Eileen has a good article on how does one define calmness, gets one thinking!

How to take a dog selfie

Norm the Pug is pretty well-known for his iconic pet self shots. But how does he do it?Here’s we got Donna to pull a Norm Pug (faux) selfie. Right now the human has this to say to you, Norm Pug – you make it look so easy.

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Townerville Conservation Area

A little bit of history: The Townerville area comprise mainly terrace houses built in the 1920s. The Art Deco styled 2-storey buildings were formerly used as government quarters but now available for lease. While all the front facade of the units are built to look consistent, habitation gives each unit’s set if windows, door and door grill and the space within a slightly different character.

lush

left behind

sociable

A room for children perhaps.

The back of alley of the row of colonial townhouses.

An extraThe view from our study window where I do these blog posts. There is a colour “art” version on Instagram, if you are interested.

Reference
– http://www.ura.gov.sg/conservation/town.htm

Phoneography Weekly: A macro look at coins

Got my hands on the new $1 coin.

Phoneography Monday Weekly Challenge: Macro
Apps used: Camera+

The one on the left is the new third series $1 coin that is replacing the old second series coin on the right. Series 2 has been in circulation for over 25 years. The new $1 coin which is bigger can no longer fit into the pay-per-use supermarket carts, so it initially did cause us some confusion, until we realised that we should use the new 50-cents coin from the third series.

The interesting feature about our $1 coins is the octagonal frame within the round shape, which according to urban legend, is there for fengshui reasons. It ensures that every citizen will carry an evil-warding bakua on their persons and bring prosperity to the nation.

I do prefer the second series coins, which Sydney describes as carrying a garden city in our pockets. The $1 coin sports the periwinkle flower. You can see the full set of coins with the corresponding photograph of the plants/flowers featured on Sydney’s post – Garden City on the coins. It is a pretty concept, I think. :P I also find the execution of the embossed design on the second series more refined compared to the third. Or it could be that the dirt trapped on the old coin shows up the design better. :P Haha!

The third series coins feature the national icons or landmarks of Singapore. Pictures comparing coin design to actual here – Singapore’s Third Series Coins.

Anyway, out of the set of coin denominations, I do actively collect 5-cent coins. It seemed the aluminium-bronze plating helps to turn my hydrangea flowers from pink to blue (which I prefer), so I have been throwing these garden themed coins into the plant pot to aid the flowering. :P Muahahahahaha!

None of the third series coins are aluminium-bronze plated though. :( Gah!

Anyway, here’s another round object belonging to a creature that had Mr P and I running in circles for the last few nights every time it rains or the wind howls. @_@ I am a very tired human.

Completely disappear has done a macro post on Japanese coins before that I liked.

Reference
– http://www.mas.gov.sg/newcoins
– http://www.mas.gov.sg/NewCoins/Third-Series/Features.aspx
– http://www.mas.gov.sg/NewCoins/Third-Series/FAQs.aspx

Sunday morning at the market

top down view of Donna resting on the tiled floor of the market.

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A quick jaunt about our neighbourhood

Let’s take a drive to Bishan Dog Run

Considering Donna had a pretty dull time the later part of our visit to III Cafe, we decided to stop by the Bishan Dog Run which was on the way home.

We haven’t been inside for quite some time since Donna had gotten fearful of the place the last couple of times she was chased by dogs there. Subsequently, I did take her to the park so that we practice staying calm while walking past the fenced-in doggy area. She did not appear averse to entering that day, so we thought we’d try bringing her in and hanging around the area where there were less dogs… except that three dogs immediately lopped towards our area to check her out.

While Donna did not jump for joy, she was not as fearful as she was previously as well. What she did was to duck under the park bench when she got uncomfortable with the attention and then make exploratory forays from there. In, out, in, out until she was comfortable with her new friends.

I didn’t start taking any pictures until later when I was assured that she was having fun with the other dogs.

If this brown dog had some spots, he would look like Scooby-doo! :P Looking at this picture, I think I start to get why Ruby’s human thinks that Ruby’s black coat looks too dense in colour. Donna’s black coat does stand out but does not look as nice as the brown dog’s softer tones against the surroundings.


Checking out the white dog who preferred the fence to them. :P


Is that a border collie? I’m not good at identifying breeds. Still that’s a lot of hair!!

We limited her to 15 minutes of play time in the dog run so that we could leave on a very positive note for her. She was so dog-tired, she didn’t even blink an eyelid at the close up shot at home. :P


If you are interested, Dr Sophia Yin has a great poster on Dog Park Etiquette that can be downloaded for free as well as tips how to train a dog to prevent him from being part of any unhappy situation that may escalate in a dog park in the dog park. Southslope.org has a nice Dog Park Etiquette Poster with lots of useful tips for adults and for parents with children on how we can help make the dog park an enjoyable place for all humans and dogs and also what to do, if a fight breaks out.

Page 14 of 31

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