••• Holy Smoke's Animals Page 2001 •••
The pets around us...
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The little black dot in the left corner is Amore, a great cat who was loved by everybody. He became sixteen years old and is missed dearly. One cold night in late December we took him in from the cold and offered him a warm house and our company. He was just getting used to being inside so much. One morning he sat on the floor enjoying lean ham when a 200 pound wooden sculpture fell over and crushed him. A quick but sad ending to his life. The last two years he never skipped a day greeting us on the parking lot and was always glad to see us. Goodbye, little friend. |
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Although the year began sad there was soon plenty of reason for Smoke to be cheerful and happy, because there was more snow than he had ever seen in his life. Here he is out playing next to the house with Wibo (Pipo) and Cora, the young but sturdy figure in the back. It is very hard to make a picture of her, because she is so restless and excited. |
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Just a friendly get-together of three neighboring dogs : Holy Smoke eating dinner with his friend Wibo (we call him Pipo), the one year old striped dog, and his nine weeks old "sister" (well, sort of...) called Chica. She is so cute she gets a space here of her own, see below. |
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Still fits in the palms of your hands... On first arrival in this appartment building she was named Chica but now, a week later, she got her final name : "Ciney", after the beer she tried to drink while visiting our house for the first time. So there's two animals on these pages already by that name - remember the pussycat that lives in the Ardennes ..? |
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We met Izzy at the nightly walk a little over a week ago and today it's three weeks ago she arrived in this country. Peter rescued her from Turkey with the help of a foundation dedicated to save dogs from countries where dogs are concidered "ayip"... She became friends with Smoke immediately and is a joy to everyone she meets. Here she is resting next to Vera on the couch on her first visit to our apartment. She just had a dozen of those wonderful cookies... |
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It is about time Wibo / Bowie / Pipo (what other dog has three names ?) had his close-up picture taken. In case you are confused by now : Pipo is the skinny fellow on the snowy night picture above and barely seen on the picture below it, where Ciney the dog is introduced as Chica... Clearer now ?
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 By now the neighbor's dogs Pipo and Ciney have grown into their adult bodies. Today - almost the end of summer - we ran in the forrest with Holy Smoke, they played in the house and had dinner together - than I had dinner and coffee with tequila - and it was time for a little rest (below). |
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In the early days of December we had a visit from a lady from spain, who was in town for the holidays. She is Dolly Schou, a.k.a. "Blonde Dolly". Child of a black poodle and an unknown soldier... She came in the house, needed fifteen minutes to look around her and then snapped at Holy Smoke. Normally he jumps back for a lady, but this time he decided to tell her to keep it quiet and behave. She needed two and a half hours to regain herself - that is where we are now. We are going to test her response to minced beef... |
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We changed her name once more, from Ciney to "Sientje". Ciney, as you may have read above, is a beer-brand, and she doesn't drink beer anymore. Got over it completely. Calling her by her new name seems to soften her up a bit, less impetuously and ungovernable. She is more responsive when spoken to if we use her new name. "Sientje" is short for Fransine, pronounced as "Seen-tjeh", the last syllable almost silent. There's not much news about her. She's healthy and grows up well. She still has more teeth than brains it seems and realy comes to life when she sees food. It's a little shark then. |
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Guess who came to visit after a-longtime-no-see? Oda. We went to the woods today, then ate all we could, then slept...
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A burglar broke into a house one night. He shined his flashlight around, looking for valuables, and when he picked up a CD player to place in his sack, a strange, disembodied voice echoed from the dark saying, "Jesus is watching you." He nearly jumped out of his skin, clicked his flashlight off and froze. When he heard nothing more, after a bit he shook his head, promising himself a vacation after the next big score. Then clicking his flashlight back on, he began once again to search for more valuables. Just as he pulled the stereo out so he could disconnect the wires, clear as a bell he heard, "Jesus is watching you." Freaked out, he shined his light around frantically, looking for the source of the voice. Finally, in the corner of the room, his flashlight came to rest on a parrot. "Did you say that?" he hissed at the parrot. "Yep," the parrot confessed, then squawked, "I'm just trying to warn you!" The burglar relaxed. "Warn me huh? Who the hell are you?" "Moses," replied the bird. "Moses?" the burglar laughed. "what kind of stupid people would name a parrot Moses?" The bird promptly answered, "Probably the same kind of people that would name a Rotweiller Jesus." |
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Kai (two times above) came from Portugal to Holland as a puppy, a streetdog adopted by tourists, presumably in May 1997. We'll save you the details, but he was mistreated and abused for almost a year. He had become a scared, growling young dog when Leonie took him home and renamed him to Kai. His physical health could be restored, but it took years to mend his soul with a lot of love, patience and understanding. Leonie did all she could and slowly but surely turned his attitude around. Kai is a happy dog now, and dines and rests in our house like a little prince when they are visiting. |
Last Updated : Juni 2010