Double feature

Tobia: “How about that! Two walks today – almost  like the good old days before we moved here, do you remember? Perhaps it is the start of a new era….”

Peggy: "You are not really paying attention, are you? Can’t you see that your master is behaving just like you these days. Staring off in the distance or staying upstairs working. Hardly talking to anybody. That just eats up all the oxygen in a room, if you ask me.

But if it means more walks for us, I don’t really care what is going on. And it seems like you've already forgotten what you told me the other day: It's the season, so it's not going to last!”

Times of trouble

Peggy: "What's all the fuss about? Lights burning at all hours, both of them gone forever and when they finally come back, they go straight upstairs where we - well, rather - where I can't check what they are doing. It is driving me crazy."

Tobia: "It is the season, I think. My master is always like that this time of the year. Don't worry, it will soon be over and then he will have lots of time for us."

Peggy: "We'll see about that. I bet that they have to do so much work now because they were too lazy earlier. And of course we have to pay the price now! That's not right!"

Information overflow

Peggy: "What on earth are you doing there? It's been almost 3 minutes that you are frozen in the same pose. Don't you have anything better to do, or are your three neurons arguing about who is to be in charge?"

Tobia: "But Peggy, it's spring, the air is full of sounds and odors. So much information have to be dealt with... you just can't go running off in all directions, you have to evaluate, concentrate...."

Peggy: "Yes, and in the meantime arrives a hundred new inputs! Might as well get going, you'll have to learn to decide on an incomplete sets of information."

Tobia: "You are repeating yourself, you should know by now that this is the way I am, and you can't change that."

Peggy: "Males!"

Food

Peggy: "Did you see that rabbit's head on the field the other day? Why didn't the tall one let me take it home? I hate to see food go to waste."

Tobia: "You will eat almost anything, won't you?"

Peggy: "Look who is talking! I don't eat salad, oranges or some of the other strange stuff that they eat. And that you, for an even strange reason thinks are edible too, just because they eat it with pleasure."

Tobia: "What about coffee then? I've seen you drinking it, even without sugar..."

Peggy: That's because I need it, I don't really like it but with all the things I have to do, I must stay alert and awake!"

Contemplation

Peggy: "How can you stand there for hours looking at nothing, not moving? That is not being a dog - that's a vegetable!"

Tobia: "Vegetable? No, I guess the word you mean is vegetating."

Peggy: "Smart alec...."

Tobia: "I do like to contemplate the various issues, we are facing everyday. Think about them in detail. Give the thought time to mature and ripen."

Peggy: "And in the meantime the door will be closed and you'll be left out in the rain."

Temper

Peggy: "Where did your so-called English temper go? You've been barking at I don't know what for 5 minutes now. Sooner or later the tall one will come barging out, shouting at us and we'll have to go inside. It'll be all your fault!"
Tobia: "I'm barking at you!!! Can't you see that I am standing two paws away from you and barking in your ear? Why do you keep biting my legs, running after me whenever I want to investigate something, you don't let me near the food if you are not quite finished eating, you keep growling at me if I set paw in you bed, but oh - you can pass through mine when it suits you, you chase away all the prey, I have taken a stand at, you keep running"
Peggy: "OK, OK, I get your point. You just want me to go away, do you! Well, you're missing me as soon as we aren't on the same side of the door."

Long walks

Peggy: "Why on earth are we staying at home two or three days in a row and then suddenly we go for a 3 hours walk? Well, at least he had brought along water. And always those 'stay behind', 'don't pull', 'NO'.... I can't see or smell anything if I stay behind all the time and it's not my fault that he is slower than me!"

Tobia: "I did like the walk today but we could have left earlier, before it got so hot. I didn't even want to take my usual runs on that fenced-in field. And then the long walk home... I kept wishing that my master would call and ask if we wanted to go back in the car.
But I guess we are being ungrateful."

Peggy: "No, not at all, we just want to be treated in a decent way!"