Growing up in my neighborhood you learned about being street savvy.
One of the unwritten rules had to do with staring at people and giving them nasty looks.
It's called "mad-dogging".
It comes from the way that dogs will growl and bark when you look or stare at them.
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Ed and Tucker have this kinda love/hate relationship going on.
Ed kinda walks around the house like the feline he is.....no problems, no worries.....very cat-like.
Tuck, every once in a while will growl over Ed's excursions around the house. Tuck will growl, charge at the cat and walk away.
This was a major cause of concern for me, Ed was raised around dogs, but mostly with a screen door between his-self and the dogs.
When I lived in CA, we would walk over to my mom's house and the dogs would follow the Edster and me on our short trek.
No problem.
Tucker will follow Ed around, his nose in the Edster's rear, without any signs of trouble.....
But, should the Edster walk by a sleeping Tuck or if Ed decides he wants to get some time with me or Doris?
The Tuck gets a little growly.
I was concerned about it at first, I didn't know if Tuck was going to bite Ed....but as time goes on, I see the Tuckster is just showing he is the king of the house.
That Ed doesn't flinch or run away, which did concern me, but now I see that it's a game they play.
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So, now we get to the meat and potatoes about how and why these game gets started......
Ed will walk be the sleeping Tuck, giving him a wide enough berth as not to wake him up, then stop and stare.
Tuck, being the gentleman he is, will largely ignore the cat and after a few seconds Ed walks away.
One day I yelled at Ed to "STOP MAD-DOGGING THE DOG, CAT!" It sounded really stupid, but, when the dog began to mad-dog the cat? The phrase changed to "STOP MAD-DOGGING THE CAT, DOG!"
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When the first incidents came to pass, I was pretty nervous, Tuck never acted that way towards Ed.
Now?
We can tell when the situation is about to happen and yell at them. We sometimes get the protaganists mixed up and had to stop and think about the dog mad-dogging the cat or the cat mad-dogging the dog!
This always bring us to laugh about the situation and the pets seemed to tune into that vibe.
Of course,
When there are treats to be dispensed, they seem to forget any animosity and their only interest is in who gets what....They both seem to exist in the wonderful place where there is dog/cat tension...It's a beautiful thing to see them both circling my legs, looking for a handout when I walk into the kitchen.
No one gets mad-dogged then, it's time for treats.....
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