Wilfred Brimley's Nosehair

A good night. Scout has become quite the conversationalist these days. I guess it was about 8 months ago that he started a groaning that I think is his speech. For the past several years we've been working with Smudge to see if we could get him to "talk" and say Ri Ruv Ru, like Scooby-Doo and sometimes he gets pretty close to it, especially when he's happy to see you after you've been away from home. Smudge can get quite "animated" in his speech and really leaves no questions that he's trying hard to reproduce the sounds that you present to him. Of course, when he does this he gets lavish praise from everyone which reinforces his behavior and make him try harder next time. But in order to make the sounds he gets started by yawning repeatedly. This is the movement in his mouth that forms the words. After he yawns a couple times, he adds his whining or growl to it and that is what makes the talking sound.

We tried to get Scout to do this but he's a very different dog and while he obviously wants in on the attention that Smudge gets for talking he could never figure out how to make the sounds. Then about 8 or 9 months ago, a couple months after he had the big lipoma taken off the back of his neck, he started to periodically groan. At first, we thought he was doing it when he hurt or was sore. But pretty soon it was obvious, at least to me, that it wasn't always related to things hurting him. For instance, he might really have trouble walking or getting up, but that wouldn't be associated with groaning, and then sometimes, he would be lying on the couch and he would just start groaning in time with his breathing and varying the pitch in different ways.

If you talk to him between the moans, in kind of a call & response, he can be very expressive sometimes. Of course, part of this is just wishful interpretation on my part but I believe it.

His groaning is never too loud but sometimes he can keep it going for a long time. I hear him a lot at night because he lays at the foot of our bed on a big dog blanket. Most nights he kind of groans a little while in a kind of story before he settles down. What convinces me about the reason for the groans is that I get up several times a night to go to the bathroom or just to sit on the side of the bed to get comfortable from my legs or hips or back, and whenever I stir or get up. He will groan to me to let me know he's there and for me not to step on him and I think, also to show that he's not at all happy about me getting up and rousing him from his rest. If I get up to walk to the bathroom he will struggle up to a sitting position and I pet his big warm head as I walk by. In the past, I've stepped on his paw or tail as I walked past him in the dark and he takes no chances about that. He'll lie still and let Sue step over him but not me. He always gets up when I'm on the hoof.

I mean to record his groaning talk but haven't yet.