Some Very Sad News

I don't often do two posts in one day but we had some very sad news today and I felt I wanted to write about it. Our neighbour has very sadly lost his lovely dog today, she collapsed and died of a heart attack. We are all very very sad for him losing such a super dog. She was a cross Rottweiler and boxer and had a lovely temperament, she looked like a lioness but was so gentle and was brilliant with children.

When I first saw her, I was a bit scared because I'm not keen on big dogs, but Shala was so well behaved. You met her and you fell in love with her. Even though she loved wandering to neighbours who invariably had treats for her she never moved until she had been given the ok to go. When she got the chance to get into our house, she would head straight to the kitchen and for the cupboard where I kept all the doggie treats and she usually got a good handful of something or other.

She loved to lay outside her house and watch the world go by, and as I moved about inside our house, she would watch me and see what I was doing. I would sometimes play a trick on Brian who owned her by opening our bedroom window and talking to her, she would start to cry and whimper to say she wanted to come over and then I would hide from Brian and he would be wondering what she was looking at. It was our little game.

She would walk for hours and hours, loved chasing squirrels, but never caught them and often would set off for a walk without a toy but come back with someone's lost football, she had a huge collection of them outside her front door and when the mood took her she choose one to take out. Sometimes she would come back with a stick (or half a tree trunk!) and then play with it for several days until she crunched it to bits. I remember her demolishing a lamb leg bone in about 10 minutes.

Not long after she moved here Mike decided to try the Crocodile Dundee 2 finger trick with her and she didn't like it so barked at him and on another occasion he pretended to flash at her and she barked and growled at him again, Brian and I were in fits. And when we got Binnie she was brilliant, she was so tolerant with this tiny puppy who jumped all over her, and on one occasion walked her full length to get over her. One reason Binnie is such a well socialised dog is because of Shala and the reason Binnie loves her balls is because of Shala too.

She was loved by many many people who saw her out and about and she will be missed by even more. It will be a long time before I stop looking for her out on the front or wandering in or out from one of her walks. I will miss you very much, you were a true gentle giant.

Sue