Expanding dogs

[bunn]

I bought two new dog beds today.   After much agonising over online options, I decided to actually take the dogs to choose beds, so that I could check they would fit.  So, I got the beds off the shelf, and I made the dogs sit in the beds to check that they were the right size.  And I swear, in the shop they WERE the right size.

Now we have got home, both beds appear to be rather too small for the dogs for which they were purchased! I conclude that my dogs are actually larger when they are inside my house.    At present, the nice new bed I bought for Rosie is quite empty, and the big squishy bed I bought for Brythen is occupied by a small and enormously smug Bungle cat.   Both dogs are upstairs on their old beds quaking at the sheer horror of being expected to cope with new beds.

Edited: New theory,dogs contract in size overnight, and then expand again during the day: this morning she came straight down and plopped herself into the bed that she protested was unfeasibly tiny yesterday evening. And there is a clear margin of space all around her!

Comments

[seascribe.livejournal.com]

Have you considered that the dogs themselves might be shapeshifters? Seems likely. Poor shifty dogs, how can they be expected to deal with new beds, new beds do not smell right!

[rabbitica.livejournal.com]

Yes, maybe they just expand to ensure they cannot be expected to fit inside scary new beds!

I can imagine the smug cat though. My cat would just love to claim a large squishy bed all for herself, especially if it was meant for someone else.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

It's not like the cats don't have lots of space! But they are empire-builders. Or at least, bed-annexers!

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

"This [bed] is the last territorial claim I have to make in this house!"

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Given the evidence of the photo I just added this morning, that seems entirely likely. Yesterday, she was completely unable to fit in this bed!

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

er... if they fit in the old beds, why not just measure those?

I have a lovely big squishy bed for Bren, on which he fits if he lies properly. However, he prefers to lie with his head (and occasionally his shoulders) hanging off it. On the other hand, my childhood dog, a GSD/Rough Collie cross, refused to part with his old wicker bed even when he was overlapping at all point despite curling as small as he could and even then he had to race the cat for it every night. The cat was very smug when it won and the dog had to sleep on the floor... or, more probably, the sofa.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Well, the old beds were all bought for Mollydog, who although not a large greyhound, was 28kg and had firm and ambitious views of personal space. And because I am not very good at estimating bed size, they would probably accommodate two Mollydogs, if Mollydogs were willing to share beds.

Whereas Rosie is 21Kg at most, and most of that is legs and although in theory Brythen is greyhound size, he's much more curly and squishy.

So, my hope was to reduce the amount of livingroom filled with beds, and make the beds slightly less of a hassle to move about.

But I think I shall not have to return the beds - Rosie came and sat in hers this morning quite unprompted!

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

She's just taking her time.

Our other dog (an English Toy Terrier) refuses to sleep anywhere but on the sofa or on a (human) bed. Luckily, he isn't mine, so I only get him occasionally on my bed when there is morning sun, and he can scatter the cats (and Bren, if he has come to spend an hour or so.)

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

28kg? Grief!

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

Why so quick to blame the dogs? Maybe the dogs are the one immutable constant in an ever-changing universe, and stayed exactly the same, but the beds changed. Perhaps the beds were scared and overwhelmed by being plucked from the safety of a shelf in a shop, and thrust into a scary new home, and went all shy and shrunken, but a night being smugged over by a Bungle restored their confidence, and they swelled.

The whole thing reminds me of Schnitzel Von Krumm's Basketwork, my favourite Hairy Maclary book:

He tried it for size;
there was room for his tum
but it didn't smell friendly
to Schnitzel von Krumm.
The basket was smart
and a much better fit -
was it cosy and comforting?
NO
not a bit.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

I now see that you beat me to it.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Maybe your dogs have been reading too much Robert Silverberg, and have decided to become metamorphs.

Or maybe your dogs are perfectly normal*, and it is the beds that are metamorphs.

*For a given value of "perfectly normal".

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

What a cute doggie face!