I can tell he’s dying to say stuff. He looks at the door. He looks at me. He does a little dance. He looks at the door. He looks at me. If he could only speak. If he could only say, 'Take me outside, dammit! I want to chase cats ‘n stuff!’
He runs to his food bag. He runs back to me. He looks imploringly toward the kitchen where the food is kept. He runs and jumps up toward the food bag. He looks at me. He looks at the food. He looks at his bowl. “Why is my bowl empty when I’m clearly starving, you heartless wench!”
“Now scratch my belly and give me some lovin’!”
Who wants to chip in so that Angus can have a voice translator box thingie installed? It must be frustrating to be forced to play charades your entire life!
Our malamute “talks”, as it were – well, actually she “woo-s”, but 99% of the time she’s either just stating her opinion or wants something. And she EXPECTS you to answer!
It’s really hilarious sometimes. Out of the blue she’ll suddenly woo while staring at you. You can either woo back at her, talk to her as though she’s human (as in, “Yes, Missy, I agree/disagree/whatever wholeheartedly”), or play “20 Questions”. For example:
Believe me, having a talking dog is not all you think it would be.
I have a mala-mutt (malamute+heeler+ elkhound+?). She talks constantly when she wants something. Woo-woos, uma-umas, growls, whines, ruhr-ruhrs. I am not a morning person but several days I week I am followed around the house by this Wookie wannabe.
And she does it on walks. I tell her to heel - she heels and starts complaining about. Cracks passerby up but it’s kind of embarrasing.
Sounds great on my answering machine though - my friends messages start with laughter, telemarketers have a real long pause.
My labX Ladybug doesn’t talk often, but when she does, it cracks me up. Mostly it’s when she wants to play that she talks. She does this rowwrrrr-ruuhhr thing, like yesterday. We had her out in the boat, and we stopped to watch the ski show at Cypress Gardens. The people in the next boat had two little ankle-biter dogs and she was very verbal about wanting to go play with them. Fortunately their boat was too far away, and my lab doesn’t swim! :rolleyes:
My parents’ dog, Gracie (who is in fact Daddy’s Little Girl, despite weighing 70 pounds and being some kind of wolfhound/pitbull/godknowswhat mix), is very verbal. If you’re eating, and she wants some, she’ll sit in front of you and stare… and stare… and then finally bark at you. Just once. This apparently means, “Hey, Idiot, are you blind? I’m starving here, gimme that. Or I’ll get my Daddy.”
So Dad will turn around and say, “Oh, Gracie’s hungry!” and you give her whatever it was you were eating, and should it be something she doesn’t like, she looks at you like you’re a moron.
She’ll also grumble if she feels she’s not getting enough attention. Which is all the time, evidently, even though you’d be hard pressed to find a 15 minute span in the day in which she isn’t being walked, petted, played with or doted on in some way. If Daddy is on the computer, she sits by the chair and wurr-wurrrs at him. If everyone in the room is otherwise engaged and no one is available to play “tuggies” with her and one of her million toys, she’ll lay on the floor and wurrrrr some more.
I love that dog, despite the fact that every visit to my parents’ house leaves me sore and bruised (she did a flying body-check on me once and almost broke my nose-- Dad found this amusing!).
I’d love to hear what my dog could say if he could talk (ditto for the cat, just to show I’m not biased) but I imagine a dog’s limited memory could make for annoying conversations.
“Can I have a dog biscuit?”
“No, you just had one.”
“Will you scratch my belly?”
“Sure.”
“Can I have a dog biscuit?”
“No, you just had one.”
“Does the cat hate me?”
“Yes, but it’s not your fault.”
“Can I have a dog biscuit?”
snugs: I want to go back inside (as soon as he walks outside).
<i let him inside>
Snugs: I want to go back outside (as soon as he walks inside)…
<I let him outside, and leave the door open>
Snugs: This is so confusing, what do I do? I know!! I’ll go inside and bark at moe.ron. He’ll look confused and tell me to go back outside. That’ll be good for a laugh… then I’ll ask to go out of the other door.
Note: Cat behavior is similar, but replace in/outside with kitty treats and belly-scratching.
I swear one time my dog said my name. I’m not kidding, my mom was there, she can vouch for me. Actually, whenever my mom would drive me to school in the morning, we would take my dog, Griff, along with us. He always gets excited when you mention the word “car,” so we made it a point to say “Hey Griff, wanna go in the car?” a good five minutes before actually leaving so we could watch him. His tail would wag, he’d crouch down on his front paws, run up and jump, and make all these funny noises. One day, with the way he was moving and everything, the noises just said my name loud and clear. Quite a feat for a dog with no lips (he has lips, but like most dogs, I’m sure, even with his mouth fully closed, his teeth still show).
He still gets all excited and jumpy whenever you mention the car (he’s also learned the word “ride”), but we haven’t gotten him to say anything in English since.
This is the conversation I’d have with my dog all day:
Angus: Can I eat this?
Me: No.
Angus: How about this?
Me: No.
Angus: This?
Me: No
Angus: But what about this? Can I eat this?
Me: No.
Angus: This? Can I eat it?
Me: No.
Angus: This looks good, how about this?
Me: No.
Iiko Puppy-Dog Boy just says “rauw.” A lot. He doesn’t need to talk, but he knows a lot of words.
Do you want a biscuit?
He looks away.
Do you want a chew-chew?
He looks away.
Do you want some peanut butter?
He licks my face and then does a tight little circle on the floor.
Wunderhund Flash is a dog of few words. He’s only “said” a few things to me in his life.
The first time I saw him, in the shelter, he quite clearly said, “Hey… get me outta here!”.
The first time he met a cat, went up to say hello, and got punched in the nose (really- the cat didn’t even pop the claws- just whacked him in the nose), his reaction was, “What the hell was THAT?”
After a week of dogsitting for a friend, he crawled up into my lap (bear in mind he’s 70 pounds of lanky lapdog) and said, “Can Otis go home now, please?”
His lack of speech, though, doesn’t mean he couldn’t if he wanted to- his comprehension of the english language is pretty damn scary.
Two-Tone, on the other hand, never STOPS talking. “What’sthis? Where’sFlash? Ishehavingfunwithoutme? IsheeatingsomethingIshouldbeeating? Whyaren’tIalpha? GoawayFlash,MYturnonthebed! Where’sFlash? GoawayFlash,I’meatingnow…oh,I’llwait,nevermind.”
