The Velocirabbit was a pretty relaxed creature overall. But one day my little sister walked in from a bike ride with her helmet tipped over her face. Bun screamed, ran away, ran into a wall, and hid behind the couch for hours. He never trusted her for the rest of his life.
Similarly, our cat Abby is alarmed whenever the silhouette of someone’s head changes. I used to have one of those knit hats with two cat ears on top, and whenever I wore it she would act as though I had come to kill her. Her tail would bush out and she would slink away with wide eyes. This past winter, we found out that the fear also applies to knit hats with a bobble on top.
The two medium-sized dogs I’ve had (Irish Setter and Golden Retriever) have had a fear of any thin box-shaped object standing on the floor… something like a suitcase or box fan, or a computer in a tower case.
If the spooky Monolith makes noise (like a computer or fan) watch out! Time to bark at it if anyone else is around. If no one is around to appreciate such bravado, time to do a commando-style stomach-crawl towards it with nose stretched as far forward as possible to smell what the darn thing is. If I shake the box like it’s alive, time to do a full-scale retreat and forget the women and children.
I can only imagine that as puppies these two dogs had narrow escapes with things like that tipping over when they went poking at it. Makes sense. I never saw it myself, though.
Pets are so cute that way, I wish I could scare myself stupid with something ridiculous like that. Sounds like fun!
For his owners I used to school a 17.3hh eventer. Thing was built like a bus – one of those half-Irish draft, half-thoroughbred numbers, the kind that took a good 20 minutes to get his motor going. If you really wanted to get his attention, you’d ask a bystander to whip out a Baker sheet and give it a wave. Not a Rambo. Not a Weathabeeta. Just the damn Baker in that classic plaid. If he happened to glimpse the Baker on the approach to, say, a Swedish the size of a firetruck, his brain would short, and you’d wind up with a really forward halt nowhere in the vicinity of “X,” followed by a Lipizzan-quality pirouette, three strides of canter, and, alas, take-off – with about two feet to spare over the Swedish.
Oh, and he got the lead change on (what was left of) the approach. A packer, I tell ya.
I have a dog, Bodhi, who I saved a dog from death row at my local pound. He’s an Australian Cattle Dog and he’s the smartest damned dog I’ve ever met, but he runs away at the sight of a newspaper. I’ve often wondered what his previous owner did to him to make him so scared of newspapers and my best guess is they rolled them up and hit him with it, so I try to read the paper when he’s not looking.
CadburyAngel, your cat Abby reminds me of a dog we had when I were still at school, a German Shepherd-wolf hybrid (the dog, not the school)…she was very protective of me, and extremely ferocious around strangers. I have always had long hair, and 99% of the time wear it loose, but one very hot day, I pulled it back into a long braid, went outside into the garden, and the next thing I know, this dog went berserk – she did not know who in the heck I was!
As soon as I spoke, of course, she went all embarrassed and goofy, the way dogs do when they’re trying to cover up a mistake…but now I understand why strangers who came to our house (my dad was a notary) would get out of their cars and immediately jump back in!
I’ve several dogs who have been puzzled, though not frightened, when they have seen me without my specs, although the current ones now know if they see me putting on my sunglasses, it’s time for a walk!
Snug: My golden sometimes goes ballistic at the sight of the mannequins in the shop windows near our place. It always cracks up the homeless people who congregate in the plaza there. One store had a giant cat display once, and I thought the poor dog’s head was gonna blast into outer space. He’s also terrified of lawn statues, rocking chairs, baby gates, and this one tall weird-looking lamp we have. My other dog, a Lab, once spent five minutes barking at a weed that pricked his nose when he sniffed it.
My dog is absolutely TERRIFIED of balloons. All types. Latex, mylar, blown up with helium or by breath, with a string, without a string… whenever one comes near her, she gets the saddest, most pathetic look on her face. She’ll lift her eyebrows up and look at the balloon, look away, quickly look back, look away, look back, etc. It’s so funny that I can’t help but torment her sometimes.
Said dog also has absolutely no problem with walking in front of a moving car.
Also, this is a bit off topic, but needs to be said to show how big of a weirdo this dog is - she loves to drag wet towels and washrags out of the bathroom and roll around on them.
Our cats are also afraid of balloons. Likewise with anything else that floats or is inflatable. Those plastic, inflatable toys that you get at fairs and circuses are the very essence of evil- to the cats anyway.
They are also afraid of each other. Sam and Zoe are afraid of Stella. Stella is afraid of Sam and Zoe.
All three cats are afraid of hamster balls. Put a hamster in a ball, put the ball on the ground, watch the cats dance around the room. VERY funny.
Stella is afraid of a pop (or soda, if you grew up not where I did) can full of pennies. But that’s because we taught her to be.
My cats absolutely freak out at the title card noise for New Line productions. Frozen in place, then ears back, eyes wild, then a mad dash to another room. Not so much if the sound comes from the TV, but when I’m watching a DVD, it’s hooked up to the stereo. This phenomenon was first noticed when watching the movie “Friday” a couple years back. And, since I’m a bad catmommy, when I saw their reaction, I had to replay the title card over and over until the movie had to go back to the rental place. Heheheh. I get unduly excited when a new movie comes from Netflix and it’s from New Line.
