Acrobatic Juno

Another dog in my past worth mentioning is Juno. He was not my family's dog, but rather my ex's parents' dog. Juno was a smaller breed rottweiler and incredibly agile.

He didn't like custard very much, and would actually run away from it. And this dislike is most likely the result of the following experience:

Once, my ex and I arrived back at his parents' house to find Juno particularly fond of his bed. He didn't run up to the gate to greet us as he normally did. And on closer inspection, he didn't look very well and was bleary-eyed. Then we found out why.

One of the female dogs was on heat, and Juno had been keeping the whole household awake with his cries to get to the female. Out of desperation to keep him quiet, my ex's mother had given him quite a bit of brandy in milk. The result was that Juno had a heck of a hangover the next day, and would never come close to brandy in milk or custard ever again!

Juno could jump. He would jump over fences, and once gave the neighbours quite a fright when he got into their yard this way. He would jump up and down at the gate, barking at strangers, and was obviously quite intimidating, because a lot of people walking by would cross to the other side of the road to go past the house.

Juno also liked to swim. And it was this combination of jumping and swimming that made him an acrobatic superstar. When he learnt how to, the only way for Juno to get into the pool was to jump in. And he could take some flying leaps, jumping across the breadth of the pool, and even jumping from the elevated platform by the deep end (as in the picture). And he loved it! He would jump in, just to climb out and jump in again.

Juno jumping into the pool by the deep end