Dog Sitting

Two days ago, I got a dog stuck in my hair.

Maybe some background will help.

Since last Friday, I've been dog-sitting for my next-door neighbor. His dog is a one-year-old chocolate lab named Daisy. Perhaps you can see where this is going.

We're playing right now, and mid-joyous jump on the squeaky ball, she remembered she needed to pee, and did so. Almost on the ball. Sometimes she gets up before she's finished and pees as she walks. Yesterday she peed on her leash.

*Mom * Last week she peed in the street, presumably from the sheer joy of seeing me as she went on her thrice daily walk. Dogs ALWAYS have to pee when they see me. You were probably too young to remember, but when we lived in Iowa we had this neighbor who had a weiner dog named Phoenix and whenever she saw us, she was scared and tucked her tail between her legs, the she peed in terror , then she realized, "I know these people and I just remembered that I LOVE THEM", then she would wag her tail in glee and flick pee all over everyone. Of course this was hilarious to her owners, but to us....not so much.

I think that's a rite of passage among weiner dogs. You're not really a weiner dog until you've tail-pee-flicked someone.

My legs are itchy from bugs, but if I leave to put sweatpants on, Daisy'll wake up the neighborhood. Oh well, moving on.

Because Daisy is a one-year-old lab, we have to lock her in the laundry room when we're not at her house.



I'm bleeding now. I should probably go put on some pants. I'm covered in bug bites, and- THERE IS ONE ON MY EAR. Why does that happen? My ear? Really? Anyway...

She's getting pushy about this whole 'play' thing. Nudging against my computer and squeaking the toy far too often. Every time she touches something with her face, she covers it in a fresh coat of slobber. My computer is no exception.

Where was I going with this? Right. Hair.

So, I feel bad if I leave her locked up for too long, but it gets too hot too quickly for her to hang out outside with us for any length of time, so I'll go over to her house and watch a movie in the basement, keeping an eye on her tearing around the house.

And I'm not being soft. I'll come over to let her out, and she'll have rearranged the enclosure she'd been kept in, covering the drain next to her cage, and extending the cage into the next room, all the while destroying everything she can reach.















It's become an adventure to go over there in the afternoon.

She's already destroyed two rolls of paper towels that my neighbor had left for me in the case of any accidents. This dog managed to destroy a Kong squeaky thing. That's where the ball we're currently playing with came from. Also, it used to be my dog Bailey's toy, but she doesn't care anymore.

Two nights ago, Mom and I were hanging out in Daisy's basement, trying to wear her out before putting her to sleep. I was making weird noises and faces, and just kind of messing with her, and of course she was going insane because of it. In a fun, puppy-like way.

Then I made the mistake of messing with her ears a little.

She veered right when I did this, connecting our heads with way more force than I would've liked. After switching to tackling me, it became apparent that something was wrong. My hair hurt, and Daisy couldn't get off of me. I was laughing too hard to really communicate my distress, but I eventually got my mom to understand that something was wrong and it had something to do with my head.

In the throes of playing with Daisy, my hair had gotten caught in her pincher collar, which of course she doesn't understand. When she realized she couldn't get away from me, the only logical step for her to take was to try harder. Which she did.

It took both of us to get Daisy calm, and my hair free, but we eventually did without ripping it out of my skull.

Also, there's a bee flying around my head, a spider somewhere on my chair, and a mosquito just landed on my finger. I'm so done with Summer nature, and it's only June 9th. dddddddddddddddd. <= That was Daisy. Now I have to clean her slobber off my keyboard.

Little Brown Dog

As with any cliched household, there is a dog in ours. This is that dog:

There was once a cat as well, but it didn't take. *Girl Note* He tried to eat me. On multiple occasions. We sent him to the farm, which isn't a euphemism in this case. We actually took him to my grandparents' farm, where he cowered under a step for two days, then ran away. For the last two years we've been trying to train the dog on the invisible fence. When on her tieout, she won't go near the perimeter. This causes stupid humans to smugly say "Yay! We did it! The dog is trained! Wooo! No more going outside in the rain to find the damn tieout! No more digging in the snow to find the damned thing! NO MORE!!!"...and we unhook her. She immediately says (in dog) "SCREW YOU SUCKERS! I. AM. OUTTA HERE!!!!" ....and she disappears with one yelp as she crosses the line in a joyful brown blur with bouncy ears. This is a problem since she does not find it worth the pain to cross back and come home. Even though that is where we keep the food. So.

Today, the dog escaped. We had been outside a lot doing yardwork. Every time we worked in a different part of the yard, we moved her tieout so she wouldn't be all bitchy about being far from her people. I think she was getting really confused though, as every move involved her finding ANOTHER SPOT where she could get shocked. Later, after we had moved her inside, she sneaked out and we were all like "oh crap...now we have to be responsible pet owners and act like we're going out to find her..." even though chasing her is the LAST thing we should do because she LOVES that game.

But lo! What's this? She has not left the yard! How could it be? She seems to think we will be herding her inside. She will not come near the humans but instead is hauling ass around the yard, tongue flapping in the wind, little doggie smile on her little doggie face. I try to give her a treat to reward her for being such a GOOD DOG and she comes to within two centimeters of me then goes skitting away like a little canine water bug. She is running laps.

*Girl talking now* Mom can't type right now, as the Little Brown Dog, as we tend to call her, has inconvenienced her. We started a fire in our little fire pit, and as an animal, she was not a fan. However, she really likes being by her people, so she decided to give the terrible patio a try. She slinked around from person to person for awhile, looking timid and frail, then moved to Mom. Slowly working her way up the chair, she placed a paw at a time on the footrest, then held position, again looking timid. We thought about stopping her, but as we decided all day, we said, "what the hell, let's see what happens." Well, Little Brown then moved to her back paws, then to the chair, sticking her big brown face in Mom's excessively laughing one, and finally brought it all to a close by awkwardly snuggling into her lap, laying down, and looking like a very strange farm animal.

Like a goat, or something.

I don't know. She was eating flowers earlier, so that fits.
She just dismounted, nearly front-flipping, and is testing the invisible fence's boundaries again. Back to you, Momma.

The dismount only got a 3.6. It was bad. At this point I need to share that LBD weighs like, 40 pounds. She is so not a lapdog. So as of now she has tested all the boundaries and appears to have had the dog equivalent of Helen Keller's water moment. "OMG...if I don't cross this line right here, not only will I be pain-free, but my humans will let me have the run of the yard! I totally OWN this place! Bwahahaha!" I can almost see the light bulb pulsating ever so dimly in her little head. In the morning we'll see just how much of this she remembers. Wish us luck!

*Girl Next Day Note* It worked! So far, she has done nothing but scour the perimeter, searching for a way out. But there is no way, LBD. You can't escape. Muahahaha!
Eh, it's a good morning after a good day.