February 7, 2007

Dogs Are Strange Little People

Well my dog is in the dog house. Well not really since he is an inside dog but you know what I mean.

I was gone for several hours yesterday and he decided to have a party while mom was away.

He has a tissue fetish. Don't ask me why, he just does. He won't get into the kitchen trash but the bathroom and bedroom waste baskets are fair game. He picks out the tissues, he won't touch anything else, and shreds them into confetti.

He's not supposed to get on my bed and I keep my bedroom door closed when I'm away because that's the only time he will try to get on it. Well he managed to push the door open yesterday and got on my bed. He loves all over our pillows and gets them quite nasty.

He won't, under any circumstances, potty or tinkle in the house but the garage, he has decided, is not really inside. Being a male, he feels the need to mark his territory and will every once in a while tinkle in the garage. We have a fence built around the garage door to keep him out of the main garage area for safety reasons. We have two doggie doors, one in the house/garage door and the other in the outside/garage door. This way he can go outside whenever he needs to.

Yesterday he made tissue confetti, wallowed on Mama's bed and had a garage peeing good time.

He's almost eight years old and the older he gets the more set in his ways he gets. I guess he figures he's older than we are in dog years and he's going to do as he darn well pleases.

If I tell him before I leave, "Don't get in the tissues, don't pee in the garage and don't get on Mama's bed," he won't do any of those things; but he has to be reminded those are no-no's. He'll look at me like, "Oh darn, I was going to do that too and now you messed me up by telling me not to."

It's kind of like the little devil that used to sit on Flip Wilson's shoulder. I'm the angel telling him not to do those things but there's that little devil with an over powering voice that tells him it's happy-fun-time.

He used to mind my husband and grown sons. But now that he's an old man he only pays attention to me. They'll say, "Basil, get down." Basil just ignores them. But if Mama tells him he falls all over himself minding.

He's really a good dog and I hope I haven't led you to believe otherwise he just has these week moments where he can't control himself, kind of like an evangelical preacher. :0)