Today is my wife, Lauren’s birthday. On this, her special day, I am at a client’s site in North Carolina while she stays home. She was home alone for most of the day until the kids got home from school. She tells me that she did have lunch with her friend Sandra, so at least she had some fun.
Due to a perfect storm of events, I was unable to buy her a special gift for her birthday. Yes – I suck. Since I’m not there, I can’t even take her out to dinner. I decided to do something a little different for my lovely wife’s birthday. I decided to write this for the world to see. (more…)
After reading so many glowing reviews of the Gentle Leader, we bought one and took Annie out in the yard to give it a try. More accurately, Lauren took Annie while I took the camera. Somehow I knew this would be an event worth recording.
The Gentle Leader is much like a halter for a horse in that it wraps around the dog’s snout and head. Though some people mistake it for a muzzle because of the way it looks, the dog’s mouth is free to open with a Gentle Leader. The leader works because the leash is attached under the dogs nose. Where the nose goes, so goes the dog. At least that’s how it works on paper.
As with most things involving Annie, this was not to go as planned. Lauren got the Gentle Leader on her, and Annie promptly set to scraping it off with her paw. We figured it was too tight, so we re-read the instructions while Annie furiously pawed at her face in a vain attempt to remove the foul restraint. Though we felt that it was properly applied, we loosened the harness a bit just in case. She still didn’t like it, but at least she stopped pawing.
Lauren clipped the leash on and started to walk. Walking with Annie was not a pleasant experience – hence our experiment with the Gentle Leader. Annie’s lack of manners was our fault of course. We had not yet spent enough time with her, so she hadn’t learned the rules. Lauren had walked with her every day, but Lauren isn’t quite as strict as me. That’s not to say that she didn’t do well, but rather that Annie didn’t yet respect her as the one true alpha female.
As Lauren and Annie started to walk, the excitement began. Annie took a couple of steps, then jumped into the air spiraling like a dolphin at Sea World. When she landed she shook her head trying get the infernal straps off of her head. She reared up on her hind legs, bucking like a stallion.
“I don’t think she likes it”, I said, chuckling.
“Ya’ think?” was Lauren’s only reply.
The Gentle Leader is marketed as the five minute attitude adjuster. After five minutes Lauren got her to stop bucking and writhing, but I wasn’t entirely convinced of Annie’s newfound manners. We decided to give her a break and took the harness off. Annie’s plan had come to fruition. Sensing the long awaited freedom from her binds, Annie erupted into a full-blown heebie-jeebie running fit. Apparently she wasn’t tired after all.
She ran in the yard, bounced off of the fence and the trees, then headed straight for the mud. We had been having a drainage problem on one side of the yard, so we had worked with Annie on the dry side to avoid it. The muddy section was only about 10 feet by four feet, and was in the rarely used corner of the yard behind the patio. Our fenced yard was almost an acre in size, so the muddy area wasn’t even visible from where we had been working. Annie knew well where it was though.
“Annie No!” I yelled. She could not have cared less. She ran to the mud, then stood there as her feet slowly sank in. I imagine that she enjoyed the way the cool mud squished between her toes. She just stood there and stared at me. She knew she was being bad – she just didn’t care. After soaking for a few seconds, she started to pull her feet out of the mud one by one and then put them down. A rude slurping sound accompanied each foot and she lifted it out. I think she liked that too. Slurp… Squish….
“Annie! Get out of the mud!” Slurp… My commands fell on uncaring ears. As if knowing what I was thinking, she slowly – deliberately – laid herself down in the mud. All the while she stared at me with obvious defiance. Squish…
“Annie! No!” Still she stared. She knew I wouldn’t come into the mud to get her. Her belly now in the wet sloppy mud, she went for the checkered flag and put her head down with a final defiant squish.
One word echoed in my head. It started as a whisper, but had steadily increased in intensity. It wasn’t a nice word when misused, but it applied, and its double meaning appealed to my literary sensibilities. My eyes narrowed as Annie watched. Her head slid forward as she anticipated my next word. Overcome with frustration and resolved to let her know it, I let loose the word. In a low voice that only Annie could hear I growled, “Bitch!”
That’s what Annie had wanted all along. She had succesfully pushed by buttons and she knew it. Once the line had been crossed, she got up from the mud with a slurp, then ran at me at flank speed. Anger turned to fear as I considered the possibility of 100 pounds of muddy Landseer Newfoundland taking me down. On the video that I was shooting, there was a noticeable lack of my previous resolve as I exclaimed “Oh crap!”
She veered off at the last second and ran to the opposite end of the yard. Lauren, her part in the training debacle since complete, stood on the deck and laughed.
The score as it now stands is Annie: 1, Gentle Leader: 0. A rematch has not yet been scheduled.
Annie likes butter. No that’s not accurate; Annie loves butter. We’re not sure why. All we know is that she once she had a taste of it she’s done everything in her power to get more.
We have had whole sticks of butter disappear from the kitchen counter while Lauren prepared dinner. It doesn’t matter where on the counter the butter was placed. She can get it from the farthest reaches of any flat surface.
We have had entire sticks of butter deftly snatched from the refrigerator door while someone was busy reaching for something else. I would usually enter the scene with the kids chasing Annie while she trotted around the house with her tail in the air and a stick of butter hanging from her mouth. As I’d watch in the typical bewilderment of a confused father, snippets of the song Yakety Sax would echo in my head.
Annie will often sit next to someone at the dinner table, leaning against them while begging for affection. Being a clever girl, she picks the person who’s either near the butter, or who is eating something with butter on it. She will often sit next to one of the kids while they enjoy their summer corn on the cob. They’ll give her some pets, eat some corn, then when they’re not looking, Annie will lean in, reach out with her long tongue and take a leasurly lick of the salty melted stuff.
Annie, being part ferret, can lean her head over backwards and to the side to get the precious butter. She will sit next to someone who is not eating a buttered treat, then contort herself over to the person next to them when no one is looking. It’s like having a black and white octopus at the dinner table. Those of you with resident octopuses will know what I mean.
Sometimes our Annie has no patience for subterfuge. On these days she will use the shock of a frontal attack to her advantage. Lauren will be sitting opposite me at the end of the table. The butter will be near the edge, being the last item to be placed since it’s (barely) safer on the counter. After we all sit down and start eating, Annie will just walk up and lick the butter right there in front of God and everyone. Since we’re usually waiting for some sort of sly maneuver, she sometimes gets a couple of licks in before Lauren yells “Hey!” and snatches the butter away. Annie then slinks off to plan her next move while the rest of us laugh.
Part of the problem is that while the person who’s butter gets licked is usually quite offended, the rest of us laugh like idiots. I guess we’re all just enablers in this house. I find it interesting that these shenanigans rarely happen on my side of the table though. Annie knows who the Alpha is in this house – at least when I’m looking. Of course we’re all eating freshly licked sticks of butter so I guess the joke is on me.
