Who Can Blog When You're in School?!

School Work Has Got Me Busy!

As I may have mentioned, I've been in school since October. I'm taking enough classes that I'm considered part time. These classes are 8 weeks and I'm taking two at a time. This past 8 weeks I took a writing class and figured that I should share some of what I wrote! Hope you enjoy this interlude!

Dogs - Give an Inch, They'll Take the Bed

Zoe. I had a hard time naming her. I wanted to give her the name of a goddess. After all, a Great Dane should have a great name – Athena, Hera, Persephone. Thankfully, I was convinced by a friend to give her an earthlier name. I say thankfully because she never would have lived up to any of those legendary names. Zoe is a big dog, with a big heart, but not a very big brain. To be fair, she is intelligent. It’s just a very slow sort of intelligence. Looking at her, you can almost see the cogs turning behind her eyes. Tell her to sit and it takes about ten seconds for the signal to go from her brain to her hind legs, and then another ten seconds for her bum to hit the floor.

It took forever to house train her. Partially, this was due to the breeder’s complete ignorance of the subject. Zoe and her litter mates lived for their first three months in a room where they could do their business anywhere, anytime. Attempting to teach her to alert me, I attached bells to the door. I rang them every time I took her out. A couple of months passed and she made no moves to ring them on her own. There were times that she hit them with her tail, but I couldn’t be sure that it was intentional. The tail-ringing graduated to body-checking, and then finally to nose-nudging followed by an expectant look. Only then did I know she had gotten it.

However, what I hadn’t anticipated was how she would decide to use the bells. She started ringing them to go outside, but not just to do her business. Every five minutes, she would ring and look at me, ring and look, ring and look. Occasionally, I would ignore her. She had just gone out. There’s no way she had to again. But, accidents happened and I was forced to let her out whenever she rang. There was also a bell on my bedroom door, for middle of the night urges. I would awaken countless times to take her out, grumbling the whole way.

Then, Zoe took things to a whole new level with the bells. She started ringing them for her meals. She would ring the bell, look at me and then at the bowl. If I failed to understand, she would do it again, and again, and again. After a while, it seemed as if she could tell time, too, because she would do it at exactly the same time, every night. She also started ringing the bells in the bedroom if she wasn’t happy with her sleeping arrangement. There were nights that my girlfriend would be in bed with me, and her two dogs in the room with us. If another dog was on Zoe’s dog bed, she would ring the bells, pace to me and then back to the door. If she was upset at not being on the bed with me, she did the same. The ringing and pacing deprived me of hours of sleep.

Looking back, I probably should have taken my girlfriend’s advice. She told me that anything I let Zoe do as a puppy would continue once she was fully grown. I loved letting her sleep beside me on the nights I was alone. She would curl up on one half of the bed, back towards me, the fuzzy little spoon. If I didn’t pet her, or stopped petting her, she would raise her head and nudge at me, begging for more. She would nudge more persistently and let out rumbling sighs if I didn’t comply. Now that she’s one hundred pounds and over three feet tall, she tries to take up even more of the bed. As soon as I start to lie down, she flops down next to me, and stretches out her long legs. If I don’t lie precisely in the middle of the bed, she will gladly take up all the space that is available, as well as all the covers.

Thankfully, Zoe has also learned, very slowly, what my limits are. “Wait” means that it’s too early for her to eat. “No” means that the revolving door is closed for the evening. She has even learned my physical cues – when my arm goes under the blankets, petting time has stopped and it’s time to sleep. When I pull at the blankets, she move and give me some room. She even knows that it’s not breakfast time until after I’m showered and dressed. I love her very dearly and she does have my heart. However, I’m very thankful that she has finally learned that she does not run my house, nor own my bed.