How Many Ways Can We Say "Naughty"

I had to wait a day to write this entry, mainly to compose myself and leave out the many many swear words that would have taken up space in many of the lines. Brutus was very naughty yesterday morning, there are just no two ways about it.

It started, admittedly, with an error on my part. Brutus woke up a little earlier than usual, and I got up to let him out to go to the bathroom. When I hooked him up to his outdoor tie, I hooked it onto the ring that holds his rabies and city tags instead of the heavy duty ring on his collar. My mistake, and a big one at that. After I hooked him up and let him out the door, I went downstairs to feed the cats. While I was feeding the cats, I heard this loud bang and a sliding noise. At first it startled me, but I figured it was just Brutus jumping off the steps upstairs, or brushing against the outside of the door.

After feeding the cats, I came back up to the kitchen to get Brutus's breakfast. I looked out the front door to check on him, and all I saw was his tie stuck on the corner of the steps, his tags laying in the driveway, and NO DOG. My heart sank. I was still in my jammies, but I threw on my slippers and headed out the door. He was gone. I grabbed some treats and his squeaky toy and started running. I went all around the house and down by the lake, but he was no where. I went back up to the house figuring I would have a much better view because it's up on a hill. When I got to the front door, I saw him go running through the neighbors yard across the street. I yelled for him to "COME" which only made him run away faster. Son of a "gun". What was I going to do? In my heart, I pretty much knew he would come home. The only reason that had me thinking he might not was his reaction to Don leaving the lake on Sunday night, which consisted of a day and a half of whining from the front step. Would the goof ball try to go home to Minnesota? Oh Dear God. Get that thought out of my head. Let's go back to thinking that he will come home.

When I saw him across the street, and running toward the woods in that direction, I figured I better get in my car just to make sure he didn't decide to run down the road that we normally walk (or the road that dad drove down). I drove back and forth on the road, but no sign of him. I also drove up the road the other way past all of my neighbors, and no sign of him there either. Now I was getting panicky. So, back to the house with the high vantage point.

I got to the living room patio doors, and where do I see him?? Swimming. Yep, Brutus is in the lake swimming about two neighbors down. This is not cool. I really don't trust him to not swim across the lake. This is a boy who loves to swim. So, I head back down to the dock with a bag of chicken strips. They are the ultimate treat to him, but you know what? Swimming means more. He saw me, and started to swim further away, so I went back up to the house, calling him for treats. Nope. Not gonna happen. Grrrr. This is where you could insert some of those swear words. Some time has gone by now, and I am getting pissed. I see him come out of the lake, and go running back toward the road, so I get back in the car. As I'm driving down the road, I pass our neighbor Bennie. Bennie says that he hasn't seen him, but he will give a look along the lake before he heads back to work. Bennie is Don's best buddy, and he is amazing! He looked for a good twenty minutes, and had no luck either, and finally had to leave.

I had had it, and made the decision to just wait it out in the house. I was so frustrated. I posted myself by the living room window, and I would see him swim by, and every now and then he would go running past. I would try to call him, but he would just take off faster. Apparently he had some energy to burn off.

After two hours, the "sweetie" finally knocked on the front door. I wish that I would have had my whits about me to take his picture. He was covered in mud from head to toe, and unfortunately, wood ticks. For any of you who know me, I don't do wood ticks. When I was younger, I took off a large hunk of skin out of my knee screaming and swiping at my leg to remove a wood tick. Now I was faced with a dirty hairy dog full of them. Oh....My.....God!

The first thing I did was lie to him and tell him what a good boy he was, and gave him a treat. Some people would have yelled at him and hit him. I try to understand that dogs don't have the capacity to reason like humans. Is he going to think "gosh, she's hurting me because I was naughty and ran away", or is he going to think "wow, I came home, she must be mad". Nope, I will praise him for coming home. I would like him to do it again. Then I hooked him up to the correct ring on his collar so I could get the guest bath (which is the only bathroom that doesn't require crossing carpet) ready, along with yucky towels, ear cleaner and the tweezers.

Once everything was ready, I took him through the garage and into the tub. The water instantly turned brown. And here's the grossest part. Some ticks were floating, and one started crawling up the tub wall. This was so absolutely disgusting. Brutus was pouting big time, and I really really didn't care!!! It took about forty five minutes, but I got my handsome boy back. And you know what? The minute he was all cleaned up he was right back at the front door wanting to go back outside.

I let him, but I didn't take my eye off him. Like I said in an earlier post, he may have gotten his graduation certificate at doggy school, but I think he needs to retake the class a couple times, and I definitely need to spend more time working with him. In the cities, he does pretty good, but I get him here at the lake, and it's like he's on drugs. There are so many distractions outside that he doesn't hear a thing I say to him. I think I need to rename each of his commands to the name of an animal. Maybe then he would listen. :)