So last month, my sister got a new puppy and we named her Sally. It's my sister's dog, but since she's usually out of town during weekdays, I end up taking care of her and spending the most time with Sally.
And I must say, Sally is quite an interesting girl. I could probably write pages upon pages of stories about her, but I don't wanna be one of those annoying people who bores everyone by talking about their dog all the time. I thought I would share some of my favorite bits here though:
- Sally is a ghetto girl. When I was driving Sally back from the vet, John Mayer was playing in my car and she kept whining and looking at me with an angry stare. After a few minutes, I decided to put on some Soulja Boy, and believe it or not, she stopped whining completely. The rest of the trip, she quietly sat there and listened to "Crank Dat". My next step will have to be to teach her that stupid dance.
- Overall, she's a very tough little puppy. Then again, I imagine when you grow up with the name "Sally", inevitably you build up a lot of angst and a certain attitude of "me against the world". I guess I'll put it this way - she definitely would not be one of the dogs that Michael Vick ends up electrocuting.
There's been times when I've accidentally stepped on her paw when she runs under me, and she'll yelp for a moment, but less than 2 seconds later, she just bounces back and resumes running around randomly like nothing happened. Or when I take her outside and she sees other dogs, some of them maybe 5-10 times bigger than her, she has no fear and just goes barking and chasing after them relentlessly. I end up having to pull her back on her leash and pick her up in my arms, before she goes and gets herself eaten.
- Maybe the one thing Sally hates is baths. I think all dogs do. But after the first time I gave her a bath, she gave me attitude for like 2 days, which is a very long time in "Sally-time" (see the next point). She refused to look at me and didn't follow me around like she normally does, she just watched TV and sulked around.
- Sally has ZERO attention span. Not until she came along, did I fully understand why people say "you have the attention span of a puppy". She seriously has complete ADD. She'll be happily playing with her chew toy or watching TV or something, but as soon as she hears a noise or senses movement somewhere else, she's off to investigate. Or, if there's noise in the background like a lawn mower or air conditioner, and it suddenly stops, Sally will immediately freeze what she's doing and look around.
Sometimes when I walk across the room, she'll frantically run after me, but then accidentally run into her food dish before she gets close enough to bite my ankles. This seems to suddenly remind her that she's hungry, so she'll give up the chase and start eating her food (until the next distraction comes along). Other times, I'll be playing with her and as she's rolling around on her back, she just suddenly decides to stay there and fall asleep.
- Despite the ADD, she does like to sit there and watch me when I'm cooking or washing the dishes. I think it's so hilarious how she looks so intrigued by what I'm doing. I also appreciate that she's staying within my line of vision, though, so I know that she's not off peeing in the corner somewhere.
- I think Sally's starting to get protective of me. One morning as she was eating her breakfast, I decided to brush my teeth next to her, sitting on the couch. Apparently, the sound of my Sonicare made her think that I was being attacked by some sort of machine, so she started to bark at my toothbrush and trying to jump up onto the couch. Compared to other dogs, Sally doesn't seem bark that much, so she must have been pretty agitated. I thought that was sweet of her though. Dumb, but sweet.
- People make fun of me for having a small bladder, and I've even written about how I need to get myself checked out BPH or whatever. But I've never seen anyone pee more than this little troublemaker. There's times when I'll take Sally out to pee, she'll pee TWICE outside in my backyard - and then 10 minutes after I bring her back inside, she's left another little puddle on my kitchen floor. Sometimes I really hate that little biatch.
- On the plus side, Sally is a true Bears fan. I got her a Bears leash and she likes to play with my Bears hat. Also, after they came back to beat Philly this week, she was extra hyper. High-Five!
- My personal favorite Sally story is about her "punishment box". At first, whenever she misbehaved (peeing/pooping inside, chewing at cables, barking for no reason), we used to just scold her and put her back in her cage. But actually, you're not supposed to make your pet feel like their cage is a punishment, because she has to sleep there every night.
So as an alternative, we decided to use an empty cardboard box instead. We had a Petland box already with "air holes" in it, which seemed convenient:
The first time I put Sally in the punishment box, she put up so much fuss about it. I tried to ignore the noise and go watch TV in the living room, but for about 10 minutes straight, all I could hear was her whining, barking, and clawing at the box. At this point, I seriously wondered whether this box method was more of a punishment for Sally or punishing myself.
But finally, after what seemed like an eternity, all of the commotion suddenly stopped. No more barking, no more squealing, no more frantic scratching sounds. I thought to myself, "Great! Maybe Sally actually learned her lesson and is accepting her punishment."
So I get up to go let her out and give her a treat, and what do I see? The little bastard's wandering around the kitchen, just sniffing about and looking at me as if nothing happened. Apparently, she didn't "learn her lesson" at all - she just figured out how to jump out of the box!
I was pretty pissed off, but what can you do? The next time, I made sure to close the lid when putting her the punishment box.
As an addendum to the story, Sally has now chewed a hole in the side of the punishment box, only big enough to fit her head through so far. What can I say, the little psycho is out of control. I don't think this box is going to last very much longer.
