Our Puppy Has Crossed The Line

I can tell I’m over it now because I fed Dale this morning without having to fight the urge to boot his ass into next week.

I’m no stranger to puppies so I’ve not been surprised by his constant chewing and property destruction… it kinda goes with the territory for the first couple of years, at least with Lab pups.  Last night was a true shocker though when I came home from softball (we won!)  to find that not only had he torn up a bunch of crap, pulled over a trash can and dragged everything out but he actually had jumped up onto my desk.  My desk is actually a drafting table so it’s quite high as compared to normal desks for computer work.  I like to stand most of the time so I can pace or whatever.  But enough about my own wierdness and back to the lucky-to-be-alive pooch.

He must have been prancing all over the desk because paw prints were everywhere but worst of all is that 3 of the keys on my laptop keyboard are completely gone with another one severely injured.  He even managed to type some characters into my jabber client that got sent to Joe and then a few more that never made it across the wire.  Can you imagine if I had a root shell open to one of my boxes and his paws managed “rm -r /”?  It’s not too far fetched considering his last transmission was “-i;./'”.

Today I need to make a decision and so far I can only think of three reasonable choices:  1) Get a crate and sentence him to confinement whenever I leave.  2) Run a wire across my backyard and attach him to it like a zip line so he can run a bit but not make it inside.  3) Take him back to a shelter.  Number 3 is basically off the table because my kids love him and even in my most upset frame of mind I don’t think I could do it unless he was aggressively biting people.  I’m leaning towards the crate because several folks I know swear by them, indicating their dogs love it.  I don’t know how anyone could love it but I’ve seen those happy dog faces behind bars more than once.

Some of you may be wondering about a potential option 4 which would be to simply lock him outside while I’m gone.   If I only had Dale I would do it in a hot second but I’ve also got 11 year old Sunshine who has been my best pal since I moved here almost 9 years ago.  He has always had full run of the yard, The Garage and the house while I’m gone.  I just can’t bring myself to punish him that way, especially in the later years of his life.

I have to admit that I would like to give him another shot at wide berth but not so much for his sake… I’d like to put a video camera up above my desk and record what occurs in my absence.  It must be an absolute circus.  And who knows, perhaps it’s Sunshine setting the little guy up.  I can just imagine Sunny knocking over the trash can knowing that Dale will get punished.  I envision Dale trying to put everything back into the can and telling Sunny (in dog speak of course… they’re not humans!) what an asshole he is for getting him busted while Sunny makes a dog version of a smirk, giving Dale the middle pad, if you know what I mean.

Next up is a trip to dell.com to get over-charged for a crappy new keyboard.  I hate taking laptops apart because they’re never quite the same once you break the seal.

One last note:  Something in the back right corner of my desk if making a deep-ish clicking sound from time to time as I type and it is driving me out of my F’in tree!  Whatever he did it seems to be somewhat permanent.  I may need to take everything apart and rebuild because if you think I’m a weirdo now I’ll be in dire need of a straight-jacket by the end of the day if the noise continues.  Option 5:  Dogskin hat and puppy stew… perhaps.