Since I started working outside of the house again I have found that the little rental dog has regressed to pooping upstairs while I am away. When she came to our house from my parents she was not fully trained and had also suffered numerous losses and changes to her routine. I cut her some slack but there were times when I really thought I was going to be dropping her off at the animal shelter because she just didn’t seem to be “getting it”. When we moved to this house a year ago she miraculously changed her ways and has never had one accident. Until now.
I have found a few ‘presents’ in the last couple of weeks. I went back to training mode by holding the gift to her nose, scolding her with a big “bad dog” and sending her outside.
Last night when I got home from work both dogs were huddled on the deck in the rain. The son had let them out when he got home from school, about three hours before. I let them in and went upstairs to check my email. While I’m waiting for the computer to find the wireless the big dumb dog follows me upstairs with the daughter right behind. The daughter and I are talking while I am checking my mail, she is behind me and I can not see her face. She shouts in a very loud voice that the big dumb dog has to poop. I turn around and lo and behold the big dumb dog is taking a dump right in the doorway. About three feet from where I am working. I’m horrified!
This dog knows better, he has been sitting outside for three hours and worst of all I have been blaming the other dog for this mistake. I grab the big dumb dog in midpoop and drag him downstairs and outside where I reprimand him with a wagging finger for several minutes. He just sits there looking at me with the big droopy eyes and his ears back. He knows he was a bad dog. I leave him outside while I go find the rental dog and apologize to her for blaming her for his bad deeds. It slowly occurs to me that I have been reasoning with not one but two very stupid dogs and they probably have no idea what I am trying to communicate to them.
There’s a Far Side cartoon that shows what we say (“You’ve been a very bad dog, Rex, and I think you should stay outside!”) versus what they hear (“Blah blah blah blah blah Rex blah blah blah blah blah!”).
I used to have that one posted on my fridge. I read somewhere that dogs have a pretty extensive vocabulary…for dogs. I think they know there name but if you call them another name with the same happy tone they still come when called. They know the word Outside and they know the word Bad, at least my dogs do. Can they put them all together and understand the sentence is the question…It would appear that mine cannot.