Little Red Beasties

Usually, the first thing I do when I get home is to potty the dogs.  Sometimes, I potty myself first. And, rarely, I sit down and rest for 10-15 minutes before I do anything else. Today was one of those rest days. Now, the problem with resting before dealing with the dogs, is that they get all ramped up with excitement and frustration and energy and then are a million times worse to handle. Today was definitely one of those days. Being smart enough to know that pottying them at the same time when they’re this ramped up is a bad, bad, bad idea, I pottied Cricket first. Then I blocked her in the living room, while I attended to Sassafras.

Now, Cricket has been here long enough (holy crap, almost 5 months!) that she understands pottying routines involve sitting calmly to put on the collar, sitting calmly to put on the leash, sitting calmly while the door opens, and not pulling my arm out of my socket at any point. Sassafras, however, is still learning these things. I consider it a victory if Sass can hold her sit for 2 seconds. At this point, I can’t really ask for more than a 2 second sit, because her butt is not capable of remaining on the floor for any longer than that. She has at least learned that much. After a couple minutes of being ignored, she’ll wriggle herself into a sit for her collar. After a couple more minutes of being ignored, she’ll wriggle herself into another sit for her leash. She can almost wriggle herself into a sit for the door, but I call it a victory if she can at least manage to stop wriggling for a couple seconds. Sassafras definitely pulls my arm out of it’s socket. 

So. This evening, after resting myself for a few minutes and pottying the nice, calm Cricket, I prepared myself to face down Sassafras, the Little Red Beastie. She wriggled. She wraggled. She kind of tried make her butt touch the floor, but it was a particularly difficult struggle tonite. We managed to get out the door, complete her pottying, and come back in for supper. After supper we enjoyed more relaxing time, with dogs in separate rooms. Post-supper relaxation time is followed by turn-the-living-room-into-a-race-track time, at which the dogs excel. 

Unfortunately, I foolishly forgot to pick up Cricket’s toys before releasing the Little Red Beastie. The toys are only a problem because Sass shreds plushy toys (of which Cricket has 1 right now), steals chew bones (of which Cricket has 2), and is obnoxiously loud and annoying with squeaky toys (of which Cricket has 1). As I began to release Sass from the collar and leash, I realized my mistake with the toys, and tried to halt the release. I was unsuccessful. Sass, trailing her leash, dove at the toys. I dove at Sass. And, Cricket dove at both of us. Cricket does love a good game of pounce and chase. Sass, of course, got the squeaky plush Alien toy. I managed to snatch that from her as she galloped by. I was trying to decide whether to gather up as many toys as I could grab, which was several, or gather up Sassafras, which would not have been easy, as they both sailed past me again. I grabbed the toys, and then took an opportune moment to step on Sass’s leash as she galloped by me for the bazillionth time. Have I mentioned I was barefoot? I was. Of course, I managed to get the leash stuck between my pinky toe and the next toe (is that the ring toe?), and Sass wrenched it as she came up short. I jumped in the air to release my foot, and Sass, who had bounced back against me after finding the end of the leash, stomped hard on my foot and dug in with her toenails to facilitate a fast escape. Now trying to stay upright with an incapacitated left pinky toe, and a bleeding right foot, I bellowed at Sassafras to Come. Here. Now. She did. She flung herself full speed, full body, full force at me and nailed me in the right shin.  For the record, Cricket was sitting on her bed in the corner watching it all unfold and being pretty sure she did not want to be involved with the bellowing human. 

As punishment, I sent Sassafras to her room, shoved her in her crate, and went to nurse my injuries. Sassafras, of course, escaped from her crate-prison. A crate prison which would have contained Cricket, or even Colyn (and Colyn was a dog who dug a hole in a linoleum floor, and destroyed a couch), but crate-prisons cannot stop Little Red Beasties. After getting Sass settled down again, I let the two girls play. I did keep all my body parts safely in another room behind a gate to avoid any further injury. Not that the gate really slows down Sassafras. Little Red Beasties have no respect for gates. At least, not when they’re casually leaned up against a doorway. And casually leaned up a doorway is just fine for Cricket, and was always 100% effective for Colyn. The only thing I can glean from this is that vicious, monster GSDs are really wimps. Little Red Beasties are not wimps. Little Red Beasties are persistent and demanding. 

For instance, if Cricket signals that she needs to go out, and I try to take her out without Sassafras, then Sassafras will demand to join us. During her 3 (or is it 4 already?) weeks with us so far, I always put Sassafras in her room behind a closed door when I take out Cricket alone. Didn’t want to provide any chances for escape. Today, I got lazy and decided it couldn’t possibly be that bad to leave Sass gated in the living room while I took out Cricket. And, at first, it wasn’t too bad. Sass whined and barked and acted like a baby. Then I heard her bark from my bedroom, which meant she had crashed a gate. (The bedroom is the safety zone for the cats.) I tried to hurry Cricket along, but every time she started to potty, she became distracted by Sass’s barking. Then I heard Sass’s barking in my room stop, and I thought, oh, crap, Sass has crashed the gate blocking the bathroom and is right now enjoying a buffet of cat litter. So gross. 

I gave up on Cricket doing any pottying and hurried back to the door. Where I found Sassafras grinning out at us. I had, at least, had the presence of mind to close the sliding door rather than only the screen door. I looked at Sassafras, collarless and full of mischief. I slid the screen door open barely enough to shove Cricket through, which was a hopeless attempt to contain Sassafras. As soon as the sliding door started to open, she threw herself at it, and through it, and was free. I, of course, tried to grab her by any body part available, was unsuccessful, but did manage to drop Cricket’s leash so Cricket could join the escape. For just a few moments they circled the deck and I thought maybe all could be saved. I was wrong. Sass flew off the deck steps, Cricket made to follow her, I stepped on Cricket’s leash (at least I was wearing sandals at that point) and stopped her. I yelped at Sassafras, who looked back at me, grinned, and galloped off. I shoved Cricket in the house, had to run into Sass’s room for her slip lead, and barreled back outside to hunt her down. To my delight, the Little Red Beastie was busy pooping in the middle of the yard. To my not-delight, she finished before I could get the lead on her. She then proceeded to gallop around and around me, just out of reach. I nearly fell over 3 times trying to grab at body parts. Finally, after being threatened with providing stew meat for supper, Sass slunk down on the ground and let me catch her. 

Both dogs are now blocked in the living room and have been wresting nearly non-stop since.