Hullabaloo

I live with 2 dogs.

One dog (dog #1) is a hyper Aussie who takes it upon herself to be on top of all the action in the house, no matter what time of day or night of variation in between. She is constantly in the middle of whatever action is taking place in the house, unless it's time for bed, at which point she jumps onto the bottom bunk in the kids' room and proceeds to take up most of the space not occupied by the body pillow and multitude of stuffed animals. She's a rescue doggie we picked up several years ago from a lovely woman who didn't want to let her go, but who had adopted another Aussie and he was getting all up in our dog's face and generally causing her no end of anxiety with his bully ways, so she gave up the nice dog knowing that the bully dog that she didn't really like wouldn't be adoptable because he was a "boss" dog. I thank her for this, because our dog is a good one, a keeper, even if she IS eight kinds of spazzy excitability. She doesn't bark all that much (only when someone comes to the door, for which I thank her), and is a great companion for the kids, letting them lay on her or use her as a footstool or whatever.

Dog #1's only real weirdness is chasing lights. Yes. Lights. Flashlights are an incredible source of entertainment for her - she chases the beam of light across the floor and up the walls and wherever she can find it. She also becomes mezmerized and confused by the reflections of the Christmas ornaments on the walls, and whines anxiously when they shimmer and move. It's hard to walk her at night, because the headlights of oncoming cars are an invitation to a chase. "Must get the lights!" she thinks. "They're dangerous and must be caught!" Sigh. We've tried to train her out of this bit of annoying behavior, but to no avail - the lights are her special enemy in this world, or her special toy, and there's no getting over that bit.

The other dog is a mystery breed/blend of dog that came out, in his case, as a nice medium-sized pooch of white and tan splotches and lovely floppy ears and a very VERY laid-back personality. We adopted him so dog #1 could have a pet. Seriously. Before dog #2 came on the scene dog #1 was driving us all nuts with her need for constant attention, so we got another dog to keep her occupied. I know, it's a little crazy but it's worked out pretty well.

I think he's taught her how to nap, because mostly that's all he seems to do. Day, night, afternoon, he's sleeping. He's more cat than dog in this aspect. He doesn't care about getting to his bed, either; the middle of the kitchen floor will do nicely, thankyouverymuch, because it's simply too much effort to walk the 10 feet to his $30 bed to take the much-needed eleventy-billionth nap of the day. He even lies down to eat, for Pete's sake, and has apparently taught dog #1 that particular little trick. He sleeps with me at night, waiting until I get the covers over me before hopping up to take his place against my back, hoping, I'm sure, to gain a little warmth by proximity.

Dog #2 has one teeny tiny little drawback. He has a very very BIG voice. Which he uses. A lot. He's in best voice first thing in the morning, when the first person in the house arises, even if it IS too damned early to be awake but said person is getting up to go into work early while the rest of the family sleeps in their nice warm beds on their VACATION week (mutter mutter mutter).

The typical scenario goes thusly:

Person stirs from nice warm bed and begins the shuffle toward the coffee pot. Dog #2 notices that the warm lump beside him in bed is no longer there, and slides down to the floor to track person down. Once he finds the person, he begins to express his glee.

"BAROOOOOO!" bellows dog #2, in his basso profundo hound voice. "BAROOOO! You're up! You're up! Happy day! Oh JOY!" Waggy-waggy the tail, then bellow again while running up and down the hall in canine ecstasy. Hooray! The day has started! Let's wake up sister dog and start to growl and play! Let's careen around the house and shake our collars and jangle our tags and bellow some more! Whoopeee!!! Baroooooo!!!!

All the while the person is shushing and cussing and telling him to please shut up before he wakes up the rest of the house, but to no end. The joy must be expressed, the energy must be expended, the day must be greeted in this exuberant fashion. The world is too fine a place to be quiet in!

And then, 5 minutes later, he takes a nap.

Damned dog.