a really bad morning
I was going to write this cheery post with pictures from the state fair but I’m sure that you would much rather read about my morning from hell and how there was blood, and pee, and poop, and yes, perhaps even some tears. Oh and sweat, definitely sweat… and bloodcurdling screams too, but of the doggy variety. Not to worry, no one dies and the physical injuries are minimal, the psychological trauma though is deep.
Settle in, get some coffee - oh how I wished that all of this had just happened AFTER I had a cup of coffee - this is a pile of nasty things happening but I must keep them all straight and in the right order or I truly will go mad.
There are dragons in our back yard, or perhaps aliens or some other type of monster. They only appeared a few months ago and only one and a half dogs can see them or sense their evil presence. I say half dog because Hombre seems to sense them when it is time to pick a spot for leg lifting but strangely they are not present when it is time to race to the back wall and bark hysterically at a cat walking by.
Chica though, she will not set one dainty paw off the terrace for any kind of enticement. If forced by the cruel strategy of putting a leash on her and pulling, she screams the banshee scream of the dying and doesn’t stop until she is safe on the terrace again. This doesn’t leave her any acceptable - to me - place to ‘do her business’, except the roof. She has not used the roof consistently in the last few months and we can safely say that this has driven a wedge between us, I do not look fondly on her gifts by the front door.
Recently she has decided that the roof is no longer an acceptable place for business doing, she’s happy to be out there but it is pristine when she leaves, I know this because I have become a stalker of her business.
So, last night I left the dog door to the roof open all night so that either or any of them could instantly heed the call of nature in the proper place. All night, that plastic flap in the dog door was flapping and the mosquitoes must have rhythm because they seem to have been able to time an entrance. So, I woke up burning and itching from bites, turned on the lights, killed bloody insects on my new white sheets, slept an hour and repeated.
I got up earlier than I care to, showered, put on clean clothes, got prepared for a meeting later in the morning - all this while that dog door flapped and all 3 dogs went in and out onto the roof. When I was ready to go downstairs I did notice that the roof was very clean, not a stain, pile or dribble. On the way down, Chica takes a big crap right in front of the guest room door on the terrace. Mother of God, I couldn’t believe it. I yelled at her and went on down to make some coffee. When I opened the door to let the cats in, she snaked in past me and ran into the living room.
It was just too much, I was going to win, she was NOT going to be in the house with her pooping ways. I went and grabbed her by the collar and started dragging her to the door. She screamed, oh my bloody hell did she scream. She screamed as if a legion of demons were sticking red hot pokers into her eyeballs. She also projectile peed… on me. I grabbed her by one front and one back leg - we used to call it the drunk carry in my working days - and carried her peeing and pooping and screaming the screams of a thousand demons towards the door. She scratched me and so I had blood running down my arm, pee all over my front, poop in my shoe… as we rounded the corner into the kitchen I spotted Gabi the housekeeper who had just walked in.
Some of you may remember that I have COPD. Breathing hasn’t been easy the last couple weeks, perhaps the high humidity or the medication isn’t working as well. After all this exertion, drama, anger, blood, pee, poop and tears - I couldn’t breathe well enough to talk so I couldn’t explain anything to Gabi. I just kind of waved my hand around at the whole mess and panted. She looked around again and went off to change into her work clothes, the antics of gringas must be more than she cares to understand.
I still thought I had an appointment with this pond guy so I went back upstairs to have yet another shower. I cleaned up the poop, and most of the pee in the living room first, there are just some things I can’t ask anyone else to do for me. Then I cleaned up the poop on the guest room terrace and then I went up to see the lovely Chica laying in front of my bedroom door. I explained to her that she was now what is called a Roof Dog here in Mexico, a time honored profession and one that she was going to learn very well. I again grabbed the collar and dragged her across my bedroom, pooping and peeing, to the roof. This dog has been saving these excretions for weeks just so she was well armed if I decided to enforce the no pooping in house rule.
With the pee machine safely on the roof, I again took a shower, put on clean clothes and came back downstairs. Internet, you are going to think I’m making this up but I assure you that there are dogs in the universe like this, I have 2 of them. This is an important point, only Hombre was in the house because Chica was on the roof and Cuba had been up in the bedroom and followed me down. So, there on the living room floor directly in front of my new blue chair was a huge pile of steaming dog shit. I am absolutely positive that this pile was not there when I was carrying the projectile pee-er over that very same spot just a half hour earlier. Can I remind you that I had now had TWO showers, two changes of clothing and NO COFFEE! That’s without mentioning all the bodily fluids I’d been wearing.
Only the fear that Gabi would quit if I started wailing and screaming saved that dog. Out he went to the terrace, he was going to be a half/roof dog or maybe a full roof dog I still wasn’t sure. More cleaning of dog shit, can I just say that nothing about me or my house smelled very good this morning.
I didn’t think I had time for coffee because the guy who was coming over was late. I called and got the ‘lo que pasa es’ and blanked out the rest. I have never heard anything but BS follow that line in Spanish so now when I hear it my mind goes on a little vacation from the stress of concentrating to understand another language. In other words, I space out and don’t listen. So, if you perhaps wanted to communicate something very important to me and you wanted to do it in Spanish it would be wise never to use that phrase. Just saying.
By now Gabi was cleaning the kitchen and if I went to make coffee I would get in her way and I already felt guilty for the screaming dog and the pee smell everywhere so I just left. I went to the beach to see the Brits and I took Cuba the Only Good Dog in the World with me. I left Chica in her new home on the roof, where she has water and shade and where I was nice enough to throw her dog bed that she had peed on so she a place to lay too… or pee. I left Hombre in the back where the dragons are and where he had peed on my new plant yesterday and it looks dead today. Have fun dude.
Things got a lot better once I had coffee and breakfast with Paula and Barb and looked for shells on the beach and toured the beauty that is their new houses. I stopped at Home Depot for more OdoBan on the way home, I think I need to spray the whole house with it so a gallon was not too much.
I had considered water, shade and bed for Chica but I forgot about rain, and rain it did this afternoon. A true downpour. It was raining like that when I got home and I realized she was out in it on the roof. Well, it’s a warm rain. It took me about a half hour to get up there and let her in. Sorry, I know she had no idea that any of this was related but hey, I knew and I laughed.
Oh, the final part of this story is that I now have the mark of God on my arm. Yes, believers, when the talon of the pee queen raked across my arm it left a burning brand that looks a lot like that Xian fish that you see on car bumpers. I knew this would be more than anyone could believe so I took a picture AND I even augmented it with the holy Photoshop so the tell tale mark would be obvious to anyone. Behold!
Please. No candles and incense, donations are ok
OMG! What a tale! They are lucky that they only became roof dogs for a while and not street dogs! There must be some trauma going on in their lives to force such a change of habit in them. Pooping where they know not too may also be a protest of some kind. Good luck figuring it all out!
I agree, There is something else going on to cause this sudden transformation in behavior. Perhaps the absence of Mims, the loss of the Brits and their brood…Lots of changes.
However, locking them out seems perfectly acceptable, even in the rain.
Then again, the Brits departure did give you a safe place to escape the madness.
Please know you can bring yourself and Cuba over here any time you need an escape.
abrazos
Debi
You have my sympathy…hope things improve soon for your sake.
Saludos, Leslie
They do know how to push our buttons, don’t they? I too have subjected Loco to behavior modification efforts after he slipped under the gate once too often. Good story, but I hope they sort themselves out and once again become house pets you can enjoy. And take care of that wound on your arm, it looks nasty!
P.S. funny how you start out with a story in mind but the events of the moment lead you on a completely different track.
The dogs are definitely sending you a message, and there’s definitely some competition going on. Have you considered giving them some Prozac to even things out? You might try that before doling out the Thorazine.
WOW- I am so sorry. All before Coffee. That is just mean. I am so sorry. I can sort of relate at times. I had a number of cats that had adopted us. They ran off my 13 year old cat who was perfect. She would leave for hours at a time. Then they would pee and shit everywhere. I could not take it anymore. I had to find them new homes. But luckily they are happy and my big cat is back
I hope that the evening slipped into a better situation.
The mystery is what is making the dogs so panicky? Have you any clue?
Some days I miss not having a pet around - our life style does not accommodate such - but after reading your pet saga - I am OK with no pets today
Life is a bowl of poop, then you die. Always look on the bright side of life ( this line MUST be sung a la Python to bring true joy!).OK Cliches are done! Life is a beach ( whoops! It just slipped in !)…so come down more often, bring the two dogs from Hades and they can camp out with us, until we bring the others back to you soon!! My the fish force be with you……….It was great to see you and Cuba ( ahhh Cuba!).any time you know that …..bring a groyne next time will you ?
You can bet that I’ve been spending many hours thinking about what the ###! happened that triggered this doggy psychosis. Perhaps the prozac would be better administered to the human here instead.
Chica in particular was abused when we found her, she was terrified of everything. She seems to have reverted to how she was then, the terror peeing, the screaming if you try and pull her somewhere. It’s been 6 years I think and she was a lot better but something has sent her back. Well, I didn’t help by dragging her across the room but she was already there. She’s terrified but how she came back to this is unknown.
In my adult hat, I realize that probably the only solution is more or less the one we used when she was young. I need to spend a lot of time with her, take her for 3+ walks a day, reward her when she does it right. The problem is that she is afraid of traffic, so walks in the city could be traumatic as well but mainly, I’m just not into it. I’m not feeling very supportive right now and I don’t much like her anymore. I’ll get over it but really, I don’t want to spend my time with the dog I like the least handing out treats and praise.
I don’t think she is going to change about the back yard and that is going to be a continuing problem. Even if I started singing koom bay yah with her, where is she going to go if the back garden is full of dragons? We are planning to redo that part, take out the rock, put in some grass so perhaps that will make it more acceptable? I really can’t allow her to poop wherever she wants until then and it doesn’t help the situation if I’m always mad at her for crapping in the house.
I am going to try and take her out to the beach to Paula and Stephen for a few days of R&R and to hopefully break this cycle and we can start over. She may just want more attention, unfortunately dogs don’t often differentiate between good and bad attention - come to think of it neither do humans which provided me with a good career.
Did you catch the vocabulary quiz in Stephen’s comment? They are slowly teaching me ‘real’ English and groyne was on a pop quiz last week. I balk at the Monty Python though.
Even with the occasional drama John, I can’t imagine life without at least dogs and cats. They add much more than they take, I just wish they’d do it in smaller bits and after coffee.
Even with the trauma, you made me think about my last two dog-less months. I would gladly trade a bit of excrement on the floor for the joy of another dog.
Lo que pasa es….okay, that little bit of humour probably wasn´t appreciated today.
Your house is huge, the dogs probably don´t see any real differnce between outside and inside. The house design is sort of a inside/outside and they spent most of their lives with a definite inside (Tortuga)and everything was outside. This is commonly a problem with small dogs, and why they are notoriously hard to house break. It might be easier to teach them where you expect them to do thier business than where not to. I am out of town so I will call you next week when I return,it´s all fixable. You might look up crate training it may help them. I think the roof dog is a good temporary solution.
The fear of the yard stumps me.
That fish scar is scary, anyway you can add legs and make it a Darwin fish?
regards,
Theresa
ROFLMAO! And Mary and I thought we had problems with our 15 year old Lab, Ethel,who just can’t hold it for 8 hours at night–I get up to a trail of dog poop nearly every morning–just clean it up, make sure she gets out at regular ingtervalsclean up when teh poor thing can’t help herself anymore.
No way to do a dog door through steel security doors, and it would have to be too big for the Labs and thus a security risk.
God, what a morning! I’ll take mine!
I’m sending this link to Mary so that she can appreciate just how easy we have it!! LOL
Joyce
In all honesty I should say that it’s hysterically funny to the READER, one who can empathize with the situation.
Joyce
Oh god, Jonna. I have never experienced that scene but it kind of reminded me when my oldest son was a teenager. He would come in while I was watching tv with the younger one and stand in front of the tv, get pissed and stamp off slam things, spill things, yikes. You think maybe yours is a teenager?
I shouldn’t joke, this is real angst for all of you. But the dog whisperer would agree with Theresa that they want to know what you want and there might just be too much choice. Our daughter in NYC uses puppy pads for their chihuahuas, you put their pee there and then they know that’s where to go. Then you move it little by little to where you want them to go and can eventually remove the pad. Oh well just an idea.
Hang in there, amiga.
The funniest post you ever blogged! Description so accurate we felt we were invisible witnesses. They miss Mimi, obviously, thinking you may have done her away.
Get her back home and all will be well.
I read the post a couple of times.
I apologize for laughing some.
I’ll pass it along to Kathy this evening.
Take good care Jonna.
I miss Mimi too, but as yet have resisted the temptation to pee and poop all over the joint….however if the contractor known as Javier in polite circles, doesn’t get to the “F” word soon ( that would be “F”inish , by the way….not the country, the verb ) I might have to think about it. Ouch ! Maybe you could join me at the therapissed real soon Jonna, just for a different reason. Discount for cash and bulk buying???
I only wish it was because she missed me. Truth be told, the fear of the yard dragons (love that btw) started long before I left.
I could coax her out into the yard during the day, no way in hell at night. That dog is seriously afraid of the dark.
Maybe one of the kittens will turn the new mark into darwin fish. Just sayin not hopin.
Missing you all an all of it.
I’m so sorry Jonna, all your friends and family are so supportive, but I have to tell you that this is the funniest post I have read from anyone in a long time. I held it pretty well, and was even sympathetic until the line, “Have fun dude,” and then I lost it. Thanks for making my day. I have an 8 year old dachshund who has no clue, so I ripped out all the carpets and put in vinyl planks. Just be thankful you aren’t having to clean carpets.
I shared it with Kathy. She said very nice things about your writing, very sympathetic things about your trials and tribulations and she laughed some also, which was more a result of your writing than your trials and tribulations.
This may be the time to find another home for the pup. She may do better in an environment where she doesn’t have to compete with others for affection and where she can be the only dog. You’ve done your part by rescuing her and getting her this far; surrendering her to another home isn’t a sign of failure or weakness on anyone’s part. You would be giving her another chance to thrive — and you would be taking the pressure away from the pack partners who have to put up with her.
No matter how hard you may try to pretend to like her, she can knows she’s not your favorite. And she’s always going to see right through that ruse.
Found your hilarious story and wonderful blog through Joyce in Potrerillos.
Seventeen years ago I got a rescue dog that I still have. The two of us lived on my small sailboat in Fort Lauderdale, FL. The problem I had with Penny was that she used to poop on the dock and this was unacceptable since, with the exception of our boat, all the boats on the dock were for sale and steaming piles of dog poop are not a good marketing tool.
I was at a loss as to how to handle this. Penny was supposedly house broken but here she was in the great out of doors so in her mind why shouldn’t she be able to do her business anywhere as long as it wasn’t “inside?” I couldn’t whack on her because I could see her point of view even if she couldn’t grasp the concept of keeping the dock a poop-free zone. I pondered for weeks on how to remedy the situation. Then one afternoon, as I was going to our boat, I caught her squatting and I saw the solution. She had chosen a spot situated exactly between two cleats located on either side of the dock. I got two lines out and tied her over her pile. It was the middle of September and it’s REALLY hot here then. I left her a large bowl of water and left her there for three hours. She got the message and there was never again a pile of dog poop on the dock again.
As they say in television commercials…”but WAIT! There’s more!”
Just across from the dock was a small boat yard where a friend and I had a small repair shop and a large selection of boats for sale were also there. Penny had the run of the yard. She never barked at the large number of people who roamed the yard each day but she would often approach the strangers and sniff them out.
There was one couple who were there often. They bought boats, fixed them up and shipped them out to the newly-free eastern European countries. For some reason they didn’t like Penny and were constantly “shooing” her away with extravagant waving of their hands. They eventually got a deal on a 60-foot sailboat and kept the boat at the end of our dock while they were rehabilitating it between their long trips back to Europe.
One day the dockmaster asked if I’d been down to Connie and Micha’s boat lately. I said I hadn’t because I had no reason to. “Go take a look,” he said. So I wandered down to the end of the dock and hopped on board and broke out laughing. Penny had, indeed, stopped pooping on the dock. Instead, when nature called, she would go to the end of the dock, hop on the boat owned by her nemesises and did her business there. There were more than a dozen tributes to her contempt of for them scattered about the teak decks. Good doggie. Just because they can’t talk doesn’t mean they’re stupid.
That is the MOST HILARIOUS blog I have ever read!!!
Sorry you had to go thru it though, just to get a Xian tattoo!
Linda
Isla Chica
Thanks for all the sympathy, it would seem that many of us have stories like this. Richard, that was an hysterical story of Penny’s revenge. I loved it.
Please don’t feel bad for laughing. This is my therapy of sorts. I knew, even as it was happening, that eventually it would be funny. On my ride out to the beach I started working at seeing the funny side because, what else are you going to do? I could angst about it endlessly or I could change my viewpoint and see the humor, my choices in life are almost always to avoid angst and see humor.
Chica and I are attempting a reconciliation. Last night I took her and her brother for a walk and there were treats in my pocket - isn’t it wonderful when you can stand right next to your latest poop and chow down on a biscuit? Apparently, it is. I’ve remembered that the joys of doggy anatomy are that if they get a little exercise right after they eat, you can almost time it. So, I’ll be doing that for awhile and see if I can get that part under control.
I did consider that she could have a new home when I was at my maddest but really, I probably couldn’t do it. She and Hombre are brother and sister and have lived with us around 6 years, we’re stuck with each other. I do think that she was happiest and felt safest living in the RV, much like Penny on the boat. She understood immediately that the place to go was outside the RV. Here, as Theresa mentioned, it is harder to tell what is inside and what is outside and I think she does not feel safe and enclosed here. OK, that’s it for the doggy psychoanalysis session. I’m just going to walk her till she goes and keep track of it - also treats, I believe that treats will overcome any dogs bad behavior.
Jonna, what a story. I was about ready to start looking for a new doggie but maybe I’ll wait a little longer. LOL
OH Gawds, Jonna, that was hilarious. Course if Kilo pulled a stunt like that….well…we’ll just say it wouldn’t be nearly as funny. I thought Mimi was headed back by now, it must be getting more than a little lonely. So the Brits are G.O.N.E.?? Wow! You guys must be bouncing off the walls!
I’m thinking it looks like one of those awareness ribbons.
Perhaps your pooch was trying to send a message. The wound looks a little like a purple in the photo. So according to Wikipedia:
A purple ribbon is worn to raise awareness for various causes, including: -Xenophobia and Homophobia (Austria 2009) -Overdose Prevention -Domestic violence -Alzheimer’s disease -Crohn’s Disease -Cystic Fibrosis -Epilepsy -Huntington’s disease -Lupus -Fibromyalgia -Arnold -Chiari Malformation -Animal abuse -Religious tolerance -Homelessness -Victims of 9/11 -Macular degeneration -ADD and ADHD -Sarcoidosis -Pediatric stroke -Gastrointestinal cancers -Thyroid cancer[1] -Ulcerative Colitis -Pancreatic cancer -Cancer survival -Rwandan Genocide
Which one is it, you think?
Good grief!! No doubt about it, Chica was marking me to say that my dragging her out of the living room was animal abuse. I disagree, I think her peeing and pooping all over me and the house was human abuse, what do you think?
Oh Jonna, I know I am late to the party on this one but that was a fantastic post! Tragedy and comedy all rolled into one. I hope everyone is healing and that you can look back and laugh. Hugs to the “good” furbabies!
I about fell out of my chair laughing I thought only those things happened to me
It all passes in the end and we remember these things and smile.
Julia