Monday Mischief: The Joys of Dog Ownership

So, I may or may not have a Doberman hair in my toe like a splinter. As you might imagine, it's hard to see based on light, and I might be hallucinating. Not to worry, I'm not going to post a picture of my right big toe for your perusal. Or the sole of my left foot. Yup, two. It's so awesome.

But really, our dogs sometimes put us through a lot.

Elka steps on us pretty regularly, and I've failed to keep her nails an acceptable length (I'm pricing Dremels, not to worry!). She occasionally sticks her nose in somebody's mouth if they're yawning, and I don't mean "sniffs their mouth". I mean "tries to crawl into their mouth". It's a little unsettling. She belches (I didn't know dogs could do that), she farts (not to worry, if I didn't hear it? I know she did by the fact that she lifts her head and delicately sniffs her tail). She wipes her eye boogers on my shirt if I call them to her attention. She sneezed in my mouth once;l I had called her upstairs, and when she came running, I had my arms open, and was telling her, joyfully, how amazing she was. Which I guess put me in prime "firing" range.

She's very sweet too, though. She alerts me pre-migraine. One of our housemate frequently has achey joints due to the weather, and she's especially solicitous then. We have a friend with diabetes, and she's invasive if his sugar is "off". Elka's love is not a gentle one, and sometimes these advances are unwelcome, but the heart of a dog is a vast and magnificent thing, and hers is always in the right place.