In the past several days, Hastings has escaped twice for a run around the neighborhood. Shiba Inus are natural runaways, and since we lost our previous dog to a speeding car during a similar escapade, we tend to be a bit paranoid about “letting the dog out.” But things happen and after two years of confinement, Hastings darted out after the sweet aroma of freedom and I felt my heart leap into my throat as I ran after him with flashbacks of my bleeding puppy laying limp in the road.

We managed to catch him both times - a miracle in and of itself, as a shiba on the loose is faster than a cheetah with its tale on fire - so this story does have a happy ending. The other miracle is that he allowed himself to be trapped in the same space twice, a mistake he usually doesn’t make the first time.

Through the ordeal, it became glaringly apparent what a role upheaval our household has gone through since Button’s birth. During the first year we had him, Hastings escaped and I came very close to a nervous breakdown, even after we caught him. J came home to a very exhausted and teary wife who was quite ready to give the dog up because I couldn’t endure the stress of it.

But this week we both found ourselves able to take the incident more or less in stride - a good thing, because if he had escaped twice in 4 days a year ago, it would probably have sent me over the edge. This four-legged rocket that used to be our child has now, to his confusion, been reduced to the role of the family pet. Now that we actually have a child, our lives and well-being are not so entertwined with the dog’s and, though it would be a tragedy, we would be able to function if something happened to him.

Now let’s just hope Button doesn’t run away any time soon.

Shiba Inus are great practice for parenting. About half an hour ago, Hastings pulled every single toy out of his toybox, one by one, and played with them all enthusiastically, for about 5 minutes each. Now he is laying in the middle of a huge scattered circle of toys, completely zonked out.

My dog sheds twice a year. By “sheds,” I mean that his fur makes a mass exodus from his body in chunks the size of hampsters and he begins to resemble a cancer victim, or a cat that has recently lost a fight.

I have a habit of reaching over to him and just pulling the already detached chunks of fur out, despite the fact that for some reason it really annoys J.

The way I see it, I would rather have a poof of fur in my hand to throw away than to find it strewn around the bed, couch, and carpet. A poof in hand is worth several distributed around the house. And it’s not like it hurts the dog.

What always cracks me up is my dog’s response, that when I pull a dangling tuft of fur from his hind quarters, HE WANTS IT BACK. You would think that we were on the playground in fourth grade and I had just stolen his lunch. He whirls around and does everything he can to TAKE BACK that poof.

I don’t know what he thinks he’s going to do with a mouthful of fur. Sometimes I’m tempted to give it to him to see if he tries to stick it back in. But then I think of what he looks like when he’s hacking up hairballs.

That’s when the fruitless arguments ensue.

“If you’re so concerned about keeping it, then stop leaving it all over my house.”

I can tell as I say it that I’m sinking into the pit of pointless communication. Not because my dog doesn’t understand English - HE DOES - but because his standard response is that the house and everything in it are in fact HIS (did we not notice that he has marked the ENTIRE backyard???) and he may distribute pieces of himself anywhere he darn well pleases.

He has such and attitude sometimes. At first the talking back was kind of cute because we’ve never actually seen a dog do this before. To see it is very reminiscent of watching a teenager roll his eyes and silently mimic his parents’ gripes behind their backs. Except that Hastings does it to our faces. He knows better to bark back, but boy can he mimic. And like most cute things, it gets old after a while.

It’s scenarios like this that make me a wee bit anxious about parenting. If our dog thinks we’re retarded, what will our kids think?

I have witnessed THE LAST STRAW. Over the weekend, our cat Countess has metamorphosised from mild-mannered and aloof to PSYCHO ATTACK CAT.
It happened on a day just like any other day in which our dog was bugging the cats. Poirot is a blob by nature and more or less lays down and takes whatever the dog will dish out. I think his theory is that if he ignores the dog long enough, eventually it will just rot away.
Countess, on the other hand, usually avoids the dog by staying high enough not to be reached and stares down upon him like “Fool. You are and will always be a lesser being.”
However, this day was different. The dog was dancing around on the floor and yapping at Countess, trying as always to provoke her into…something…but this time IT WORKED.
It was like watching Gollum get really pissed. Or that scene where Bilbo turns into Scary Bilbo but I couldn’t find any pictures of that. First we heard her…growl can be the only appropriate description. Then the eyes became enormous, the tail took on that electrocuted look, and the claws came out. Within seconds, she was flying through the air with ALL FOUR claws aimed directly at dear dog’s face.
Fortunately he has very quick reflexes and turned tail to run, but she chased him until she had him cornered in the bedroom. Then she let out another growl as if to say, “Look at me the wrong way again and they’ll be finding pieces of you in the litter box for weeks, buddy.”
And things haven’t been the same since. The dog is always up to a challenge, so it hasn’t stopped him from attempting to provoke the cat. But we’ll hear the growl, then the sound of stampeding around the carpet and then a Nazgul shriek that lets you know the cat has just detached one of the dog’s limbs from the rest of his body. He takes what’s left of his bleeding carcass away and doesn’t mess with her for the rest of the day.
He is now accepting his role as the beta cat. He even does Sit and Lay Down for her, his attention glued to her expression to see if he has won approval. He hardly does that for us.
Perhaps we should try the growl & slash routine.

The following post is written solely for the benefit of my dog. And yes, for all you skeptics out there, he DOES understand the English language and is probably at home surfing the internet at this very moment. Unless he’s sitting patiently to the side while my cat renames all the desktop icons. Again.

But I digress.

Dearest Hastings,

I appreciate your enthusiasm for life, truly, but I believe there is an area we need to discuss. Namely, the middle-of-the-night bursts of energy that seem to have taken over your sanity and my ability to sleep well over the past two nights.
I understand that because you insist on drinking a half gallon of water just before bed, there will be the occasional - OCCASIONAL - time when you will need to rise in the middle of the night to relieve yourself. I can live with that. But aside from those occasional times, the following is a list of life facts that I hope you will take into consideration in the future - if for nothing else, to save yourself some time and me some sleep.

1. If you have gone to the bathroom at approximately 4:00am, I will not believe you when you try to convince me you need to go again at 4:30am.
2. The fact that the cat has just regurgitated an entire day’s worth of food outside the bedroom door is not - and I repeat NOT - a good enough reason for us to get out of bed and open the bedroom door. Trust me, it will still be there in the morning and if we can help it, you won’t get to eat it anyway, even though it is recycled bits of your own food. Learn to be a little more territorial about your food and maybe the cat will stick to his own “sensitive stomach” food.
3. Licking the door doesn’t open it.
4. Whining at the door doesn’t open it.
5. Throwing yourself into the door doesn’t open it.
6. Jumping up on the door and scratching your claws all the way down like fingernails on a chalkboard doesn’t open the door.
7. Licking my hand, my elbow, and/or my nose doesn’t open the door.
8. Standing on my hip does not instill me with the urge to play with your rope toy.
9. Pulling clothes out of the laundry basket may get me out of bed. It may also get you a squirt in the mouth with the bitter spray. BUT IT DOES NOT OPEN THE DOOR.
10. PULL ALL THE COVERS OFF THE BED ONE MORE TIME AND SO HELP ME GOD…

Just so you know, there is a puppy-sized jail cell at Petco with your name on it. And it will go in the far recesses of the house in which no one but the cats will hear your cries for deliverance…

(Insert maniacal laugh here)