What a morning!

It started at 4:30. I got up, to go to the bathroom and had every intention of going back to sleep. Rowdy nixed that idea, by sitting on my chest of drawers, yowling and banging picture against the wall.

I stumbled out to the kitchen, switched on the coffeepot and let the dogs out. Located my cigarettes and shuffled onto the patio, only to be nearly knocked down by Pearl. As I sat in my chair, she tried repeatedly to climb into my lap. Forty pounds of squirming dog does NOT fit on my lap!

She then proceeded to lunge at the window and screen door, where Rowdy and Buddy were taunting her. Ike, of course, was behaving himself, patrolling the yard, looking for a place to pee.

Coffee ready, I decided to distract Pearl, by filling the food pan. After a few bites, though, she's back to trying to climb into my lap. She managed to knock over my ashtray, with her tail and spill my coffee. My temper is VERY short in the morning and the dog is coming close to being worm food. Finally, she decides to play in the yard with Ike and I settle in with coffee, cigarette and a book. Unbeknownst to me, my cigarettes have fallen out of my robe pocket. Here comes Pearl, mangled pack in her mouth and cigarettes scattered all over the yard.

Back into the house, for another cup of coffee and a pack of smokes. Opie and Buddy are trying to assert the manhood that neither of them has. Hissing, spitting, growling and fighting all over the house. A stomp on the floor and a sternly delivered "knock it off!" put a stop to that. They are now in neutral corners/windowsills.

The wonder of it all, is that Bill is still asleep. The rest of the house is in total chaos and he's peacefully snoozing away.

It is just now 6:00 am and the house has been turned upside-down. If I didn't know better, I'd say that there was a full moon. Too bad that I'm wide-awake. I'd crawl back into bed and pull the covers up over my head and not come out, the rest of the day.

Somebody, please remind me WHY I wanted pets.

Ah, the joys of pet parenting! My husband says that if we had just ONE pet instead of many, we wouldn't have so many days like that. Although he manages to sleep through just about all of the night-time games pretty well also!

My dogs have never eaten a pack of cigarettes, but have eaten just about everything else. I read an article by Dave Barry that said (I am paraphrasing liberally here) his dogs eat anything that falls to the floor in the kitchen, because if it turns out not to be food, they can always throw it up later. My dogs certainly believe that also.

I think the worst thing my dog Warren ever got into his mouth was a lightbulb. He was just under a year old (part dalmatian, so still extremely wild), and had gotten away from us. He went running through town for a few minutes, then came back with a lightbulb in his mouth (still intact, thank goodness!). We managed to get it out without it shattering, but it took about an hour.

Hope your morning goes better. It's hard to remember all of the rewarding parts about having pets sometimes, but these types of times are the ones we always laugh about later - after we'ver had some sleep!

Susan

Now that Bill is up, everyone is behaving like perfect little angels. Pearl is playing with her toys and chasing her tail, the cats have had their breakfast and are reclining about the house.

Ike put his head in my lap and got his ears rubbed. Pearl tried to force her way in and muscle Ike away from me but I wouldn't let her do it. He's the only one who has behaved this morning.

I just love reading about the antics in your household! They always bring a smile to my face!

Peedoodle isnt the most behaved cat at nighttimes - he thinks it is fun to attack our feet at 3am!

Everybody seems to have calmed down, now. Rowdy had one brief spurt, when we got home from grocery shopping - she crawled into one of the grocery bags. Naturally, it was the one containing a Porterhouse and a ham steak!

"Somebody, please remind me WHY I wanted pets."

Umm, because they're sweet little angels?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this perfectly normal for a household with kids -- doesn't matter what species the kids are!

What a great story, though -- well told! While you're there, gritting your teeth, we're out here guffawing.