Moose, the dog

I didn't name him, he's my roommate's dog. He doesn't look at all like a moose, but he is brown. When I was asked if I could share a house with a dog, I didn't even hesitate. Of course I could. I've done it before. I lived with Shannon when she had three dogs and a cat. My roommate Charis had a dog. I normally like dogs. I normally like Moose. Here he is nearly comatose on the couch. Doesn't his belly look so rubable? Think again. That treacherous tummy is full of my cookies! A whole batch of them! I ate two fresh hot ones and left the rest to cool, and turkey butt here ate every last crumb.

My boss called to tell me I could pick up my patrol car from the shop. So I got a ride down and came straight back. I wasn't gone more than 10 minutes. It was plenty of time for this canine thief to sneak into the kitchen and scarf down every last warm, delicious cookie.

I yelled, I ranted, I called him names, and shut him in the garage. No way was he going to take a nap in his comfy bed after eating the cookies I'd made. I decided I would pretend that I didn't live with a dog. I knew that if I thought to much about him sitting in the dark garage, I'd give in.

(My roommate is out of town, so it's just me and Moose)

I left him there for 2 hours (it's a heated garage) and was planning on leaving him there all night (there is a carpet in there to. I guess it's not much of a punishment, is it?). Lucky for him, I wanted to grab something out of the garage. I came in and completely ignored his attempts at reconciliation, his wagging tail, his blinking brown eyes. But then I was digging through my stuff when I happened to glance over my shoulder at him. He was looking at me, with his head down. Just the tip of his tail was wagging, ever so tentatively. When he saw me looking at him, he slunk over, contrite. He knew I was mad and he was trying to make it better. He can't talk, he can only look pitiful.

It worked. I relented. I petted him and told him I know he's only a dog and he has no will power when it comes to food.

I'm supposed to be the smart one. I know he's a devious food stealer. His previous transgressions involve snatching a tub of butter off the counter and licking it clean. A former dog-sitter tells of him grabbing an entire block of cheese when her back was turned. Tupperware and recyclable yogurt containers that are left in the sink, magically appear on the living room floor. The other day at lunch, I made a salad. I left the trash in the sink because I was in a rush to get back to work. I came home to find pieces of egg shell, carrot shavings, and the stem and seeds from a yellow pepper all over the living room floor.

Second in vileness only to today's crime was the slurping of my strawberry.

My greenhouse garden didn't do very well this year. I didn't get a single thing to eat for all of my work. Tomatoes rotted while still green. The strawberries to, would mold before they even turned pink. It was a cold, wet, summer. I thought they might do better in the house, so I got pots and dirt and brought them inside. Unbeknowst to me, they had bad aphids. Once I noticed, the infestation was severe. But through it all, a strawberry began to ripen.

One day, I was examining that strawberry. I noticed that it smelled really good and I figured it would be ready in a few days, my first fruit of summer in late September. Better late than never.

I'd just been to town, where I'd picked up some pesticides for the aphid problem. I took the plant outside to spray it down, but I didn't want to put it back on the kitchen counter since it was dripping poison. Instead, I put the plant on the windowsill in the dining room.

This was before I knew I lived with a vegetarian dog.

Mere minutes later, I was in the kitchen making bread when I saw Moose at the windowsill. I heard his lips smacking and I knew. I knew my strawberry was gone. Taken before it's time. I charged into the dining room yelling, but it was too late. My tender fruit was in a dark doggy stomach, nibbled ever so gently from it's stalk. Only a slobbery nub remained.

Moose was banished to the garage.

I have yet to get a strawberry. The aphids are finally gone, but the plants were so badly wounded that the stalks holding green strawberries and flowers turned brown and died. I've trimmed the plants down to almost nothing and I'm trying again. With the aphids defeated, I only have to safeguard them from my backstabbing canine roommate. Wish me luck.