Here’s why the puppy made me cry, this time: She’s deceitful.

She’s used her wily chocolate lab-ness to forge a way into my heart. She rests at my feet during the day when I write. She sends herself to her crate any time she feels tired. She “leaves it” when we sternly say said command, if she shows too much interest in something. She has started walking at our side on walks, not tugging or chasing down geese like she were training for a gold medal. She’s turning into the dog of picture frames. You know, the friendly, family dog whose picture you replace with your own, but not before thinking, “What a picture perfect dog.”

Until tonight. As a consolation for not venturing onto the hopping streets of Denver in search of green beer, we stayed in and I made macaroni and cheese. It’s a consolation in our book; stop judging. And to counter the creamy, cheesy, carby goodness, we were going to have a salad. I was so excited for the lone cucumber in our refrigerator, I even sliced stripes down the side, like they do in restaurants and on cooking shows. Then I chopped it and set it aside until the timer beeped.

Enter Kona, who has never eaten human food. She jumps up, weasels her way around the sharp knife on the cutting board, eats the entire cut cucumber and saunters off to sit at my husband’s feet. I didn’t realize it until minutes later, when chastising her was futile. And now, all that’s left to our salad is spinach and nuts. Pathetic.

OK, so it may seem like a dumb reason to cry, but it’s not only for the lost cucumber. I thought we had developed a level of trust, and I see I was mistaken. Back to square one, Kona puppy. I may forgive, but I don’t forget.

If our dog wore pants, she would have a muffin top. I didn’t realize this until a recent soiree at the dog park.

Kona puppy was following her usual protocol: hogging the water when other dogs tried to drink, acting aloof when people tried to throw her a ball, jumping on unassuming women in pastels, trying to dominate me in an embarrassing show of barking and assertiveness. This is how we do.

I usually enjoy watching the other dogs and secretly think mine is much cuter than theirs, except for when the occasional striped bulldog with multiple chain collars and an unexpected orange bandanna earns my admiration for looking so badass. But this time there was another chocolate lab who looked like Kona — even with the same color collar — except she was at least 10 pounds lighter.

I would see this dog chase after a brown tennis ball, and think, “Kona is so sprightly today. She better be tired tonight!” And then I would look over to the mud puddle and see the real Kona sniffing around and licking. Don’t judge me for calling her a fatty under my breath. The skinny dog’s owner struck up conversation with me, and I found out that she is just a few weeks older than Kona, but eats 33% less than Kona does. Looks like we will be enforcing portion control.

Admittedly, the vet always says, “We’d like to see a little more waist on Kona,” as if saying she’s overweight will send Kona reeling into a distorted body image, self-doubt and depression. But I assumed that line was like the dentist’s “You need to start flossing regularly, every day.”

I do floss every day! And Kona obviously has a waist! It’s just a protruding waist that would be accentuated by tight pants.

This is a cute freaking dog. And I don’t even like animals.

Kona was only a few months old when this picture was taken after her first bath at our house. She’s 7 months old now, and cute in a different way. The way that makes me shower her with praise and high-pitched puppy talk when she plops down on her doggy bed and plays with a toy. When she’s not scratching at the floor to get a ball under the couch, or jumping up in a fit of unbridled energy to play, or barking at me in her jabber — vehemently chastising me for trying to sit down and relax. That’s when she’s cute.

It would have been a nice day for a run, if I hadn’t had a dog attached to me.
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Not my brightest day, the other day. I baked a chocolate bundt cake to take to dinner with friends. To cool it, I put the bundt pan upside down over a wine bottle. And the cake plopped out, crumbling on the stove in millions of little pieces. This is not the first time I’ve done this. And I even described the cake as “plopping” when I documented it last time, four and a half years ago.

Then I took Kona for a walk in the snow. I let her off the leash in the park, threw a tennis ball for her to fetch, and the ball disappeared into the 12 inches of snow. Oopsies. She doesn’t do well knowing objects could be in her mouth but aren’t in her mouth.

She does love the snow, though.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nau7-fEc8Q[/youtube]

We’re going to Spain! Tonight! In five hours! And celebrating our one-year anniversary! With friends!

No, the puppy is not coming.
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Yes, again, with the puppy. She has caused me more barking-related stress and pee clean-up in the past weeks than in my 26 years combined. I’m convinced that raising Labrador puppies is one of life’s harder tasks, and few people make it out with their sanity and carpet intact.

My theory is that Jesus’ parents felt so bad after they left him at the temple in Jerusalem for three days, they bought him a little lab puppy to make up for it. The ensuing training and adjustment for Jesus was so difficult and messy, the Bible just left it all out, and skipped ahead to when Jesus was 30.
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The night after my throw-down with Kona, she woke up at 4 a.m., yelping periodically. By the time we got out of bed three hours later, we decided something was wrong. Hubs and I dropped her off at the vet, and one of us was crying, because he/she didn’t know how to help poor Kona or what was wrong. OK, it was me.
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Today at lunch, Kona Puppy looked me in the eye as she walked inside from outside, squatted on the carpet, and peed. I called her a little shit, and I screamed and stomped around and threw her food outside for her to get herself. Then I cried and stomped more, all the while texting the Hubs about our little tyrant dog. Now my throat hurts from screaming, and I feel guilty for yelling at her and putting her back in her crate so soon.

I’m not cut out for this. Serenity now!

If I’ve learned one thing from the Dog Whisperer, it’s that calm, submissive dogs get that way because they have plenty of exercise. So, I walk Kona.

She sniffs at dirt, runs toward bushes, is gaga for wood posts and tries to lick cigarettes. But most annoyingly — and in conflict with my idea of a casual stroll with a puppy — she tries to chew on her leash as we walk.
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