MORE MISS MOLLY

                                                           

 A few weeks back I introduced you to my Ivory Lab puppy, Miss Molly. I think it’s only fair that I give you an update on how she is coming along, and how I am coping with this new friend of mine. As you may remember, I jokingly named her Miss Poops a Lot. She still fits the name—not so frequently, anymore, but she makes up for that with volume.  There is a natural phenomenon, which few people understand—that being, how a dog can take fifty pounds of dog food, and create fifty-five pounds of poop, and still get fat—but somehow it happens. One of life’s mysteries, I guess.

Labs like to grow hair and then shed hair so, when I got Molly, I selected an Ivory-colored dog because I have an Ivory-colored rug in my living room. She must be shedding because the rug, which was a 10 x 12, is now a 10 & 1/2 x 12 & 1/2. I don’t vacuum enough, I guess. The other day, I had her down to the public landing at the lake, and she waded in to take a drink. Now she is only five months, but already she doesn’t want to bend over to drink, so she wades in until the water is chin deep and then lets it just run into her mouth. A guy at the landing told me, if the DNR saw her do that, I would have to stay until she urinated. Everybody must pull their plugs and drain their tanks, no exceptions.

Deep inside each Lab pup is a coiled-up spring that needs to be released in a spastic, and almost violent, fit of energy. This can go on for several hours, depending on how long your arm will take throwing a tennis ball. It’s best to have several people involved so you can take turns. When the spring is finally unwound, it takes about a fifteen minute nap to recoil the spring, and then they are good to go again. Your only chance to escape is during that timeframe! If you live at the lake and are going somewhere with the dog, in the car, Murphy’s Law says they will go swimming about ten minutes before you are ready to go.

Way back in their ancestry, some Lab, somewhere, mated with a beaver and a goat. This is where they get the urge to eat the legs of your kitchen chairs or chew up a plastic water bottle into a zillion pieces. Leather chew toys take second place to furniture and your shoelaces. I went to the dictionary and I learned how to say “NO!” in fourteen languages and she still does not understand what I am saying. I think “NO” is just too close to “GO” and she knows what that means without being taught. She demands a treat for going potty outside, so just to be fair, I give myself a cookie when I do my own duty. The only difference is I have to clean up after myself.

When I got her, I made a firm rule she would not be allowed on the furniture. So far, she has been everywhere except on top of the hutch and one high dresser and—oh yeah, the refrigerator—but she has been in it. Last Sunday, I went to church and locked her in the kitchen. When I got home, I found that she had tipped over her water dish, and mixed her dog food in it, and had dragged all of her toys and the rug through it. I told my daughter; as soon as Molly is taller, there will be no more water dishes. She can learn to drink out of the toilet like a normal dog. So there is your Lab report and you didn’t have to wait a week to get the results.