The Misadventures of Pip the Wonderpup

Pip in the cone of shame

I have, what can only be described as, the world’s worst dog. Luckily for him he is also the world’s most adorable dog. I’ve been told more than once I should write a book about his misadventures. I’ll settle on a blog post for now.

I’ve chronicled here how Pip came to be in our possession, or rather we came to be in his possession because, let’s face it, he owns us. Ask him, or anyone else who may have made the little monsters acquaintance, they’ll tell you. He runs the show around these parts. He barks and these humans do his bidding.

Pip has this obnoxious habit, which I can only assume he inherits from the terrier blood, of putting whatever he is chewing on at the time underneath the furniture. When he was a baby it was adorable because he could fit under the bookshelf or the television stand and retrieve his toy. Now, he can only bark and dig at my carpet until we’ve finally had enough and retrieve his toy for him. After two or three or one time of this we’ve had enough and take his toys away. This leads him to wander off in search of some other entertainment. That is usually a pair of underwear that he chews and then hides in his den, errr under my bed. Sometimes he finds less personal things to chew on and eats the eyes off a stuffed animal a young girl has saved her money to purchase from the American Girl Doll store or a pair of mittens in the shape of an animal. That leads me to have several hours of wondering if this will be the time whatever he ate decides to get caught up in his intestines and cause us to spend the monthly grocery budget on a trip to the emergency vet.

Pip was becoming a very naughty little boy who had to spend several hours every day running around the yard peeing on all the trees and bushes and stray toys so that every other dog who lives in the neighborhood knew this was his territory. He also had a nasty habit of trying to eat anyone who dared make the unforgivable mistake of trying to visit any of his people. It was time for the big snip snip. After a few days of babying the baby he was back up and running. It didn’t seem to slow him down in the least. He was so insane still that he broke his cone of shame and had to have it removed a few days early. He would just smash into the walls or the back of our legs like he didn’t have the thing on. It was the oddest thing. Our bushes are happy to report they are urine free but our friends will tell you he still tries to eat them. I’ve had to resort to arming people with treats when they come in as an offering to the evil ruler Pippen.

Then there’s the order of the pack thing that I swear we’ve never had to deal with until now. All these dogs we’ve had over the years know their place but this one thinks we should know our place. In his world the leader of the pack as me, I rule the world. He thinks he shares the second spot with the rest of the family except Bean. He clearly rules her. She walks through the house and he bites her ankles. She tries to correct him and he snaps at her. Heaven forbid she tries to take him out to go potty. The few times she tried I had to go bring him back from the neighbor’s yard. This is a situation that we have to work on. Obviously the kids is higher up in the pack than the cat, even the cat gets more respect than Bean does! 

All of these things would lead you to ask yourself why we haven’t sent him packing. I’ll tell you why, I’m afraid he’d find us and kill us all in our sleep. I kid. I think. Really, he is so cute. That’s what keeps him alive most days. In the morning he doesn’t want to go out until he’s had his daily snuggle. He spends a good 15 minutes every morning begging me to rub his belly and covering my face with sweet doggy kisses. Then there is the afternoon nap that he must spend on my lap. Whenever I speak to him he cocks his head to the side in an attempt to tell me he hears me and knows exactly what I’m saying to him. I could go on and on about what a cutie he is but I don’t want you getting sick and quite frankly a naughty dog is more fun to read about. I’ve always been a cat person but there is something about this little guy that has completely turned my world upside down. I’d take ten more just like him. I’ll let you know when I plan to get them so you can buy stock in Victoria’s Secret.