Dogs Gone Wild

Monday evening I found myself to be a single girl bored at home. Okay – so I wasn’t exactly single, but hubby was gone for the night and I was lonely. After a quick workout, much needed cleaning of the kitchen & master bathroom and a load of laundry, I refused to do anything else “productive”. I stole away to the master bath and drew myself a much needed bubble bath. I couldn’t remember the last time I had relaxed in a hot bubble bath while reading a book – and Emily Griffin’s “Heart of the Matter” was calling my name.

I added way too much bubble bath and stirred the water vigorously to create maximum bubbles. When I was satisfied with the mountains of bubbles floating on the surface, I quickly ran to the living room to find a lighter. What good is a glorious bubble bath without candles, no?

After a few minutes of searching high and low for a lighter, I returned to the bedroom to find Dixie sitting upright at the entrance to the master bathroom. Her ears were pinned back, her tail was down and she was whining. As I entered the room, she immediately backed away from the door and shot me her best “I had nothing to do with this – please don’t spank me” look.

As I rounded the corner toward the bathroom I heard the sound of water splashing onto the floor and walls. Correction – I heard the sound of A LOT of water splashing onto the floor and walls. Upon reaching the doorway to the bathroom, my fears were confirmed.

Bauer was in the bathtub - my glorious bubble bath bathtub – playing in the bubbles. His entire face was covered in white soapy bubbles. I stood still for a moment as I watched him smack his jowls repeatedly as he tried to eat the bubbles. With every shake of his head and wag of his tail (or should I say nub) water went pouring over the side of the bathtub and onto the floor. He was in puppy heaven – in my bubble bath – he was having the time of his life.

The initial “Aww..he’s so cute playing with the bubbles” reaction wore off in about .5 seconds when I realized what a mess he had made in my moments before spotless bathroom. “BAUER!!! WHAT DID YOU DO?”, I shouted. As soon as the words escaped my mouth I regretted them.

Jovial, fun loving Bauer turned into scared, oh-so-sorry Bauer.   Bauer hates being in trouble more than any dog I have ever seen. He hates the phrase “What did you do?” more than anything in the world because he knows that he is in trouble. Those words send him into a panic every single time. He shot me those puppy dog eyes as if to say, "What - you didn't create all these bubbles just for me? I'm not supposed to be throwing water and doggy hair all over you pretty white, super-clean bathroom? Oh mommy - I'm sorry!"

Realizing he was in trouble, and wanting desperately to apologize, Bauer leapt from the tub (spilling what little water remained in the bathtub onto the floor) and tried his best to reach me. Unfortunately, my tile floors were soaked and Bauer was dripping with soapy bubbles, so he slid across the floor and barreled into my legs at full speed causing me to topple down onto the soaking wet floor with him.

As I laid in a puddle of water with bells ringing in my ears, Bauer licked my face enthusiastically in sincere apology for the mess and for making me fall. Not wanting to be left out, Dixie sprinted to my side and, tail wagging, began licking me as well. It took me a good five minutes to get them off of me so I could get to my feet to survey the final damage.

I don’t even want to talk about the twenty minutes it took me to dry the floors and clean doggy hair out of my tub and off the walls. Next time I’ll be smart enough to close the door to bathroom when I leave the room…..