In which I invent Radar
The dog is driving me nuts.
She is refusing to leave the house.
Now her excuse is that the arthritis is giving her gyp and she can’t step down the couple of inches to the terrace outside the back door. There may be a modicum of truth there though she is known to be a bit of a chancer, but it is leading to a major problem.
Yesterday was a typical example of just about every other day. The door to the garden was open all day and Penny was free to wander in and out at will. She would go and stand at the door sniffing the breeze [which is deliciously sweet as I cut half the grass]. She might even brave the couple of inches and stand outside on the terrace. She then comes in and promptly pisses on the floor.
Her latest favourite spot is the far end of the kitchen. During the day, things aren’t too bad but at night time when there are shady parts of the kitchen this is a death trap. For some reason my slippers live up to their name and become very slippery when I stand in a pool of piss. So I have developed a technique. I switch on the torch in my phone and hold it pointing downwards at arm’s length in front of me. I then carefully walk slowly into the patch of light ahead of me. If I suddenly get a sharp reflection I know I have found my target – a pool of piss. I’m quite proud of my little invention and am thinking of patenting it.
I’m getting through quite a few rolls of kitchen paper. The average lake takes eight to ten sheets to reduce the pool to a smear. Then of course there are the turds which can also adorn the floor. They take another sheet which is carefully folded into a strip. The turd is then collected in the mid point of the strip, and holding one end firmly, I let fly out the back door. I’m getting quite good at this lark and am even getting as far as the neighbour’s garden.
The whole business is bloody annoying and even worse, the flooring in the kitchen is beginning to warp [solid oak planking, for fucks sake!]. The idea of the local Dignitas has crossed my mind on more than one occasion.
But then she sneaks up behind me and gives my leg a gentle poke with her nose when I’m not expecting it.
And she looks up at me with those big trusting eyes………
Add a skim to your floor to make it slant towards the outside door.
I have a ramp to allow wheelchair access to the back door. Penny hates that too as it’s metal and she doesn’t like walking in it. She’s a fussy bitch to the power of ten.
I think therein lies your problem GD. Maybe Penny rules the roost, as they say. My daughter has a French Bulldog and she’s had to have a gate fitted across the stair door to stop him from running upstairs and pissing on the bed. He also humps people’s legs. These are signs of dominance, and to get good behaviour you have to think like a dog and become the alpha. Establish boundaries and make sure the dog knows who the boss is. I know that Penny is somewhat infirm but still, from your description she should be quite capable of taking herself out for a piss.
Daughter has two dogs, the aforementioned Frenchy and a Staffy bitch. She is the polar opposite of the Frenchy, just 6 weeks old when they had her in 2010, well behaved, intelligent and I love her to bits. Her one fault is that when they both go out into the garden, the Frenchy takes a shit and she runs up and scoffs it. That’s perfectly normal IMO, females do this in the wild to clean their pups and she was spayed at an early age so never had a litter. The Frenchy came a couple of years ago as a very troublesome 2 year old so she sees him as her offspring. Between them they drive my daughter nuts, but then she never listens to what I say.
By the way, piss glows in the dark under the light of a UV or Black Light torch.
I think there is more than a grain of truth there. Time to reassert my authority. I believe one of the ways to do this is to unsettle the dog by moving things around such as her feeding dishes. Also I’m firing her out the door more often than she wants. She is getting a bit pissed off and the lakes are reducing in volume.
I hadn’t heard that one with the UV light. Blood and piss? Makes sense.
Here’s another tip that you may not already know. The floor you are worried about, is it varnished or just waxed? If its warping then piss will get underneath, turn into a syrup and make the place stink. Anyway, the best way of dealing with piss spillages is, after you have wept it up, smear shaving gel over the area and leave it for a while, then scrape it up with a squeegee and wipe dry. Try to see if you can force any gel in between/under the warped boards. If you go over the area with a UV torch after, you will see no trace of piss. And the room will smell nice. Works best on hard floors but walls/tiles as well.