Life was good – nice and boring.  The dogs were behaving, not getting into things, just laying around the house while we were at work.  I should have known that a storm was on the horizon.  It all started when we helped my son out and dog sat one of his out-of-control dogs while he and his wife went out of town for a few days.  Charlie, our “psycho” dog took an immediate dislike to my son’s dog, Izzy, and would bully her around the house.  As soon as we sent her back, both AJ, our laid back black lab, and Charlie decided to go on a rampage.  I guess they had some pent up frustration with us for bringing a wacko dog into their domain. 

AJ is a “carb monster”.  He loves bread, pasta, chips and most of all coffee cake.  He has stolen countless loaves of bread off the counter,  He pulled the covered glass Pyrex baking dish that housed the freshly baked coffee cake off the back of the counter and dragged it off to enjoy “al fresco” in a more relaxed setting.  Why it didn’t break when it hit the floor, I’ll never know.  Pyrex is some strong stuff.  This prompted us (I mean Mitch) to build a  pantry with doors and move everything that is edible out of harm’s way.  Or so we thought.

AJ figured out how to open the pantry doors.  The double louvered stained doors didn’t fair too well, now they are sporting deep gouges and scratches from determined toe nails.  After he pulled the doors open, he had a veritable smorgasbord in front of him to sample at his leisure.  Do dogs do anything leisurely?

We came home from work one day for lunch and discovered that the dogs had gone grocery shopping, using our well stocked pantry to dine lavishly.  As we walked in the door, AJ met us with a chocolate candy bar hanging out of his mouth.  The dining room looked like a tornado had blown through.  Strewn across the new rug we had just bought was the box that the taco shells had been in and the bag that had held a pound of dry pasta.  Yum.  The two had sampled their way through two loaves of bread, one white, one whole grain, everyone needs fiber.  For dessert they dined on chocolate cake mix, chocolate candy bars and Magic Shell chocolate fudge ice cream topping.  Magic Shell makes a really interesting mosaic all over the brand new rug.  All of those goodies must have made them thirsty, so they dragged a case of diet coke out of the pantry to quench their thirst.  In the kitchen, all of my spices had been knocked off the shelf and were scattered all over the floor. 

After a moment of shear disbelief, I snatched the candy bar from AJ, walked in and attempted to salvage any of my spices and herbs.  I picked up all of the chewed up wrappers and threw them in the trash. 

Mitch looked at me and said, “Well, how about sitting down to a bite of lunch?” 

I said, “I don’t have time now.  I have to get back to work.”

He said, “Well how about taking a sandwich back to work with you?”

“With what, they ate all of the bread!”

Contrary to popular belief, our dogs are not affected by chocolate.

I looked everywhere for child proof latch covers, nothing fit.  We secured the doors with heavy rubber bands.  That seemed to do the trick.  Once again, lulled into that false sense of security, I was positive that we were home free.  Dogs are cured.  Silly me.

One day when Mitch was out of town on business, I came home for lunch to walk off some of the dogs’ pent up energy and get some exercise for me too.  Bonus!  I opened the door and there was AJ and Charlie, munching away on a box of Hershey Bars with Almonds.  They didn’t even take the time to remove the wrappers.  The box was a full 36 count concession style display box that we had just bought last week at our neighborhood warehouse store.  I grabbed the one in AJ’s mouth, Charlie wisely chose to drop his and I managed to salvage two more that hadn’t been dined on yet.  I was in total shock.  I was so angry I could spit.  At that moment, all I could do was put their leashes on and take them for a
walk and try to calm down.

Before I could leave to go back to work, I had to come up with a plan on securing the pantry doors closed.  I had nothing to put the dogs in to keep them out of trouble and I had to go back to work.  I needed something big and heavy enough that couldn’t get knocked over to block the doors.  The only thing I had available on short notice was a padded weight lifting bench.  I dragged it in front of the doors and stood back to survey my handiwork.  I hoped that it would withstand my determined dog.  I wasn’t so sure.  When I got back to work, I entertained a co-worker with my lunch “date” and she said, “You don’t have dogs, you have goats!”