Dudley Update

It's time for a Dudley update.  So, the other day I got home from work and made my daily climb up a very steep staircase.  Dudley had greeted me at the back door like he always does by jumping up and giving me what I like to call a "Dudley hug".  This usually consists of a two-paw embrace while jumping on his hind legs, claws out, and slobbering.  One day he is going to jump up while I'm leaning down and my next post will be about how Dudley broke my nose, but I digress.  As soon as I dropped everything off at the table and went to check messages on the phone and the contents of my refrigerator, he bolted upstairs.  This is highly unusual and should have been my first warning sign.  But as I was enjoying some peace and quiet Dudley was quite busy.  It dawned on me when I got the the third or fourth step that something was not right.  Dudley was laying at the top of the stairs gnawing on something.  Oh no.  It couldn't be my glasses because I was wearing them.  He didn't find that brand new box of tampons I just bought, did he? No, those are locked up in the closet.  (I'm not going to make that mistake again.) What could it be?  I haven't had sofa pillows since his arrival.  (Note: covering your couch in aluminum foil each day when you leave for work, does not deter a determined puppy from getting to those fluff-filled pods of wonderment.  I foolishly believed the dog trainer when he said the the crunching foil noise would scare him and Dudley would never want to 1 - eat my pillows or 2 - lay on the couch.  All the diligent foil wrapping got me was ridicule from my dad who stopped by one day after golf and tired legs from standing.) No, at the top of the stairs was this:
Photo reenactment -- there was no way I had the presence of mind to capture this on film.

Four crumpled wads of wet, gooey, dollar bills.  Wait, what did I see in the corner of his mouth?  Still one more?  And thus began the adventure of me trying to pry Dudley's jaws open while I retrieved my dollar  In these hard economic times I was not going to let it "go to waste".  I apologize...I'm an avid Cake Wrecks reader and she is seriously punny.  I can't help it. Anyway, I knew getting a dog was going to be an investment but I didn't think he'd actually resort to literally eating my money.  He had to search it out.  It wasn't as if I leave money on my bedside table like I do my water bottles (his third favorite treat, next to peanut butter and cheese).

The dollars were in a pocket, in a laundry basket, in my closet.  he didn't even bother to take the pants out of the dirty clothes, he just rooted around in the basket and helped himself to the contents of my pocket without disturbing anything else.  He'd tell you it was my fault for leaving the closet door open.  That, or Dudley has somehow miraculously learned how to open louvered doors.  This might actually be a possibility because a few mornings later I awoke to a strong fish smell.  I had made a tuna sandwich for dinner the night before, but I know I tossed the can into the trash in my "garbage closet" and I never leave that door open.  Well, this is what I found:

This image actually lends support to Amie's pet name for the Dudster.  She likes to refer to him as Montecor.  Montecor gained fame after ending the legendary Vegas run of Seigfried and Roy following an unfortunate mauling incident.  I think Amie lives in fear of coming over for a friendly visit and leaving to spend the next two months under heavy sedation after having to undergo a face transplant, (Yeah, I'm talking about crazy women who let her pet chimpanzee eat her friend's face.) While I have yet to be mauled, those Dudley hugs I'm so fond of do tend to get a little aggressive.  So I will continue to throw money at him in my efforts to tame this savage beast.  The last stupid purchase I made was for the Pedi-paws during our Black Friday shopping expedition.  It was my fault for believing that Dudley would actually sit calmly while I lifted his nails into position and filed them down without incident.  I mean really, you saw the tuna can.  How delusional do I have to be? 

For now, I think I'll just sit back and watch Marley and Me and relish in the fact that while the Dudster can be naughty, he barks at scary things in the dark, warms my toes when it's cold, and never jumps on me when I cry.  So for now, I'll keep him around, unless he eats my glasses...again.