One of my favorite qualities in Trip is that while he loves to be near me, he doesn’t have to be on me. All of my lovely daughters would like to be on me – all the time. By the time the three of them are in bed having Trip come and flop down near me is fantastic.  We keep each other company.  I talk at him, he doesn’t talk back. I keep full mobility of all my limbs, he gets to stretch out and stay cool. I love my dog.

Tonight while waiting for my poor, sad, computer to catch it’s breath after I asked it to do too many things at once, I reached down to pet Trip. As soon as I touched the hair on his back Trip just about jumped out of his skin. Truly, I think he almost lost his hide when he went from sleeping sprawled out on his side to upright and facing the opposite direction in one giant leap.   Since I wasn’t expecting such a dramatic response my response to his response was a bit, ahhh, shall we say, extreme as well. As soon as we peeled ourselves off the ceilings and refit our skin Trip gave me his best offended dog look, stalked over to the opposite side of the room and flopped down on the dog bed with a big huff.

Not only did I miss out on my nightly dog bonding time but the cat came to sit on me instead.

Must make a note: Let sleeping dogs lie!