Dogsitting

I agreed to dog sit for my Dad this week so that he wouldn't have to put their beautiful black lab in a kennel while they were on vacation.  Though, they refer to her kennel as the spa because she gets to play on a farm with other dogs and then they wash and massage her twice a week.  So it's not like it was a hardship for the dog.  It's probably a little bit more difficult for the dog having me watch her.  (I work a full time job when she's used to my dad being home all day and I don't get home until 7 when she's used to being fed at 4, etc.)

What I was not prepared for was the level of training Delilah has in her daily routine.  I do not mean the training that my dads' have given her, but rather the training she has given them.  This weekend, she started trying to wake me up at 4am.  I was able to ignore her until 6am when she proceeded to stand on me and lick my face until I got up.  I was not as upset about this 6 am business as I know this is when my step-dad goes to work and figured he probably fed her before he left.  So I stumbled out of bed and put food in her bowl then went straight back to sleep.  At 7 am I hear Delilah barking downstairs.  I thought there was someone at the front door or that maybe she had to go outside so I went downstairs again. 

I opened the back door to let her outside into the yard and she firmly sat down on the rug by the refrigerator.  She looked from me to the treat back on top of the fridge and then back to me.  Then she barked at me.   I texted my dad real quick to ask about this behavior and he said, "oh yes she always eats and then gets a treat."  I just thought it was incredibly funny that the dog had to wake me up again because I had "forgotten" the treat part of it.

This morning it was pretty much the same thing.  I didn't want to wake up at 4 am, I wanted to wake up at 8 am.  So I told her to lie down and go back to sleep.  Which she did until 6am when she started throwing herself against the bed frame so I would wake up.  When that didn't work she stood over me, again, and licked my face.  She is very demanding.  At this point I remembered the treat business since I didn't want to have to get up again before my alarm went off.  It was this moment when I realized how she had trained the dads.