Smarter than your average "dog"

I know all the blogs have been about my baby boy Reese. But.... I can't leave out my other two babies, Boone and Lexi. Most people know my dogs pretty well but just in case, here is a little background on the two. At the bottom is a funny story about Lexi.

Lexington is part Rottweiler, part Labrador and I think part human. She was my first baby. We got Lexi from the Boone County Animal Shelter in Kentucky when I was visiting up there in August of 2001. We have had Lexi since she was a little under 6 weeks old and she turned 7 in July of this year. She is everything you would expect in a Labrador, friendly, loyal, loving, great with kids but she has the stubbornness of a Rottweiler. Her philosophy is "If I don't want to do it, you can't make me". Trust me you can't make her do anything she doesn't want to do. She is 85 lbs of solid strength. She believes she is part human and deserves equal rights. She sleeps with us in the bed even when there is no room for her. There are times when Randy or I come to bed and she has already established her spot. It is a fight to get her to move! She also sits with us on the couch and during car rides thinks she has to ride shotgun. She is the alpha female.

Boone is a yellow dog. I have no idea what he has in him, maybe lab, maybe chow, no clue. We got Boone from the Animal Shelter in La Marque, TX. Boone's whole purpose was to keep Lexi entertained, because while Randy and I were at work Lexi was chewing on our pool equipment and digging holes in the ground. We adopted Boone in July of 2002 and he was already 4 months old. He just turned 6 in March of this year. He is Randy's dog but lately has been really attached to me. His motto would be "I am very appreciative that I was given one morsel of food today". He is the sweetest and most submissive dog and is frightened of children that are smaller than him, especially if they are a little wobbly. He usually just runs and hides from them, but kids LOVE him.

We could not have picked a better two-some of dogs. They get along great because they both ignore each other. They don't really play together or lay next to each other, they just both do their own thing. Boone knows Lexi is in charge and Boone doesn't care. On road trips when we have both dogs, Lexi usually takes up the entire back seat and Boone is squished up against the window but looks to be in dog heaven because we thought to bring him with us.

Okay onto my hilarious story. I decided to give the dogs a bath on Friday. I do this outside in my backyard with the hose. Boone as you can probably guess from the profile of him above doesn't like to get a bath but just stands there and takes the "punishment". He just stares at me with those puppy dog eyes the entire time thinking I can't remember doing anything to deserve this but I am sure I did something wrong so I will just stand here and be good. Lexi's bath is on the entire other end of the spectrum. First, I have to chase her down in the backyard to grab her by the collar and bring her closer to the hose. That never works because she digs her front paws into the ground and doesn't move. So usually I have to trick her into getting into the alleyway between our house and our fence. When she is there it is a game of chase, me running around with the hose and Lexi trying to avoid it (you can already guess that after I bathe Lexi I am usually soaked and end up taking my own bath during the process). This time was no different except when she was running away from me she would go and hide behind Reese in his stroller. Somehow she knew that I would not spray her if she was near the baby. I thought it was a coincidence so I moved Reese. Again, Lexi runs right next to Reese and just stands there, I swear she was smirking and laughing at me. I decided to move Reese further away from me and continued on with Lexi's bath. Finally after drenching me, the side of the house, and anything else in the near vicinity, Lexi's bath was finished and just to show me who is boss she walked over to Reese (who is now a good bit away from Lexi) and shook off right by him. When I ran over to her and told her no she moved but as soon as my attention was somewhere else (picking up the hose and the shampoo) Lexi would walk over to Reese's stroller and shake off again, three times total. I finally towel dried everyone off, Boone, Lexi, Reese, Reese's stroller and myself. We all went inside and took a nap from the day of hard work.

That dog amazes me how intelligent she really is. Some people would laugh and say no way does she know but something tells me she knows exactly what she is doing and knows exactly the way I will react.