How to train your human

I’ve known my share of “bad” dogs. My mental roster includes a robust Chocolate Lab that dragged whoever held her leash, a stubborn, overweight Golden Retriever that devoured a cellphone and a sausage of a Border Collie that never met a french fry she didn’t like. All are past or present members of the Winslow family.

Hailey & Barkley circa 1989

For years I’ve daydreamed about adopting the first dog of my adulthood, but I put off a serious search until this past autumn. By then, my husband and I had completed our “World Trip” and settled into our new West Coast home. So I told Matt I wanted a dog addendum added to our lease as my birthday present. He made it happen. And then I got to work. I signed up to become a “Dog TLC” volunteer with the Peninsula Humane Society in Burlingame. I researched online and borrowed library books on canine behavior. I took a part-time position with Benji’s Backyard, a small business that shuttles dogs from the Silicon Valley suburbs to Fort Funston in San Francisco for 3-hour romps on the beach. And what did I learn? All that exposure to dogs and dog experts essentially boiled down to one universal truth: Most “bad” dog behavior is not the fault of the dog but the two-legged creature at the other end of the leash. Consequently, it is with great humility that I recognize my contribution to the legacy of delinquent Winslow dogs.

My family had three dogs and three cats for most of my childhood, and although my sister and I were extremely fond of all our pets, we were selfish and lazy when it came to training them. It was our mom who singlehandedly housetrained Barkley, Jackson and Charlie, and she did an admirable job molding them into loving, loyal family members. They were still turds.

Scene of the crime

The first Winslow turd was Barkley, a miniature schnauzer mix my family adopted when I was about 6 years old. According to legend, my mom selected Barkley -- of all the dogs warehoused at the Broward County Humane Society –because he had the shrewd sense to jump into her arms as she entered his kennel. We named him for a “Sesame Street” canine with similar shaggy gray hair, and he demonstrated the appropriateness of our selection through his favorite pastime, which, of course, was barking.

The quintessential Barkley story involves a houseboat and a jet ski. In Barkley’s pea-sized brain, jet skis were roaring, menacing demons intent on destroying the sanctity of water-related excursions; his burden was to keep them in line. And so our 20-pound mutt exhausted countless hours of his 18-year life chasing jet skis up and down beaches, his frame morphing into a gray blur as he reached warp speed and all four legs left the sand at once. He barked and he barked and he barked. There was no calming him. His hatred for personal watercrafts was legendary, even comical. Yet none of us anticipated how his mania would culminate into sheer madness one weekend afternoon in the late 1980s.

Barkley in his golden years

In those days, it was customary for the Winslows to spend at least part of the weekend on my grandparents’ houseboat, the Loggerhead. On that particular weekend, the Loggerhead was ambling down the St. John’s River when a jet ski pulled up alongside. Enraged by this noisy interloper, Barkley began racing across the second story of the houseboat. Upon reaching the bow, he took a flying leap and belly-flopped 12 feet into the water below. He did not surface until passing beneath the entire length of the 55-foot boat.

My dad was not particularly fond of Barkley, but he did not hesitate to dive in after him. Somehow, Dad managed to swim back to the boat with the half-drowned dog flailing in his arms.

Barkley didn’t slow down until Hailey and I were in college. By then, cataracts had claimed his sight and advancing age had scrambled his brains. He often “stared” into corners and barked at nothing at all. He coughed up puddles of phlegm, presents Matt never failed to step in, and, if not monitored, would walk straight off second-floor landings (He did so on at least two occasions and, miraculously, suffered no discernible injuries, a clueless Mr. Magoo of a canine.). 

Charlie: The best dog I've ever known

Barkley, that incessantly howling, mailman-biting, phlegm-spouting, pee machine, was definitely on my mind as I conducted my search for a four-legged best friend. As much as we all (excluding perhaps Dad and Matt) loved that dearly departed dog, I was not in the market for another Barkley. And I happened to be in a unique position to be choosy; I met and interacted with adoptable dogs during each volunteer shift at the humane society. I also carefully observed the Benji’s Backyard dogs I took to the beach.

“Jack Russell terriers are too hyper,” I said to Marie, Benji’s Backyard owner. “And I’ve met some sweet pit bulls, but I don’t think I’d ever adopt one. They seem unpredictable.”

I certainly didn’t have the energy for a boxer like the giant, high-strung beast I walked most days. Tommy* can be awfully sweet but he barks incessantly to demand I throw whatever I happen to be holding in my hands. He has a habit of torturing the overturned crabs that wash up on the shore, and his favorite game is lunging to rip legs off those I’m holding aloft to toss back into the ocean.

“We are not getting a male dog,” I repeatedly told Matt. “They have too much aggression and pee on everything.”

I knew what I wanted: a calm, mid-sized, adult female dog, preferably of the Border Collie variety. And it had to be a rescue. That got along with our cats.

Dad & Jackson (before he ate the cellphone)

“Do you eat kitty cats?” I asked Keesha as I took her picture for the PHS adoption website. The Queensland Heeler seemed to smile, and I took that as a favorable sign.

But as with every major decision I’ve made in life, I erred on the side of caution and waited. And waited. And waited. Months went by. Keesha the Heeler and Catorina the Dachshund and Phi the Australian Shepherd all went to other homes.

“I don’t know how you go to the humane society each day and not come back with a dog,” my mom would say whenever I called her during my drive to PHS.

I reminded her of all the canine troublemakers my family has sheltered over the years. Inevitably, Scrappy’s name came up.

Scrappy is the demon dog my mom adopted under the pretense of fostering him for her own local shelter. Three years later, he is still at her side and wrecking havoc daily: perfuming himself with carrion, lunging at much larger dogs, decorating the interiors of new cars with footprints, snagging sausage links from the kitchen table, running from his owners as they attempt to leash him in front of beach patrol officers. He is, however, pretty cute, an oddly proportioned terrier mix with pointy ears and wiry hair that somehow floats into most meals my mom cooks. Scrappy resembles Alf, that wisecracking extraterrestrial from the 1980s television show, and Mom wishes she had had the foresight to switch his name to “Alf” long ago, as she believes his original name inspires mayhem.

Ruby, Scrappy & Hailey in St. Augustine

Scrappy just might be Barkley reincarnated. His favorite pastime is perching on the bow of my parents’ Boston Whaler and angrily barking at -- and biting-- the boat’s wake. Unless leashed, Scrappy becomes so obsessed with eating waves that he plunges headfirst into the water. On one such underwater exploration in St. Augustine, Fla., Scrappy swallowed so much of the Intracoastal Waterway that he became sick the moment my dad plucked him from the waves. He expelled a terrific stream of diarrhea across the boat, causing its occupants, including family friends Michael and Diane Buchanan, to promptly became nauseous. (While video footage of that particular plunge is unavailable, here are clips of three other Scrappy boating incidents, including one in which Hailey pulled a "Dad" and dove in after him: "Scrappy Plunge, Part I," "Scrappy Plunge, Part II" and "Scrappy, a Slight Alteration.") 

Scrappy is a loyal dog that adores my mother and has become a never-ending source of comic relief for my family. But no, the Winslow Family dog roster did not need another wave-eating, dead-fish-rolling, Napoleon-complexed canine.

Sally, Scamp & Tess

Last Wednesday, I drove to PHS early to photograph adoptable dogs for the website before I began my shift in the wildlife department. I was a mere 10 feet in the door when I spied Scamp, a 7-month-old terrier mix tussling with his kennelmates. With crazy gray and black fur standing on end and a pair of floppy, antennae-like ears protruding from a tiny 6-pound body, he was easily the cutest of the four puppies.

But I don’t want cute, I reminded myself. I want smart. I want good. I want female.

Thanks to puppy mills and that ignorant segment of the population that fails to spay and neuter pets, San Francisco Bay Area shelters are flooded with Chihuahuas and pit bulls. PHS is no different. Young dogs that aren’t Chihuahuas or pit bulls are rare and highly desirable. Fluffy, white puppies are adopted so quickly the volunteer photography team often doesn’t bother photographing them; odds are, someone will adopt the pup before we have a chance to post his mug online. I’ve always scoffed at these puppy-obsessed adopters. Don’t they know all dogs grow up? Don’t they realize “cute” is fleeting?

The puppies in dorm AD 145 were brand-new arrivals. It was 10 a.m. The public wouldn’t know about them for another hour, when the shelter’s doors opened at 11 a.m. I felt an unfamiliar wave of frenzy wash over me. Now was the time. I had to investigate.

The Wolfman

Scamp was the only male dog in the kennel, so I asked an adoption counselor about the others, Sally, Cherry and Tess*. The behavior logs for Sally and Cherry flagged them as “nippers,” so I visited with Tess, a sweet, all-black terrier pup.

Selecting any pet, a new family member that will spend decades at one’s side, based on a 10-minute visit is a bit asinine. Most people wouldn’t select a human best friend within 10 minutes because it’s impossible to sufficiently judge character in that time. Yet I spent 10 minutes with Tess in the PHS “Get Acquainted” room and made the kind of snap judgment required in that situation: Tess was indifferent to me. So the adoption counselor brought in Scamp. He jumped into my arms.

“Scamp” is now Wolfgang, a tribute to his lycanthropic features. He has Barkley’s gray coat and Scrappy’s disproportioned ears. He eats leaves and dirt and howls when housed within his kennel.

“’We are not getting a male dog,’” Matt has said repeatedly, mimicking me.

My husband is absolutely right. Wolfgang is everything I didn’t want in a dog: male, adolescent and tiny. And, since adopting him, I’ve done all those ridiculous things owners of small dogs so often do: carrying him into Walgreens, purchasing a special purse for him to ride in, pricing tiny knit sweaters to keep him warm.

But will Wolfgang be a “bad” dog? That’s up to Matt and I and how much time we’re willing to invest in his training. A dog behaviorist I recently met demonstrated just how important such training is.

Wolfie & Matt

Robert accompanied Marie and I to the beach on Friday so as to evaluate Tommy and his relationship with Billy, a pit bull that frequently lunges and snarls at him. Within 20 minutes, Robert had taught both dogs a “settle” command and had bewitched them into interacting peacefully.

Dog training is difficult because it requires the dog to suppress its natural instincts, Robert said. For example, a dog in the wild would starve if it wasn’t able to chase a darting rabbit, but domestic dogs are taught to ignore such a distraction.

Robert’s current big assignment is with a Mountain View beer garden; He’s been hired to teach the owner’s Bernese Mountain Dog to pull a cart so as to deliver drinks to customers. So far, the pup can comfortably haul 120 pounds.

I don’t see cart pulling in tiny Wolfgang’s future, but basic commands are forthcoming. He came “pre-programmed” to fetch, and Matt taught him “sit” within a single, 30-minute training session. It’s a start. Just to be safe, I’m thinking our next lesson should focus on perfecting “stay” in preparation for his inaugural Winslow boating trip.

*Names have been changed to protect the guilty

Birds for Bonnie

Around our house, Matt and I typically spell out the word “bird” rather than say it aloud. We take this precaution because our cats know the word, and their immediate reaction to hearing us utter it is to stare at the television set. Not out one of the two living room windows offering views of real robins or jays or chickadees perched in real trees. At the television.

We blame Kelsey and Brice for this. Months and months ago, after dinner at our house, our well-meaning friends mentioned their own cat’s fascination with bird videos.

“Bird videos?!” you say. “What does that even mean?”

Readers, we too were perplexed. So Kelsey and Brice explained: Apparently, songbird enthusiasts across the globe train video cameras on their bird feeders and upload the resulting footage to YouTube for cat enthusiasts to play for their feline friends. Many of these videos boast views in the millions.

So we connected a laptop to the Apple TV and connected that to the flatscreen and broadcasted one such bird video for our cats. Only Bonnie, our plus sized female cat, stirred. (Let me preface the following by making something clear: this is a cat action verbs like “stir” typically don’t apply to. Bonnie’s idea of chasing a feather teaser is to roll on her back and absently bat at the air with both front paws, a move that resembles weightlifting but thus far has had no discernible slimming effect on her figure. Derek, a family friend, once referred to Bonnie as “Bubba Seal,” a fitting nickname for a cat whose favorite lounge position is big belly up, stick legs curled.) Anyway, Bonnie stirred the second she noticed those YouTube birds. Without pause, she extracted herself from her basket bed atop the ottoman and took a flying leap onto the carpet. She planted herself in front of the television screen and stared, mesmerized, as foot-tall scrub jays devoured piles of sunflower seeds. Bonnie was so convinced these birdzillas were actively within or on the other side of the peculiar third window before her that she barked, a soft, breathy chatter of aggression released through curled lips. When the digitized birds became especially aggravating, Bonnie jumped onto the thin strip of table in front of the TV. With little room to maneuver, she was squished sideways against the screen but still attempted to swivel her head on that sad stump of a neck so as to keep the now-blurred birds in sight. It was as if Dinah had tried to follow Alice through the looking glass, but the looking glass had rejected her. Poor Bonnie.

Naturally, Bonnie’s confusion and angst was quite amusing to us, and so Matt and I began hosting entire film festivals for her; “WinterBirds -- Entertainment for Cats” by cowboystew, “Video for Cats” by outofthebiz and “30 minutes of CrazyBirds for your CAT to watch” by Mike OD (capitalization by Mike OD – perhaps to dissuade any humans who might be tempted to watch a half-hour of songbirds noshing on seed). It didn’t matter where Bonnie happened to be lounging. If Matt or I said “bird,” she’d come running and plop herself in front of the television. And, inevitably, she’d begin barking.

“Get ‘em, Bonnie!” we encouraged. “You tell those birds! Kill them!” (As Bonnie is an indoor cat who never goes outside, this overly enthusiastic line of encouragement is perfectly acceptable).

But, sadly, YouTube’s library of cat porn is finite, and we eventually exhausted the available material. No matter! It turns out Bonnie is not discerning about her entertainment. Overnight, she had morphed into a television junkie who glued herself to the boob tube whenever it happened to be switched on. Her yellow eyes tracked the gilled stars of nature documentaries. She followed the football during NFL broadcasts. She earned “Wheel of Fortune” Wheel Watcher status. She read the news ticker. Even when the television screen remained dark, Bonnie peered into the nothingness and willed the bright colors and shapes to return.

I was putting clothes away one day when I happened to look out the bedroom window and see robins swarming our California Holly tree. More than 20 birds were perched on the tree’s branches and gulping down its red berries. Huh. Within five minutes, I had dusted off the video camera, attached it to the tripod and pointed it at the tree. Within three hours, I had managed to upload a solid 45 minutes of thrilling bird footage to YouTube. I too could boast a million views! I would enable my channel for monetization and become rich!

But first: a test audience.

“Birrrrrrd! Birrrrrrd!” I purred. Bonnie came running, her undercarriage swaying.

I pushed “play,” and the two of us sat companionably on the carpet in front of the T.V. Together we watched digitized robins fly in and out of that holly tree. Oh the joy as each beautiful red breast took flight!

Bonnie stared at the television, transfixed, a reassuring compliment to any budding auteur. Only I noticed the real robins flying in real-time past the adjacent living room window. Bonnie was too busy barking at the T.V.

Treasure, Part II: That time my dad found a quarter

The Winslow Family Treasure Trove of Bizarre Artifacts gained its most recent exhibit in November. Snippets of the story behind this great find had since reached my ears, but it wasn’t until the day after Christmas, when I visited my parents on their sailboat domicile, that I was finally able to exact the gory details from my dad (a few rounds of beer and the assistance of Mom and family friends Alex Ripley and Krysten Biggica and their adorable daughter Kennedy played no small part in bringing this historic account to the masses). The true, embarrassing trajectory of our conversation is documented word-for-word thanks to a tape recorder I shoved into Dad’s face, but as you read, imagine you’re immersed in a fictional, one-act play by Arthur Miller or Neil Simon. Doing so might make the following dialogue easier to digest.

ACT I, SCENE I

The curtains open to reveal a nautical scene. The principal characters, “Dad,” “Mom,” “Alex,” “Krysten,” "Kennedy" and  “Megan” are seated around a table within the salon of a sailboat. A salty breeze fills the air. Kennedy gurgles occasionally but contributes little to the conversation. Friendly chatter dies down as Dad takes center stage.

DAD: When I was a kid, we lived in Pensacola for about a year, and my mother was dating this guy who was kind of a family friend, and he used to challenge my brother — my middle brother — and I to do crazy stuff all the time. One of the things was how much horseradish you could take on a spoon, a little bit and then a little more—

MOM: Sounds like a crazy guy.

DAD: —and Kevin would inhale the whole thing. He actually, and I can’t remember the whole thing, it’s kind of fuzzy—

MOM (exasperated): It’s just a nickel, Kim.

DAD: —I was like 5 or 6 years old, and he challenged me to swallow a nickel—”

MEGAN: That is so dumb.

DAD: —and I did. I swallowed the stupid nickel.

Five pairs of eyes are directed toward a quart-sized plastic Ziploc baggie and the dark coin contained within.

ALEX: It looks like a quarter.

MOM: Sounds like he was trying to kill you.

Mom, Dad & Scrappy

DAD: And a month ago, it came out.

MEGAN (matter-of-factly): He was getting a colonoscopy.

DAD: I was getting a colonoscopy—

ALEX:  That’s, like, recent?

DAD:  About a month ago.

MEGAN: What date is on it?

ALEX: Can we just wash our hands and take this thing out? I’ll wash my hands. I don’t care.

MEGAN: Sure.

MOM: Oh no, no.

DAD: I don’t know if I’d open the bag.

MOM: It’s been washed.

MEGAN: So what was your reaction? You just went to the bathroom and just looked down and—

DAD: When you have everything that I had and Mom had recently, there’s nothing in your, there’s nothing coming out but just water. They get you so—

ALEX: Cleaned out?

DAD: —Cleaned out. There’s nothing.

ALEX (nodding knowingly): Yep. Flush your system.

DAD: And the biggest concern you have is that you can’t stop going to the bathroom, once they’ve got you to that point. So right before we left to go to the doctor’s, Hailey’s driving me, and I went into the bathroom one last time to try and make sure I—

MEGAN: At the doctor’s office?

DAD: No, before I got to the doctor’s office.

MOM (shocked): What, here?!

DAD: No, at Hailey’s apartment.

MOM: Oh.

DAD: —to make sure I could make it. And all that came out was water and that. And I looked at it and said, ‘What the hell is that?’ And I mean, it was just so weird. I had to find out.

MEGAN: So you reached in and then what happened?

ALEX: Megan, I want you to find the date on it. I just want to know what it is. Actually, I think it might be a quarter. That’s a quarter.

MOM (addressing Krysten): There’s a magnifying glass behind you somewhere.

ALEX: I think that’s a quarter. I don’t think that’s a nickel.

MOM (addressing Krysten): It’s in a little brown thing. Don’t worry about it.

DAD: I thought it was a quarter too, but we looked at it really close on Pete and Linda’s boat. Somebody with better eyes than me would be enough to see it.

MOM (addressing Dad): You know what the magnifying glass looks like, Kim, over there.

DAD (placing a small magnifying glass on the table): Yep.

MEGAN: So where do you keep this now? Under your pillow?

ALEX: With his last tooth.

MOM: I think we should put it in with The Eyeball.

DAD: Linda was able to see the date on it.

MOM (addressing Alex): It’s been scrubbed. You can take it out.

ALEX: I wonder what the date is. It might be real silver.

MOM (addressing Krysten): Actually, there’s a black magic marker behind you—

ALEX (Hopeful now): It just may be so old that it’s real silver.

MOM (addressing Krysten): Yes, a black magic marker. Can you? Thanks. (Mom begins writing on the plastic Ziploc baggie) I’m going to put—

MEGAN: —‘Dad’s Poop Nickel’ on it?

ALEX: All I can think about is Adam Sandler saying, ‘Poop!’ The Poop Nickel!

The Eyeball and the "Poop Quarter"

MEGAN (reading over Mom’s shoulder): ‘Dad’s Poop Nickel.’ You need an apostrophe. Yep. And the date. What was the date of this pooping out?

MOM: We’ll just put, ‘11’—

DAD (pulling out his phone): Hold on, I can tell you.

MOM: No, it’s OK. We’ll just put, ‘11’—

DAD: November something.

MEGAN (desperate): Wait. I want to know.

DAD: Megan’s gotta know.

MEGAN (with great feeling): I gotta know!

ALEX: We have to have the correct date. And when did you swallow it then?

DAD: I swallowed it in 1962 — or 1963.

MOM: Who scrubbed it? Didn’t someone scrub it?

DAD: Linda. She was insisting on finding out what date it was.

MEGAN (hopeful): Maybe it’s a British coin.

DAD: Hmmm, I don’t know. (Reads phone calendar) Colonoscopy was on November 4.

MOM (writing on the Ziploc): Let me fix this.

ALEX (impressed): That was very recent. I’m glad I didn’t open the bag. That’s too recent.

Megan removes the coin from the bag and begins examining it with the magnifying glass.

Megan examines the specimen as Krysten, shocked, looks on

MEGAN: What did the doctor say about this, the fact that it stayed in your body this long?

ALEX: Did he document it?

DAD: I didn’t tell him until right before they were going to put me under anesthesia. And I said — everybody else had left the room and he was just standing there — and I said, ‘I gotta tell you something. That cleansing was amazing!’ Then he said, ‘Well, while we’re in there, we’re going to see if there’s any more change.’

MEGAN (running her index finger along the coin’s edges): This has got to be a quarter. It has the edges of a quarter.

Megan hands the coin to Alex.

ALEX: That’s what it feels like. It’s crazy. There’s nothing there. Nothing to tell what it is.

DAD: The fact that you guys are handling this after I told you where it came from is really beyond my belief.

ALEX: Oh, come on. It’s been washed a few times. I wish we had a grinder wheel or something with a little brush on it and maybe just brushed off—

KRYSTEN: No, you couldn’t. You’d grind it right down.

MOM: A jeweler would probably be able to figure it out.

Everyone laughs.

MEGAN: A jeweler?!

ALEX: Just don’t tell him the story. ‘Can you find out where this is from and how old it is? Tell us the date and everything.’

MEGAN: Maybe a coin collector. So, how old were you when you found this eyeball?”

MOM: We were on Dania Beach.

ALEX (picking up the Eyeball): Now, this is crazy. I mean, the Poop Quarter is pretty crazy, but this.

MOM (addressing Dad): Was that when the kids were little? When we were on the beach?”

ALEX (placing the Eyeball over his own eye socket): It’s just so detailed.

MEGAN: Yeah.

ALEX: That’s crazy. I mean, it looks like my eye, partially. If I lost an eye, I’d probably come to you guys.

MOM (looking worried): We’re not giving it up.

ALEX: What? Rinse, reuse, recycle.”