A Morning In The Life of Maxwell the Pug
Maxwell is a creature of routine. He has his own time and way of doing things and is greatly put out when his schedule is interrupted. He also has a strong sense of proprietorship over my time and attention. Things like “work” , “wife”, “NFL”, “books”, “eating”, “playstation” have no meaning to him. There is a big leather chair in our family room. Max’s career goal…his life goal…is to spend as much time as possible with my ass in that chair and he wedged tightly between my thigh and the chair’s arm.
In the morning, when Max and his sister Zoey wake in their crate, they create a ruckus so that I know they are awake. I let them out and they head for the kitchen, whirling like dervishes until I get their breakfast into their bowls and onto the floor. Afterwards, they head outside for the morning squat and cocking of the leg.
When they get back inside, Zoey goes into the family room and Max heads back to the crate, where, growling loudly, he pulls his bed out, thrashes it furiously, drags it across the floor in fury, folds it in half before proceeding to hump it. Max gets that behavior honestly because that’s what Leslie does to me before our romantic interludes.
Spent, he enjoys hanging out with me while I eat breakfast and surf the web. The past few days, though, I’ve broken the routine somewhat. Instead of eating and surfing in the big chair, I’ve set up my laptop on the kitchen table…its easier to juggle the internet, coffee, English muffins and cereal that way.
Maxwell has shown his displeasure in a couple ways. I eat breakfast after my morning walk…grab some coffee and take off my running shoes before settling in to read the day’s news. The other day, Max picked up one of my shoes and carried it into the family room, jumping onto the big chair. I went after him and he immediately dropped the shoe, which is odd because I thought he wanted to play, in which case he’d have made a big show of growling to show me how tough he is and not letting me get my footwear back so easily. After I returned to the kitchen, he calmly walked in, grabbed the sneaker and took it back to the chair. Again, he didn’t put up a fight….looking at me as if to say “You’re not getting the message, dumbass.” Again, wearing a look of infinite patience, he took the shoe. Then I finally got it…he wanted me in the family room, on the chair. I grabbed my laptop and sat next to him on the chair. Seconds later, he was wedged in, snoring loudly.
Today, I came downstairs for my shower and found this:
Max looking at me like “is there a problem? Have you never seen a pug on a kitchen table before? If you think I’m moving when you sit down to tap-tap-tap on this thing, you are sadly misinformed.”
Alas, mornings generally do not end well, with Max barking in panic as I leave to earn the kibble.
