Puppies in the night...

Oh well. I am now resigned to the well-publicized fact that Great Pyrenees dogs are nocturnal by nature and from now on and for the next ten to twelve years, I may not always get a proper night's sleep. As Walter Cronkite would say: "And that's the way it is..."

Savannah woke up at one o'clock this morning, giving me her one-bark bark, which is her signal that she has to go out. There is just no way to ignore that... doing so gives me the surprise of a puddle on the kitchen floor when I come downstairs in the morning, which has happened twice now. And yes, Savannah can probably hold it in if she wanted to, but the problem is that she gets herself excited by barking.... and do I really want her to be decorating my tile floor with after-midnight puddles?  In case you haven't guessed, the correct answer is 'No.'

I've also realized that Savannah is like a cat during the day... she sleeps a lot, sometimes deeply enough to snore. Well, of course she does... she has to conserve as much energy as possible during daylight hours, in order to protect her home and her cats and her people when it gets dark.  As I'm typing now, Savannah is in her bed, sound asleep and snoring. I've learned how to concentrate on my computer and just ignore the snores, which are worthy of a 94-yr-old man.

Speaking of Savannah's bed... when I woke up this morning, I found a pile of brown fiberfill from the inside of this puppy's once-very-plush dog bed. After this puppy's three attempts to de-stuff that bed of hers, Savannah's bed is now more of an oval shape than a rectangle, and one of the front corners of that bed is no longer upright and pillow-ish.... that particular corner looks like a smashed lima bean. I've sewed up all the holes, thrown the fiberfill away, and being that I'm not the best seamstress in the Hills here, Savannah's bed looks Frankenstein-ish where my stitches were placed. This puppy princess will just have to learn to live with that because she will not be getting a new bed anytime soon. (Or at all, if she keeps making holes in this one.)

It was unusually cold and windy this morning (not normal here for late March) and Savannah was just loving the cold and trying to catch the wind while we were out walking. She literally jumps up with her front paws in the air and tries to swallow the stiff breezes of air.  I'm the first to admit that when Savannah is being very good and old-soul-ish, she's an exceptional dog.... but when that puppy-ness takes over, she is just useless, easy to distract, and as stubborn as they come.

But... it is what it is. Savannah's personality was set in puppy-stone during the first three months of her life, which did not include us, and unfortunately, did not include as much early-training and certainly not nearly enough contact with sane and sensible dog-loving people. I think we're paying for that now, and I just hope and pray that as Savannah gets older, she will once again settle down into her old-soul self that has recently been captured by the Puppy Devil that has now taken control.