No, I didn’t name her, “Dog” because I didn’t like her. We tried to give her a nice name but she absolutley preened when we called her “Dog”. She loved my friend, Arthur, who spoiled her unbelievably. Me, on the other hand, didn’t and she hated me as much as she loved Arthur. She never forgave me when he died.
We found her in Cape Coral, one night she just jumped into our car and although we knocked on doors and advertised, we never found her owners.
She was very well trained, waited for permission to eat or get on the sofa but didn’t seem to understand any voice commands. I finally thought that maybe she didn’t understand English and tried the few Spanish words I knew. Nothing. Then one night when I had her out for a walk I spoke to her in French and said, “Allez a la maison” (go to the house). She disappeared suddenly then I found her sitting at the front door. Could it be this easy? I learned French when I lived in Canada so I could speak to her. Yes, that was the answer. She loved to hear the French language and when I put the French channel on the TV, she would wake up and almost smile.
For a brief time, we had a cat door installed. Our neighbor came over one day and seemed to know this dog quite well. She explained, after we left for work in the morning she would go out through the cat door and go to her garage and bark until they let her in. She would spend the day eating dog treats and watching Doctor Phil, then when she heard one of us come home, he would run back through the cat door. We had no idea!
I brought her with me when I moved to Tennessee and she began hating me even more. She would wait until I cleaned the floor and the pee or poop on it. It didn’t matter when I cleaned it, she would hold it all day if necessary. If I took her outside, she would look at me as if she didn’t know why she was there, even though I told her (in French) to pee. Again, she would hold it until she got inside and pee just inside the door.