Human Training for Doggies

Here's my post for the challenge. I believe this is one of my shorter short stories.

 Humans are strange creatures. Quite boring sometimes. They only ever tell you the same thing over and over again. Things like, “Good dog,” or, “You're such a good boy, Snickers. Yes you are. Yes you are.” Pitiful really, the way humans can be suckered into doing what you want. It just takes a little training. (Of course, they think they are the ones doing the training.) There are just a few simple steps you have to take to train your human. First of all, make sure they think you're doing what they want. If they say “sit,” then do it. Then accept the treat, patting, attention, or whatever reward they give you. I know it's quite lame; but here's the trick: if you always do what you're told, then you can get a way with a lot of things when they aren't looking. If something goes wrong, the blame will be placed elsewhere. For example, I'm going to tell you a story about my experience with human training.

One day as I was bathing in the afternoon sun, completely relaxed and dreaming of ham bones, a bright orange bullet whizzed through the air and struck me on my precious nose. I yelped and leaped to my paws. A little boy with spiky red hair and a plethora of freckles stood laughing obnoxiously at me, a toy gun in his hands. I lowered my ears and tucked my tail between my legs. The boy let loose another bullet that struck me on the backside. I released a low growl, threatening him. He just continued to laugh, enjoying my misery. I thought he was going to shoot me again, when a little girl with brown curly pigtails stepped in his way. She dropped to her knees and cuddled my head. The dizzying smell of some washing detergent drifted up my nose. Why humans smothered everything they owned in flowery scents never made sense to me. Flowers were for bees. If I were human, I would make everything bacon scented.

“Be nice to the puppy, Riley,” the little girl bossed.

“I don't have to do what you say,” the boy stuck out his tongue. “Besides, he likes it.”

“No he doesn't. I'm going to tell mommy!” she argued back, still choking me. I was sandwiched between a boy who wanted my misery and a toddler who seemed to think I couldn't take care of myself. That's when I got my brilliant idea. I would make them pay.

That night when everybody was in bed, I carried out my wondrous plan. I jumped off my pillow and headed to the little girl's room first. Sniffing around the room, I searched for that little doll of hers, the one she took with her almost everywhere. A familiar plastic smell met my nose. Ah-hah! I dragged poor Barbie down the hallway to the little boy's room. Then it was time for the fun part. Holding the doll between my paws, I took a mouthful of its hair and yanked. The delightful sound of ripping and snapping met my ears. Perfect. I scattered the hair across the carpet. Next I dragged that horrid gun of his out my doggie door and buried it in the far corner of the yard. Then I spotted a couple of those orange bullets. Easy peasy. I'd get rid of those in a couple of bites. Thy didn't taste all that bad. When my task was finished, I reentered the house and climbed the stairs to the dad's office, and that is where I am now, typing out this wondrous scheme for you on his handy dandy laptop. My little family will wake up tomorrow morning, and all will be chaos. Little Pigtails will be in tears blaming Riley, and he'll claim she hid his gun. Mom will be perfectly stressed, and Dad will ground the kids. Plain and simple. No one will ever discover my little secret because I'm normally a perfectly good doggie. (Except, of course, for you, my fine dog blog readers.)