I still miss Woody

It’s been almost 3 months now and I still lose it from time to time. Usually after dropping the boy off at daycare and coming home to an empty house (plus Obi), the missing of him just overtakes me. It’s hard to get my day rolling when my heart feels like lead and my limbs like wet noodles. In his old age, Woody had become the perfect companion. Still not touchy-feely, but empathetic and there when I needed him.

Obi, on the other hand, is a puppy. I had no idea how young he was when I first laid eyes on him a month or so ago. To say he is a handful is an understatement. A few minutes ago I saw something red out of the corner of my eye; my arm was bleeding from some bite Obi had inflicted during an earlier meet-n-greet. For him, a chomp is as good as a kiss. It pisses me off and is dangerous to The Missus. To his credit, he doesn’t use his mouth on The Boy – some of that probably is the result of The Boy being so assertive with him from the beginning – but I also think in his pack mentality, Obi understands that if he hurts the pack leader’s youngling, he’s toast.

But everything else is on the table, even stuff that is on the table, or the counter. He almost brought The Missus to tears the other day when he dug up the only viable pepper from her back yard garden. He tore the wing off the mask of Captain America (inset), a Captain America that cannot be replaced, even on the ebay or amazon. We looked for half an hour, and as close as we came was someone else lamenting that he couldn’t find one anywhere. Yesterday, Obi ate a stack of magnetic business cards that were sitting on the dining room table.

Consequently, he spends most of his time masked or in the dog house (literally). And just when it seems like he’s getting it together, he’ll have a day like last Sunday where he tried to eat the neighbor’s dog, snarled at the neighbor, chewed up something irreplaceable (I don’t even remember what) and peed on the front room carpet.

Anyhow, it’s been almost 3 months now, and even if Obi was the best-behaved dog on earth, I think I’d still come home and miss Woody. I’d just have someone to commiserate with instead of someone to play Warden to.