my bishes party all night

I think my dogs have become teenagers. Lately, all they want to do is sleep all day and party all night. And it’s driving us crazy.

Our dogs sleep on beds on the floor of our bedroom. When they want to wake us up, which until recently was around 7:00 am, they start prancing around the room and banging on the furniture with their tails. I’m sure there are some who might argue they’re not doing the tail percussion on purpose, but I promise, this is intentional. They stand next to our metal bed frame and wag their tails, producing a surprisingly loud “DING! DING! DING!” Lemme tell ya, that will get you up in a hurry.  Lately they’ve been doing this at 2:00 am, demanding to be let out of the bedroom and into the rest of the house, where they engage in such wild behaviors as getting on the furniture (they’re not allowed) and finding things to chew on, like used Kleenex in wastebaskets and the remote for our Xbox and sound system.

I watch enough Dog Whisperer to know that he’d tell me my dogs aren’t getting enough activity during the day, so they’re not tired enough to sleep all night. He’d suggest I strap on giant rollerblades and take them for a run every day. Because he obviously wants to kill me.

My solution is less strenuous. I simply keep the bedroom door closed during the day, so the dogs can’t nap in their beds all day long. Now, they begrudgingly nap on the living room rug, but they don’t sleep as soundly, because every time I leave the room, they have to get up and make sure that I’m not planning on feeding them or something. They also spend more time playing with their toys and each other, and, we’ve found we like the added benefit of having them hanging out in the same room with us, rather than dreaming sweet puppy dreams in their beds. Now they’re waking up at 6:00, instead of 2:00, which is a real improvement. Just call me the Dog Whisperer for lazy people.