Who let the dogs out?

Resslin' Around, by Casey Ressler

Late last week, my wife and I became parents again, this time to two beautiful little girls. If anyone wants to buy gifts, we are registered at PetZoo and are in desperate need of a Pooper Scooper.

See, instead of a daughter, this time we opted for dogs. Two of them, actually, which officially proves that I have lost my marbles. Or at least the marbles were buried in my yard by the little pooches who have an affinity for stealing anything left within three inches of the floor.

The first night home, we cuddled the 8-week-old puppies and petted them, commenting on how cute they were, right up until the minute one thought my recliner looked like a litter box and let one fly. After cleaning up that mess, I was confronted by a mess in the corner in the living room, which was followed up by two other messes in strategically hidden places that you could most certainly smell but not see without a valiant search. No matter how fast I went, the pups stayed one step, err, squat, ahead of me.

They are little Jack Russell mixes, and one looks quite a bit like a Chihuahua, and I openly admit it looks a little funny when a big dude like myself is rolling with a Chihuahua in hand. They are so small — just two pounds each — that the smallest collars we could find fit all the way around their stomachs, and the smallest treats they make are the equivalent to a 16-pound steak for you and I.

My daughter turns four on Monday, and within minutes of having the pups, I thought back to those days when we first brought Madison home from the hospital. I had no idea what to do, how to do it or how to clean it up, but I learned on the fly. The same thing goes for the pups, but the biggest difference is that we never lost Madison behind the couch when we first brought her home, and she rarely chewed on my slippers while I tried to enjoy SportsCenter.

She decided on the names of Belle and Lizzie for no particular reason. As an homage to my Denver Broncos, I suggested the names of Elway and Denali -- Elway, the Great One -- but was overruled. Now that the girl-to-guy ratio in my house is 4:1, I'm getting used to being overruled, however.

Perhaps the weirdest part of trying to housetrain the pets involves getting them to go on the "paper." I never gave it much thought until the first time the dogs "eliminated" on the paper, with my picture staring right up at them from on the paper. Thanks to a three-day scientific study, I can honestly say they would rather go on the picture of Jeremiah Bartz, our sports editor, than on mine, simply because the whole idea freaked me out enough to not lay down any more copies of the paper that bear my mug shot. I don't want to give them any ideas when I'm laying on the floor of the living room, because that's an association I don't need them to make. Jeremiah, however, is more than welcome to visit anytime.

It's hard to believe their little bodies can contain so much energy. They go and go and go, and then all of a sudden basically fall over into a deep sleep. Just like when I became a dad four years ago, I now truly live for "nap time."

Casey Ressler (valleylife@frontiersman.com) is the Valley Life editor. He is trying to train the pups to fetch him a homebrew in a nice frosty mug.