Sammy’s latest chew toy

My dog, Sammy, truly has reason to thank God that she’s still drawing breath.  Don’t get me wrong, I love my dog and would never really do anything to hurt her, but she truly can be a pain in my ass.  I got her when she was 5 1/2 from a family that has a different idea than I do of what a dog’s life should be like.  They kept her in a kennel a lot, she wasn’t allowed on the furniture or to sleep with their daughter.  I’ve tried to teach her that, along with the privilege of getting to roam the house, she has some responsibility as a member of this family.  You know, like she shouldn’t put things in her mouth that don’t belong to her.  But in spite of my efforts, she’s having trouble “getting it”.  Maybe you really can’t teach an old dog new tricks?  In the 2 1/2 years that she’s lived with me, she has ripped to shreds magazines, books, boxes of tissue, socks, one of my favorite shirts and my Gameboy Advance SP (the last one almost had her living in a Basset Rescue home).  She’s very lucky that she’s so stinkin’ cute and that I’ve come to love her to pieces because if she weren’t and I hadn’t, she would definitely be behind bars at the Animal Rescue League right now. 

What did she destroy now, you ask.  Well, the other night I’m dinking around the house, doing my own thing and basically just peacefully enjoying my evening when I walk back into the living room to find my mobile phone on the floor.  Given Sammy’s history, my first thought was - SHIT!  Terror rushed through my body as I slowly approached my phone lying there lifeless on the floor.  “Oh God, please tell me she hasn’t chewed up my cell phone,” I pleaded but in my heart, I knew I was screwed.  The phone, my precious phone (I’m a bit addicted to my cell phone – my dog isn’t the only one with issues, okay) was covered in Sammy slobber and had holes in it.  I’m not talking about bite marks.  Oh no.  I mean actual holes.  I could see the internal wiring of the phone.  Son of a bitch!

In vain, I picked up the phone and showed it to Sammy while telling her sternly, “NO!”.  My second order of business was to make a hysterical phone call to my mother.  “How could she do this to me?!” I asked.  My mother’s attempts to assure me that she didn’t think Sammy did this to me did little to comfort me.  At this point, I’m not sure who I was more pissed at, Sammy or myself.  It’s not like she hadn’t give me plenty warnings that something like this could happen. 

 The second thing I did was call the mobile store to find out what my options were.  I talked to this dude (seriously, “dude” is the right word here.  He sounded like Wooderson in Dazed and Confused.  I found myself wondering if he was wearing pink pants and I kept waiting for him to ask me - “say man, you got a joint?” ).  Wooderson kept assuring me that their tech guy could probably fix it.  I tried to explain just how badly the phone was damaged yet he remained optimistic telling me, “man, you’d be surprised what he can fix”.  Yeah, okay, whatever.  After determining that the “tech guy” would be there at 10:30 the next day I decided that I should just enjoy the rest of my evening.  And by enjoying the rest of my evening I mean, I cracked open a beer and tried not to think about it anymore. 

At this point, it’s important to note that this was not one of those free phones that you get when you sign a new mobile contract.  Oh, no.  This was a very nice phone – bluetooth, GPS, internet, MP3 player, the whole nine yards.  I’d bought it right before I went back to college when I still had money.  And, of course, knowing that I was going back to college and that money would be tight I had decided to save myself a few bucks and had declined the optional phone insurance.  In the words of Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, Big mistake.  Big.  Huge. 

The next day I dragged myself to the mobile store where I’m asked, “can I help you?” by a guy who I instantly knew wasn’t Wooderson.  I hand him my once beautiful phone, he takes one look at it and asks, “Dog?”.  “Yeah,” I confirm.  “Do you have the insurance on it?”.  “Nope,” I reply.  He didn’t say anything else at that point.  He just walked over to a locked cabinet and pulled out a new phone that is exactly like the one Sammy decided to have for dinner the night before.  He then proceeds to start scanning bar codes from my old phone and the new phone into the computer.  I stood there wondering what he’s doing.  “Can you fix the phone?” I ask.  “Uh, no,” he answered.  (I told ya, Wooderson) 

Of course the store is packed with people and there’s a guy standing next to me buying a Blackberry.  The sales associate helping him asks him if he’d like to purchase the optional insurance on his phone and I suddenly find myself to be the poster child for purchasing the insurance.  I was beginning to think that I should get some commission on their insurance sales for the day. 

At this point, my situation has become the talk of the store and “Wooderson” comes over to ask if I’m the girl who called last night.  (he wasn’t wearing the pink pants but he did have the general look down).  I was asked what kind of dog I had more than once.  The salesman of few words tells me that he carries the same phone and has never seen anything that can chew through the steel case.  Yep, that’s my basset brat for ya. 

Fortunately God was smiling on me that day because when the salesman of few words ran the new phone through their system it told him that I didn’t owe any money.  What?!  Could it be, where my ears hearing this correctly?  Do I get to walk out of here with a brand new phone that is exactly like my old phone and not have to pay anything for it?!  Yep, that’s what I was hearing alright.  Woo hoo!  Of course when he asked me if I wanted the insurance on the new phone I quickly said, YES and tried to hurry him along before he realized that the system has made a mistake and I’d have to pay for the phone.   

To celebrate my good fortune in how all of this played out I decided to put a picture of Matthew McConaughey (if you didn’t know, he played Wooderson in the movie) on my phone as a screensaver.  I used to have a picture of Sammy as my screensaver but, for some reason, as much as I love her, I just don’t feel like looking at her when I go to use my phone anymore.