Last Thursday, I almost completely lost it – Sam, our adorable little beagle, ate a big bag of trail mix. In truth, Sam eats anything that has any hint of flavor – the only exceptions are: pills, broccoli and socks – if it’s not pills or broccoli or socks, which oh please, don’t insult her puppy sensibilities, she greedily snarfs it down – things like: panties (the smellier bits), Q-tips, Kleenex, used girly products, dog remnants, cat remnants (in fact, were it not for a child gate with a cat door – bless the soul who invented that – the cat box would be a welcome little beagle buffet) – and the list goes on . Come to think of it, she had a perfectly pornographic moment with my pillow – I remember her pinning it down and using those long tongue-y licks across the entire surface – it was a moment where you wanted to yell out “GET A ROOM!” – instead, I wrestled it from her and threw it some place to dry off – my poor little pillow had been violated. Did you know there’s no support for abused pillows? That’s what we call a travesty – poor thing – it eventually had to be tossed.

When the cats eat on their little perch, Sam licks the walls next to them trying to extend that tongue high enough to get a taste and she’s intimately familiar with the sound of a kibble tumbling down to the floor – a sound that penetrates the deepest of sleeps, because she’ll go from snoring to toes tapping quickly across the tiles trying to get that one stray bit of food on the floor.

For Sam’s protection, we keep bathroom doors shut, all food is removed from low surfaces and the trashcan with its little catch on top has to be turned around – Sam knows how to open that – she’s serious about her snacks.

As a beagle, she’s hungry ALL DAY LONG.

So, last Thursday… Sam eats the trail mix. Do you know what trail mix is? A BIG BAG OF DOG POISON! Raisins, chocolate and macadamia nuts – all packaged together to KILL YOUR DOG.

I was panicked and hit the websites – mostly because I had read something about grapes and raisins and “imminent death” after your dog suffered from “kidney failure”, and other fun phrases like “the dog will die a painful death” “…and the dog had to be put down…” and it mostly boiled down to “you’re going straight to Hell for being a bad parent” and the “SPCA is going make it their personal mission to destroy your life and will display your picture at your work with the words DOG KILLER plastered in big bold letters across your face” and I’d be used as a warning to others who were too lazy to pick up the trail mix off their desks that being a bad pet owner wouldn’t be tolerated. I would probably have to move to the edge of town and live in exile from my community with a promise never to even look at another dog or think about one. In fact, I’d probably be banned from watching programs like the Westminster Dog Show (wait… this isn’t sounding bad… anyway, you get the point).

Then I waited and watched and shook my head as she spent Friday eating grass and redecorating our yard. I suppose that if I were a better dog parent, I would have held her ears back and patted her forehead with a wet cloth.

… and that’s how I almost killed poor starving chubby Sam.