With Maggie The WonderBeagle, You Snooze, You Lose

There is a game that goes on every day in my house.

It involves wherever you are sitting. And Maggie the WonderBeagle.

Most dogs I’ve had are quick to jump up on furniture, so that’s nothing new. Previous dogs in my house weren’t even allowed to do that, as a wonderful Black Lab I had for 12 years named Butch used to make it an art form to sneak up on a sofa when no one was looking. It was his few minutes of heaven until Dad came into the room and asked “what do you think you’re doing?”

Just as we spoil our grandchildren and let them get away with things we never let our children do, the same happens with dogs as we grow older. Maggie has never given it a second thought about whether it’s OK to get up on furniture. She just assumes it comes with her ownership of the house.

But even that’s not enough.

To Maggie, she doesn’t just want to sit on the sofa. She wants to sit in YOUR seat on the sofa.

If you’ve gotten comfortable in the den, have the TV on, laptop in front of you, hot cup of coffee by your side, that’s where she wants to be. The picture above was about 13 seconds after my wife got up to take care of something in the kitchen. Maggie sat up, looked over the top of the loveseat toward the kitchen to make sure the coast was clear, then made herself at home.

She will even emulate what you were doing as if she’s trying to be a human. I’ve seen her staring at the television as if she's watching whatever Hallmark Movie my wife was watching, furrowing her brow as some man is about to do some woman wrong. Here, she seems to be looking at my wife’s laptop as if she’s checking email.

With me, she’s even more calculating, mainly because when I get up I tell her “don’t take my seat.” There are times she will follow me into the kitchen, patiently wait until she sees I’m involved with something like having one hand on the coffee pot and one on my cup, then casually stroll back to the den, find your seat, and hop up and defiantly look back at you as if to say “what?”

She then ramps up the game by refusing to move. She knows she’s adorable when she does this, and really turns up the cutes to ensure you’re not going to yell at her. You can say “c’mon Maggie, move,” and she’ll give you the same consideration as if you said “the Orioles have a 0.0 chance to make it to postseason.”

What she wants is for you to try to move her out, so she can then try to draw you into a wrestling match. Pull slightly on her front paws to move her a little and the next thing you know, Foxhound teeth are treating your forearm like a chew toy. Then it’s on.

There will come a day she’ll be too old to do this and I will look back with sadness remembering these times, so I let her get away with it. My wife believes I do the same with everything else involving the hound, as she often says “I don’t know what magic powers she has over you, but I wish she’d teach them to ME.”

It’s really quite simple, however. It’s Maggie’s World.

I’m just along for the ride. 😊