Messes, messes everywhere

My plan of baby-gating the shoe room failed. Although Boden cannot even climb onto our bed or the couch, he is apparently agile enough to jump over the baby gate, which is even taller than both aforementioned pieces of furniture. His motivation: the kitchen garbage can. If he can sniff even the tiniest hint of food in the garbage can, his main objective becomes getting to that food despite all risk. The first time I caught him, he was inside of the garbage can. He had knocked it over and crawled into it, and was munching delightedly on some dinner scraps. First, I whipped out my camera to quickly record the action. Then I tried to scold him. He looked so confused as to why I was sounding angry. Like he could not understand what was naughty about forging through the garbage can.

He has this thing when he gets in trouble. He doesn't ever seem remorseful or guilty, he just seems puzzled. I don't think he fully recognizes yet that "no" and "naughty" are negative words. Just looks at me like, "Mom, what's wrong with you? Why does your voice sound louder than normal?" Thatcher is the exact opposite and always has been. When he does something wrong, he punishes himself more than we do. All I ever do to scold Thatcher is say, "Thatcher, that is so naughty." He does the rest. He will literally grovel at your feet and make you feel like the guilty one for scolding him. There have been rare occasions when he gets sick and throws up or has a potty accident in the house, and my heart almost breaks for him because he seems so distraught. He does not like letting his mom and dad down, and he has the saddest facial expression a dog can possibly have. The other day I came into the bathroom to find the toilet paper roll shredded. I knew it was Boden, so I called him into the bathroom to tell him that was naughty. Thatcher, ever the masochist, brought himself into it and sat right next to Boden while I scolded him. Good big brother.