Great stories. Here are a couple from me.

Years ago my family had 2 dogs and a cat. The dogs were Maltese and the cat half Persian half alley cat (that's a story in itself LOL). The three were best buddies and we found out just how much of a team they were when one night for some long unremembered reason we left the dining room table uncleared after dinner and went to do something else intending to clear it later. Well, my mother finally went in to start clearing and there was Larissa (the cat) on the table happily eating and dropping pieces of food down to the two dogs waiting below.

Gracie, my Toy Fox Terrier lives with another owner now (long story) but I get reports about her all the time. Currently they are up in Seaside, Oregon staying at Grace's relatives B&B and enjoying running free on the beach. Grace was telling us that people stand and stare open-mouthed at Gracie, who weighs maybe 5 lbs soaking wet running full tilt beside a Mastiff. And the Mastiff will not permit anyone or anything near Gracie. He's given his drooly heart to that little imp.

My two most amusing stories both involve a rather peculiar little black female greyhound I had years ago.

I was told that greyhounds were difficult to train, but never had any problems training them at all until I adopted Raven. There didn't seem to be anything that motivated her. A friend (who bred Dobermans) insisted she was just stupid, but I didn't think so for a minute.

I finally learned through trial and error that Raven would do anything for whipped cream in a can. I thought I was on to something. I thought I was teaching her things like "sit" and "down" and "come". I suppose I was, but I was also teaching her to go into the refrigerator, take out the can of whipped cream, pop off the cap and step on the squirty-thing until the whipped cream came out. A fact I discovered one day when I returned home and caught her in the act. She became the reason I needed to lock my refrigerator, and the reason I needed chains with padlocks on all my outdoor gates. Raven had figured out how the gate latches worked too.

The other incident involved a ladder that I kept leaning against the house. It had been a snowy winter, and I frequently needed to get onto the roof to clear it. We had a warm spell and the snow disappeared within a week, but the ladder hadn't been put away yet. Raven decided that she wanted to check out the view from the roof, and so climbed the ladder.

While I was having a panicked conversation with my boyfriend at the time about how to get her down, Raven took one last look around at the view and then came directly down the ladder on her own like it was nothing.

I have always suspected that dogs can learn by observation, but nothing hammered this possibility home quite like the behavior of my "stupid" little Raven

A couple of my stories:

Back in '03 I got my first Blue Lacy puppy-- Chula. I only had her 2 months until she got out of the backyard & I never found her again but BOY was she smart. At about 11 weeks I had put her outside for the night like always with our other dog. There was a cat door but I didn't think anything about it.

I got up the next morning and walked out to the living room. She was laying on the couch, quietly thumping her tail, surrounded by ALL the dog toys (probably 20 or so) she'd taken out of the basket and moved to the couch one-by-one. No one ever heard a thing!!

The second story involves my little Shih Tzu that I got in college-- Benji. He was an integral part of my life for 6 short years. So it was only natural that when my BF and I decided to get married I wanted him at the reception.

So we were all rushing around, getting dressed in my friends' apartment, getting to the church and we took 2 cars. Benji had a bath, was brushed out, and had flowers woven in his hair. We were ready to go!

We got to the church and NO BENJI!! Each car thought the other car got him!! Panic!! We had to put the wedding on hold while my soon-to-be-husband (who loved Benji like I did) rushed back to the apartments. There was Benji, a little confused, sitting by the apartment door and patiently waiting for someone to let him in!! (The rest of the wedding went off without a hitch and yes, he got PLENTY of treats at the reception!!)

The first shepherd that came into our lives when my husband and I first got together truly had a sense of humor. He loved to knock things out of people's hands. Walking along eating an apple, he'd dart up from behind with a nose bump to make it go flying. Hubby walking across the yard with a tool in his hand, bump, down it would go.

He had no intentions of doing anything with these fallen objects, just loved the idea of making them drop. I have no idea where he got that from.

Unrelated but his funniest story was out boating one day. Our fault, bad owners. We were out for about 4 hours, it was hot and he was getting lots of water on the boat. Our drinks were going down nicely as well, however, we had a means to relieve ourselves.

We finally pulled up on the little beach in our community and all got off. He was an incredibly social dog and we had no worries about him interacting with anyone.

The beach had a few sun tanners lying about soaking up the hot sun. One girl in particular was on her stomach with the back of her bikini top undone, I guess avoiding the tan lines.

For some reason Koke bee lined for her, cocked his leg and just stood there relieving himself on her lower back. Even as she popped up in horror, her screams didn't dissuade him. He just ended up getting her stomach and the towel.

You can't imagine our hysterical shock as we watched this instantly unfold. We called him back, spewed off some verbal diatribe of correction for the viewing public, not that he understood a word. Turned our backs and had one heck of time controlling our laughter.

When I was able to keep it together, I approached the lady and apologized profusely. She was all about your bloody dog pissed on me and my towel, and rightfully so. I offered her a clean towel which she snatched up immediately and suggested she may want to take a dip in the water.

Needless to say he was the talk of the town for the next couple of weeks as the story got relayed over and over again. And while no one should be subjected to something like this, we didn't know the lady but a few people did and apparently he couldn't have chosen a better target.

In college I worked at a laboratory. On Friday my job was to pick up Dunkin Donuts on the way to work.
Bought a dozen donuts. English Setter, Tate, a real Marmaduke, was in the back seat - donuts in box on passenger seat. Left my keys on the counter at the donut shop -ran back in, grabbed them, came out and drove to the lab.
When I got there, picked up the box of donuts. It was EMPTY. I was out of that car < 2 minutes, maybe < 1 minute. Only evidence of the crime was a fine dusting of powdered sugar on his soft blue and white muzzle.

"Only evidence of the crime was a fine dusting of powdered sugar on his soft blue and white muzzle."


And a happy smile?

Don't ever leave a box of donuts beside me, either. They are not even really a favorite sweet of mine, but there is something about fried flour covered with and filled with sugar when it's right there that cries out to me.

And to English Setters.

 Quote: Deb Collier

... I got up the next morning and walked out to the living room. She was laying on the couch, quietly thumping her tail, surrounded by ALL the dog toys (probably 20 or so) she'd taken out of the basket and moved to the couch one-by-one. No one ever heard a thing!!

I have one who reinforces never leaving the room when dogs have chewies.

I can be gone for 40 seconds, just to grab an iced coffee, and when I come back everyone is in the same position as before but one dog has no chewy and one has one in his mouth and one underneath his body.

My first Shepherd,Lady, who I got when I was 14, was my lassie. She was the greatest dog and was my entire social circle through High school and college (what can I say, she was fun and alot nicer than most people). While in college I would walk or bike to school which was a couple miles away. I lived at my parents house and would come home at random times. She was a one woman dog and my mom noticed that she would get up and lay at a spot in front of the door and just watch, about ten minutes before I got home. She was always waiting for me, but since I came home at random times and I walked or biked, theres no way she could have heard me coming. I firmly believe some dogs can just have a deeper bond with you.

My first dog, a little black terrier mix named Gypsy was the coolest dog! My family moved to an orphanage located way out in the country in mexico and she taught the kids there to value and love dogs. In that region, dogs are not valued very highly and are treated so roughly that most have totally shut down by the time they are adults (and are usually too malnourished to show much signs of life anyway) well she was so lively and handsome that the kids fell in love with her- the boys would go out lizard hunting with her. She was also fast and an incorrigible car chaser, and they loved to watch her chase cars through the fence next to a dirt road.
She was smart too,during feeding times she would sometimes pretend to see something and run a few feet away and bark at it, then when the other dogs came to see what it was, she would dart back and take their food. (of course we didnt let her eat it but it was funny)

Another time me and my friend were walking to these woods behind our house. These two massive dogs came running up to us and it scared me so bad I took one look at my little sister, my friend, then back at the dogs and decided to literally jump the fence right beside me, leaving everyone else to defend themselves LOL. I have NO idea how I cleared it in one jump but I did. I came crashing down flat. on. my. face. My body was as straight as a pencil and If I had a video you guys would be busting out laughing in tears. My neck cracked and everything went black for a few seconds. I woke back up Laughing and had a horrible headache and sore neck for a few days LOL. It was hilarious but I am thankful I did not become a vegetable!

My youngest male (gibbs) was being very quiet, my wife or I had set a loaf of italian bread on the kitchen counter, my wife was in bed and I was in the computer room, I call Gibbs to see why he was so quiet because he'll stare at food forever, and he walks in and gently lays the loaf of bread in my lap. It never dawned on him to eat it without permission but he let me know he'd sure like a piece, very cool. That's character right there.