I'm not your bitch, BITCH.

So, Chester is officially Danny's bitch.

At first, their interactions were amusing to watch. Danny would pick up a toy (i.e. his stuffed snake), Chester would run and grab it out of his hands, Danny would laugh, and they would do it over and over and over again. We all sat and watched, thinking, oh, this is so adorable, a boy and his dog, how touching. So Norman Rockwell.

Things have really taken quite the turn.

It all started when I realized that Danny viewed Chester as a toy, a simple plaything if you will, rather than the living and breathing canine he is. What makes Chester far superior than any of Danny's toys that we've actually purchased (and don't have to feed) is that Chester has the tendency to run away (thereby livening the chase) and that sparks Danny's interest times a bazillion.

If you haven't realized it by now, Danny is cunning. He is very sly. He is also another adjective that fits in that group that I can't think of. He uses his cuteness very well to cover this up, and if you don't know him, you'd never think him capable of the incident I'm about to describe, certainly after he plays you like a fiddle with a display of affection such as this:

Don't let this fool you. If you look closely at Chester, you'll see that his body is clenched just about as tight as it can get, and he's mentally plotting all the ways to possibly remove himself from Danny's "loving grip".

The incident I'm about to recount happened last week, let's say Wednesday, right before Danny went to bed. When he gets really, really tired, he gets what we like to call "crazed", where he gets this insane look in his eyes and usually runs back and forth, back and forth, until he collapses on the carpet. Chances for tantrums and/or tears (from all parties) are highly likely at this time. It's a critical part of the day. I wasn't surprised when I saw Danny reach for this in his toy bin:

Doesn't look harmful, does it? Didn't think so.

I was surprised when I saw Danny, child of my own womb, walk calmly over to Chester (who just happened to be observing the goings on of the living room, perfect case of the wrong place at the wrong time) and clock him in the face with it. It was like something straight of The Sopranos. I half expected Chester's head to come flying off, with the force that Danny used to hit him, but he just kind of shook his head and calmly walked away. I broke my cardinal parenting rule and cursed in front of Danny. Although I just said, "HOLY SHIT," half under my breath, I still felt bad afterwards, but that situation deserved it. It was horribly disturbing.

After things stopped moving in slow motion, I ran over to Danny (who, by the way, had this devilish little smile on his face and was obviously quite pleased with himself) and snatched the bucket/weapon of destruction from his hands and let out the most serious, scariest NO that I could muster. He looked at me all, that's all you got lady? and yelled no right back at me. Holy shit is right. We have a discipline emergency on our hands, folks.

I wondered what else the kid had up his snotty, food stained sleeve. Was he fashioning a shank out of his wooden toys to attack me with while I slept? This shit was serious. I knew I had to do something, so obviously I turned to the Internet for some advice, as any good parent should. I found, and promptly ordered, this here book on Amazon:

The cover itself is priceless. If you replace the little brown haired boy with Chester's head, it's a very accurate pictorial representation of what goes on daily at our house. Although intended for educational purposes, the book is also quite entertaining.

They have several scenarios that discuss better ways to channel anger. One example:

Rather than squeezing the cat (or tricolored dog with the sad eyes), the book suggests it's better to:

Clearly, the better idea.

What's really hilarious is how much these two pictures resemble one another:

Now, I know boys are more aggressive than girls and blah blah blah, but this behavior worries me. I asked my Mom if I were like this at his age, to which she replied, "Oh hell no." Apparently he's not body checking or decapitating anyone at daycare (I would have heard) so that's a plus. Knock on some wood. Now.

In the meantime, I will try to give Chester some extra attention, and hope he doesn't break and go batshit crazy on Danny's ass a la J-Lo in Enough. Chester's from the mean streets of Pasco County. He could be the Suge Knight of the dog world for all I know. I do know he's capable of putting his foot, er, paw down.

But really, how can you keep a straight face when this one is looking up at you?

Easy peasy lemon squeezy (thanks, Hannah Montana)...you just hide your face in your shirt and turn away so he won't see you laughing.



I'm fucked.