I am a BAD dog trainer

In my room I have two dog crates - one for Sparky and one for Kota. Sparky's is a medium sized one and is at the had of my bed. Kota's is a small on and at the foot of my bed.

Now Kota's taller than Sparky he doesn't really fit in his crate. Rather than buy a third crate I've been leaving Sparky loose when I'm out and putting Kota in Sparky's crate. So far, so good. Sparky seems to have got past the chewing stage that made me buy the crate and, as long as I don't leave anything edible in his reach, he behaves himself.

However Sparky likes to sleep in his crate at night-time. If I try and get him to sleep somewhere else he just won't. He's slept in that spot since I bought him home and he's not moving now, dammit!

Up until now I've been shutting Kota in his crate and leaving Sparky loose, Sparky will always choose to settle in his crate. I don't want to shut Kota away in a little crate all night (especially when I've been at work all evening and he's been shut away then too) and so I've been trying to get him used to sleeping loose.

For the last few nights he's spent the first hour pacing around my room, trying to get onto my bed, lying down, getting up, trying to get onto my bed, pacing around my room and trying to get onto my bed. Everytime he's tried to get up I've shooed him off and told him to "go to bed". Eventually he's always gone and lied down on his bed and fallen asleep. But I'll wake upin the early hours of the morning with him on my feet and then we go back to pacing and lying down and standing up only this time he'll mix playing with squeaky toys in, just to add a bit of fun!

Last night I read through the archives of Save the Pit Bull, Save the World right before bed and was feeling a bit soppy after looking at puppy!Steve pictures.

And so when Kota placed his front feet on my bed and looked at me appealingly I called him up.

He curled up and was snoring within 10 minutes.

I once again woke up to dead feet and a happy puppy on top of them!

*sigh*

BAD dog trainer. Now you've given in he'll try harder next time!

Although it was quite nice having a snuggly puppy in my bed...