Finding a good dog sitter can be ruff for owners

Before you get a dog, you think that boarding it while you're on vacation will be easy. You keep your neighbor's dog while they're away, they'll keep yours. Or something like that.

Actually, if you're like me, you don't think about boarding at all. You don't know enough to realize you should. I was concerned with breeds, size, training and feeding, but not boarding.

And in those naïve early days, it wasn't a problem. We took our dog, Annie, with us. She ran blissfully through the Wisconsin woods on my sister-in-law's country acreage, or happily chased deer over my parents' Iowa farm.

The first time we traveled elsewhere, I boarded her at our local vet's. How could you do better than a vet?

But when we picked her up, it was clear she'd been hanging with a rough crowd. Like a teenager who'd succumbed to peer pressure, our sweet little lady now lifted her leg on fire hydrants and snapped at other dogs.

What was this? Psychological trouble? Last week she was normal. Now she had gender identity issues and needed anger management class.

But canine psychotherapy is for Hollywood, and I had my hands full just finding her a decent place to board before our next vacation.

First I asked our neighbors, who wanted to try a dog before getting one of their own. On our get-acquainted visit, before I'd taken off my coat, Annie darted into the family room and declared their rug her territory.

I blotted it up while apologizing profusely, backing away on my hands and knees. They were sweet about it, but clearly would not be making this a regular thing.

Next, I tried the 20-something living with her parents across the street. The young woman was between jobs, loved dogs and cats, and could use the cash. Annie could stay in our home, where she'd feel settled. There would be no carpet issues and there'd be no need for emergency calls to a doggie therapist. Annie would get walked three times a day, more than usual.

But there was an emergency call, not to a psychotherapist, but to us. At 1 in the morning when we were in the wilds of Costa Rica.

With no cell phone service, the call had come from our Naperville neighbor to the resort's landline and awakened the property manager, who'd then stumbled through the underbrush, phone in outstretched hand, to rouse us.

It seems Annie was shut out of our house, alone, at night, in freezing temperatures. Where was the dog-sitter? Why wasn't our dog snuggled up in her warm den in our laundry room?

We resolved that situation immediately over the phone, but didn't find out the whole story until we got back. The dog sitter said she'd left Annie safely tucked in bed.

She guessed we'd left a window unlocked, Annie had spied a rabbit outside, jumped up on the window seat and pushed the casement window open. Able to get out and jump down, our dog couldn't then jump up and back through the window.

I argued I had locked the whole house. She argued that I couldn't have. Her mother, now in on this, decided that Annie had somehow unlocked the casement window herself and cranked it open.

Our dog is smart, but not that smart.

It was a mystery -- until later that day when I flipped open the lid of our kitchen garbage can. Cigarette butts. And like daylight breaking over the Costa Rican jungle, I suddenly knew.

The young woman had opened our casement window and settled on the window seat for a secret smoke. Later, Annie was able to push it open. The young woman didn't want to tell me, in front of her mother, that she smoked. Voila, genius dog!

I decided not to tell the mother about the smoking. It was better to have a genius dog than a psycho dog. Better, indeed, to let sleeping dogs lie.

• Cheryl Stritzel McCarthy lives in south Naperville with her husband and three human daughters, in addition to the canine one. She welcomes your dog stories at otbfence@hotmail.com