Meeshka would approve

I have a great scam going! It's such a good one that I'm not going to stay upset about not celebrating the anniversary of me coming here!

The girls are on a kibble strike. I don't know what Gremlin's problem is. She'll probably get a trip to the vet because of it.

She gets bored sometimes. But usually only for a meal or two, says the Human Assistant.

Shu Shu, well, who knows? She won't eat what she brought with her. She won't eat our excellent stuff.

And the H.A. is annoyed that he doesn't remember which excellent stuff we have at the moment.

Heh. He likes to get a different grain-free food each time. That way we don't get sensitized to what's in them by eating the same thing for years and years.

And that's fine. But ya gotta remember what you had last time so you know what not to get next time. Humans - sheesh!

H.A. thinks Shu Shu may not be very hungry because her thyroid is low.

I didn't know you could move them around!

But he says that's what the vet said. You learn something new just about every day!

But anyway, here's the deal. H.A. pours three bowls of kibble. I lie down and thoughtfully chew what's in my bowl. Gremlin wanders off.

Shu Shu looks at her bowl. Looks at the H.A. Looks at her bowl. Looks at the H.A. He points to her bowl and tells her to eat her food. She looks at it some more and he wanders off. Shu Shu follows him.

Right about now, even chewing every bite, I'm done. I stroll toward the water bowl.  Oh!  Look!  Shu Shu's bowl is full!  I stick my face in it and gobble as fast as I can. (The human's words, not mine.) By the time the guy gets to me, I've had two or three good mouthfulls.

He picks up Shu Shu's bowl. I go back to wandering toward the water.  Oh!  Look!  Gremlin's bowl is full!  I gobble, H.A. grabs, I go drink water.

By now I'm up at least a third of a bowl. But wait, there's more!

Now the guy feels guilty that I have a nice full tummy (hah!) while the girls are "starving." So he gives them some stinky stuff. With half a serving of kibble mixed in.

"Stinky stuff" is something like canned venison or green tripe or maybe some rehydrated raw food.¹

Tonight he thought he'd get away with just pouring some stinky water from a can of tuna on their food. Shu Shu was very interested! But most of the kibble she picked out of the bowl, she set back down on the floor.

So he broke down and mixed a little of the meat in with their kibble.  SNARF SNARF  There it went!

Now, is the Human Assistant able to give wonderful, smelly, highly nutritious food to two dogs and ignore the third?  Is the Pope Jewish?²

Isn't this great?  My regular food. Plus extra food that I can be dominant and steal.  Plus stinky stuff!

The only annoying thing is that when we have smelly food we don't get extra treats later. I don't know why that is.³

Otherwise, what a good deal!  This is one case where having other dogs in the house benefits me!  Especially my dear little foster sister Shu Shu.  ::Husky Hugs::  Oops, sorry. You okay?

The H.A. is really determined to get her eating kibble. He keeps trying and failing. Until he dishes out rations of smelly stuff.

This is so cool! I've been trying to learn tactics from Meeshka. She uses Loki and Sam to get what she wants. I think she'd approve of the way this works!  ::Big Husky Grin::

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¹mr_ed:  Yes, it's just a tad bit hypocritical to claim the dogs are grain-free when I give them a food that has grains as its first two ingredients. I'll gladly give my rationalizations to anyone who's interested.

²Hint: NO!

³mr_ed:  Because I hide their medicine in the stinky stuff instead of needing to bury it in peanut butter or small pieces of deli turkey or the like. Shhh!

-- photo of Shu Shu by Nicole Howard
-- image of human glands from Wikipedia