Gave her an inch and she took a mile!

Taricha doesn't get left outside by herself pretty much ever. I smoke like a chimney so her bathroom breaks are a good excuse for me to go outside and do that. On a typical 'break', Taricha walks down to the yard (two flights of stairs), does her business in a timely manner, comes back to the porch and chills with me. If she doesn't have business to do she stays on the porch. (Unless there's a squirrel sighting in the yard. In which she forgoes walking two flights of stairs and takes them in one giant leap... then returns to the porch when the prey inevitably escapes.)

Yesterday was a nice enough day. Other dogs were out in other yards, birds in the trees above bein loud, windy, fresh, sunny. She seemed content to just lay on the porch and watch and listen to what was going on around. The backyard isn't in full view from inside the house but the porch is and I figured she would be okay by herself for a few minutes while I piddled around inside.

For whatever reason I was distracted for literally a whole five minutes. Not long. I return to the porch to find Taricha not lazying about as I thought she would be.  "Taricha come heeRRree!" her usual recall... no sound no nothing from her!

Usuuuually she zips right up the steps with a-butt-wagging. So this means she's probably doing something she isn't supposed to be doing. Upon walking into the yard I spy this AWESOME new hole in the lattice of my porch with a giant dog head sticking out.

I yelled "HEYYYY!"
She ZIPS out.

Taricha had the BIGGEST smile on her face. Muddy from head to toe from crawling around in that tiny space. Stands right infront of me. Just stands.

When I move towards the lattice work to inspect the damage, she takes off into zoomies of doom. Like she KNOWS she did something she wasn't supposed to. Mischievously, she repeatedly  zipped by me, again and again, stop and aim for the hole, I'd body block and then she'd take off again to run another zoomie lap around the yard.

I fully admit that my porch is not in a..... like-new condition. It's been slowly falling apart, this winter being rather harsh so this cheap lattice keeps breaking.  But still, it wasnt bad enough for a knee-high-truck-wide dog to crawl though! She had ripped off several pieces and drug them under the porch with her.

I like to put thoughts into her head and think she's smarter than she is. This porch fiasco was probably a conspiracy. Maybe she'd been waiting and watching the weak spot in the porch for a while and stole her moment of truth... knowing she had a very rare completely alone-moment.  Or a rabbit was under there, tempting her into sin.  Oh I am still so furious (on the inside) but I simply can't blame her!

I fixed the porch with my trusty staple gun and blocked it off with lawn ornaments. Meanwhile Taricha was stuck in the garage drying off the muddddd. Oh I guess it was just another day!