Adventures in Dog Bathing: Tank Edition

Remember four score and seven years ago when I wrote about bathing my lab mix, Raven?  I put To Be Continued all dramatically at the end of the post, totally intending to post Tank's bathing adventures the next day.  As you know, I am a confessed slacker, so it didn't happen as planned.

But fear not, my restive readers.  I shall present you with a Tankcentric post forthwith.

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After Raven ran off to do her post-bath victory lap, Tank trotted into the bathroom all excited about his turn in the tub.

Tank is easy to bathe. He's a little obsessed with the tub, actually.  He likes to sit in there while I read on the potty quickly and efficiently take care of business.  He does a Tub Check at least once a day so as not to miss any delicious bath water remnants.

Tank loves bathing so much that I really don't have to do more than pass him the soap at bath time. He waits for permission to get in the tub, and then waits patiently for me to arrange towels on the floor before he gets out. It's adorable.

On this day, the tub was full of fur from Raven's bath, so I rinsed it out.  Afterwards, I ran a new bath so my bathing beauty of a boxer could get to the fun as quickly as possible. 

This upset the order of Tank's universe.  My bath-loving boxer would not get in the tub. 

Tank is not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed (bless his heart).  So I assumed his confusion was due to a misfiring of the ol' neurons.  To help the poor guy, I tried saying all the usual things to clue him in that jumping in the tub was okay.

"Get in the tub, Tank!"

"It's okay! Go on in!"

"Time to take a bath!"

It didn't work.  After about 5 minutes of cheerleader-like encouragement with nothing to show for it but a befuddled boxer head tilt, I gave up. I grabbed a towel and moved near the bathroom door to defur myself, and lo and behold--Tank hopped in the tub.  No, he didn't think I was a matador.  He'd just been waiting patiently for me to get over my brain fart and proceed to the door.

It took me a minute to realize that I'd made two boxer bathing-related gaffes. 

1.  In the World According to Tank, a dog must enter the tub before the water goes in. (I was unaware of this particular dog-ma.)

2.  I had also failed to obey the People Must Always Stand By the Door Before I Can Go Through Law. (I'd observed this preference in Tank's door exiting behavior, but was ignorant of the fact that it also applies to tub entrances.)    

So Tank was finally in the tub.  But since I'd stupidly added the water first, he had to suffer through that icky sensory experience of having to step into standing water. He wasn't okay with this. He really wanted to take a bath though, so he compromised by only getting 3 feet wet. The 4th foot stayed cocked and ready like an angry mule's, and it eventually shot out and knocked all 3 of my (open) shampoo bottles off of the side of the tub.

Sigh.

At least the rest of his bath went well.

So well, in fact, that Tank decided to crash my shower later in the week!  All 70-odd pounds of boxer jowls and muscle hopped in the tub with me mid-shampoo.  Try rinsing out your hair with a giant boxer head just south of your tush!  I tried pushing him out of the way so the shampoo wouldn't get in his eyes, but we don't call him Tank for nothin'.  And instead of rescuing this damsel in distress, my husband's reaction was to stand at the door and laugh.

Next time he's totally on dog-bathing duty.