More Millie-isms

Last night I had one of the most heart-wrenching semi-dreams.  As I have described in previous posts, Millie and I cuddled all night every night, but occasionally I would wake up because she had positioned herself with her body perpendicular to mine, typically with her scratchy little back feet pressing into my back.  Just not a comfortable position.  So I would wake up and gently move her body parallel to mine.  She would wake up, roll onto her back with a big snore, and we would snuggle back to sleep.  Now, for those who don't know, I found out I have a weird kind of sleep apnea that only occurs when I sleep on my back, so I sleep with this weird thing strapped to my back to prevent my from rolling onto my back while I sleep.  Last night at some point this thing came loose just enough for me to roll around and wake up with it in just the position Millie would wake me up in, and I genuinely thought for a minute that it was her and went to gently move my sleep apnea thing back into an appropriate spooning position.  Fortunately, when reality sunk in, I just threw the damn thing on the floor and went back to sleep immediately, instead of coming all the way awake to have a good cry.

This all reminded me of my intention to write more about Millie than I've done lately, so here are a few of her silly bits:

Millie-ism #1,108:  What's that tail doing?
Millie hated her tail.  Compared to many pugs, her tail was curled fairly tightly, so it looked quite a bit like I funny cinnamon roll on her back.  Just one of the many features of the breed that are, really, just funny deformities.  As a result, nearly everyone wanted to poke it, wiggle it, unroll it, examine it.  I don't think it hurt her or was really uncomfortable, but it definitely felt strange to her; I'm not sure she realized her tail was part of her own body.  As a puppy she once bit it hard enough to make herself cry out.  Eventually, all you had to say was "Millie, what's that tail doing?" and she would try to whip around to check it out--quite difficult when you are shaped like a burrito--and when she realized there was a weird cinnamon roll sitting on her back, she would make quite a fuss growling and trying to get to it.  At some point I realized that she really did genuinely hate that thing, and I had to make a deal with her that I would never mention it or let other people mess with it.  But she continued to worry when you started to say something about anything that started with a T.  Sometimes I would catch myself saying "Look at this tum--I mean belly."

Millie-ism #429:  I love you so lunch.
Millie was one of those dogs who is really good at picking up words.  Especially words that had anything to do with food (which includes 'Gramma'), or words that sounded like other words that had anything to do with food.  She had a very large vocabulary, although distinctions between words was not her strong suit.  At some point she started to think the word 'much' was 'lunch'.  This was troublesome, as I often felt compelled to say "I love you so much."  I had to train myself to say "I love you so--really a lot."  I think it took me about six months to realize that I can say "I love you so much" to Ruby.  She's not so good with words.