I am what's wrong with kids these days.

It is now time for me to talk about my dog. She is a medium-sized, black, fuzzy mutt who answers to the name "Kaela." I spell it with an "ae" because I could never understand, for the life of me, why people persisted in spelling it name "Kayla," when it is obviously derived from Eastern European names like "Mikaela." It's that standard pop-culture butchery of language, and it's excruciating.

"No, people, 'Hooked on Phonics' does NOT work for me."

But now I've gone from pets to pet peeves. Back to the dog.

I don't have kids, so she's it. She has terrible breath and kind of smells in general; she hasn't had a bath in some time. She doesn't like baths, and I don't like giving her baths. We have an accord. I can't stand looking at her wet, pathetic face staring at me like, "why are you doing this to me?"

She also jumps up on people, sleeps on the furniture, goes in and out of the house approximately 20,000 times a day, demands (and gets) treats for simple tasks like peeing, and basically does whatever she wants. She is a very naughty, very adorable, very happy puppy dog, and I am a sucker for a cute face.

But if I allow a creature as submissive as a dog to run the show, what the hell will happen to me when I have actual human babies to take care of? Consider it notice: A few years down the road, when you're in the supermarket watching some poor woman try to control her horrendously ill-behaved children with cookies and caffiene... that's probably me.